The secret Blu-rays you may not know about

The practice of releasing movies on Blu-ray format exclusively to one retail chain or another appears to be gathering steam. Highdefdigest reports copies of The Green Mile on Blu-ray magically appeared on Best Buy store shelves this week, without so much as a peep of promotion from distributor Warner Bros.

 The studio took the same approach a couple of weeks ago when it quietly released Gremlins on Blu-ray, which you can't buy on Amazon or anywhere else online, but you can pick up right now at a Target near you. Same goes for the no-frills Blu-ray release of The Wizard of Oz: If you want the movie but don't feel like shelling out $85 for a mammoth box packed with Oz tchotchkes, you can buy a Blu-ray of the movie by itself for $35 at Target.

When Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen hits Blu-ray next week, the only way to watch the cut of the film created for IMAX (featuring a few extra scenes and some "opened-up" sequences in IMAX format, a la The Dark Knight) will be to buy the disc at Wal-Mart. Every other version of the Blu-ray will present the film in its standard theatrical cut.

I understand these exclusive deals with retailers are probably pretty lucrative for the studios. But when you're trying to make a niche format break through to the mainstream, doesn't it make more sense to make all your titles available everywhere, so people can buy them wherever and whenever they want? 

Comments

[Adrian Ruhi]

I bought the target 3 disc Oz blu because I didn't want the extra crap.
Walmart even has a 1 disc Oz blu for $20.

[Erwin]

Rene, I'm trying to find an entry you posted a long time ago about a website that dealt with filmmaking in Florida. Do you remember the address?

[Rene Rodriguez]

I can't find the old post, but this was the website:

http://www.filmiami.org/

[Justin]

Aren't some of these exclusives going to be available everywhere after a certain amount of time? I know I read somewhere that Goonies and something else was going to be exclusive to Target (I think) but only for a finite amount of time.

Of course, things like the Transformers 2 disc will probably remain exclusive but I'm not so sure about everything else.

[Juan]

This is an extremely stupid trend. I can understand stores offering exclusives WITH the movie at thier stores, but having the movie itself BE the exclusive? That doesn't make any sense. Why limit the stores a movie is sold? Why make your customers go through a hassle to buy a movie on a new format? This is stupid on every level.

Oh and they can keep Transformers 2. If i see that movie again, my brain will melt out of my ears.