Warner Bows 'The Lake House' Simultaneously on DVD, HD DVD and Blu-ray

Today Warner Home Video announced that they will be releasing 'The Lake House' simultaneously on standard DVD, HD DVD and Blu-ray formats.

With a September 26th street date, Warner will be the first studio to release titles in all formats. They will also be releasing the film as a combo disc, with a high definition DVD on one side and SD DVD on the other side, priced at $39.99. The Blu-ray version will be available for $34.99 SRP. And a standard DVD will cost $28.98. The bonus materials will be available on all versions, though Warner did not disclose if they would be in high definition on the HD DVD and Blue-ray versions.

'The Lake House' is a time-travel romance starring Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock, and is a remake of a recent Korean film. Warner may be banking on the geek appeal of the film’s plot and Keanu Reeve’s Matrix pedigree to appeal to the early adopters who are currently the biggest segment of the high definition player owners.

In theatrical release this past summer, 'The Lake House' took in $52.3 million domestically and $49 million overseas, coming in at #38 for 2006.

Warner Brothers and Nokia Team up for Mobile Content Downloads

Earlier today, Nokia and Warner Brothers announced a deal that will make special Warner Brothers content available for consumer download through the Nokia Content Discoverer client, which is available in millions of Nokia devices worldwide.

The multi-country agreement will create a dedicated Warner Bros. "storefront," embedded in capable phones, from which subscribers to the service can download images, tones, games and video clips. The content selection will include a combination of free and promotional material from Warner’s basket of franchises and recent films, including brands like Looney Tunes and DC Comics and recent films like ‘Superman Returns,’ ‘V for Vendetta,’ and ‘Batman Begins.’

The Nokia service is available on over 40 different Nokia models, which are expected to reach over 20 million consumers worldwide by the end of 2006.

Guba Movie Download Pricing Experiment Boosts Sales 1000%

Guba, the online video sharing site, today announced that their month long price reduction experiment yielded a 1000% increase in sales and a doubling of their site traffic.

For the last 30 days, Guba has offered new release movies priced at $9.99, catalog titles at $4.99 and TV episodes for 49 cents, though the offerings cannot be burned to a DVD. These prices are at a substantial discount to the current pricing structure at Amazon's Unbox service ($14.99 and up for new releases, $9.99 and up for catalog titles) and the forthcoming Apple download store, which is likely to bow new release movie downloads at around $15 dollars.

Guba currently has deals with Sony Pictures and Warner Brothers, offering 500 and 200 titles from each library, respectively. In all likelihood, Guba is serving as a low-risk pricing test bed due to its lower profile and smaller user base, which is probably enough to keep Wal-Mart from getting nervous. As of late, the mega-retailer has been annoyed at the prospect of downloads being priced below their DVD wholesale pricing of $17 for new releases, and has used their muscle to influence online pricing moves.

So what is the optimal download price for a burnable, DRM-managed feature-length movie? Take the poll below to give us your opinion.

New CBS Series 'Smith' Finds Ad Partner with Warner's 'The Departed'

According to Zap2it, CBS has partnered with Warner Brothers for the premiere of the new crime drama ‘Smith.’ The pilot will be solely sponsored by the upcoming Scorsese film The Departed, with “limited commercial interruptions.”

The Warner Brothers sponsorship of the ‘Smith’ pilot takes care of a tricky scheduling dilemma faced by CBS. With the premiere running over an hour before commercial breaks, CBS would have had to trim down the episode, limit commercials, or run an extended premiere.

'The Departed,' a hard-boiled crime drama in the vein of Scorsese’s past work, is a natural fit for 'Smith.' The series also stars Ray Liotta, who had his big breakout role in the Scorsese classic Mafia hit 'Goodfellas.'

‘The Departed’ features an ensemble cast including Leonardo DiCaprio, Jack Nicholson, Matt Damon and Martin Sheen, among others, and will premiere in theaters on October 6th.

Warner Independent Releases First 24 Minutes of 'A Scanner Darkly' on IGN

Warner Independent Pictures has made the first 24 minutes of 'A Scanner Darkly' available as an online exclusive at IGN FilmForce. You can watch the extended preview, - nearly the first quarter of the film - at this link.

While the studios have been releasing clips under ten minutes on a fairly regular basis, this is without a doubt the longest preview released by a studio or specialty division to date. This shrewd marketing move is undoubtedly meant to drum up interest preceding the film's expansion onto 190 screens this weekend, up from 17 during the opening weekend. In its first weekend of limited release, 'A Scanner Darkly' earned over $392K, averaging just over $23K per screen.

De Beers to counter `The Blood Diamond`

The De Beers Group, the Johannesburg-based diamond mining and trading company, has announced plans to spend $15 million dollars to counter any potential bad press from the release of 'The Blood Diamond,' the Mining Journal reports.

Slated for a January 2007 release, the Warner Brothers film stars Leonardo DiCaprio as a man involved in a diamond smuggling ring. According to reports, the film depicts the exploitation of diamond miners in Sierra Leone and the plot implies that "conflict diamonds," or diamonds used to fund the ongoing civil wars in Africa, are still prevalent. This contradicts the stance in the Diamond Industry that the problem has been eliminated. However, with the promotion of the film beginning during the holiday season, the $15 million will go towards an education campaign touting "conflict free diamonds" in TV, print and online channels in an attempt to counter a public backlash.

[link]

General Mills to Give away free Movielink Downloads

General Mills will be giving away coupons for free Movielink downloads as cereal box promotions, according to the Minneapolis-St. Paul Business Journal. The $5 coupons will be in specially marked boxes of Honey Nut Cheerios, Lucky Charms, Cinnamon Toast Crunch and Golden Grahams, among others. The code will allow the customer to rent a digital version of the movie of their choice for 30 days, according the the article.

A joint venture of Paramount, Sony, Universal Studios and Warner Bros., Movielink's content is made up of the partnering companies' catalog titles, and they also have non-exclusive distribution agreements with Disney including Miramax) Lions Gate and others.

After many years of being the official "idea before its time," Movielink's time may have finally arrived. And with consumer acceptance of digital downloads quickly coming to a head, they really need to think about building their brand. Partnering with General Mills gives them the broad exposure outside of their core audience, which until now has probably been tech savvy early adopters. Movielink coupons in boxes of sugar cereals will help them reach teens -- the most voracious of digital content consumers.

Wrap-up: Movie Marketing and the Star Power Conference

Brandweek has a nice wrap-up on last week's Star Power Conference. For those of you not in the know, the conference, hosted by the Promotion Marketing Association, helps studio marketing execs meet-up with potential marketing partners. Some key points include:

1. Mobile marketing to reach the 18-34 segment -- as we all know, reaching this market has become increasingly difficult with the fractured ad landscape. Companies like Fox and Warner Bros. have been using mobile marketing to reach this market with some success, but the main caveat is that the telecoms are still trying to figure out their business models.
2. Shrinking DVD windows -- This has been a hot-button issue as of late, and the studios have been shuffling around their marketing teams to optimize joint efforts.
3. Product placement overkill -- to better optimize efforts, companies like Universal are setting caps on promotional partners for titles, especially after the 'Cat in the Hat' promotional partner overkill in 2003.

[Via Brandweek]

Warner Brothers promotes 'Batman Begins' with Yahoo Takeover Ads

Warner Brothers has purchased massive takeover ads on the Yahoo homepage, which includes heavy flash animated bats and sound effects. If anyone else spots a major 'Batman Begins' online ad buy, post where you saw it as a comment.


[Thanks to Adrants]

NY Post Distributes Free 'Batman Begins' Comic Book

Fast Company alerted us to another Batman Begins promo and giveaway -- basically, the New York Post is giving away free copies of a special 'Batman' comic book with each newspaper. As Warner Bros. parent company Time Warner owns D.C. Comics, this isn't surprising. Fast Company notes that there's a saturation level of outdoor advertising on the streets of Gotham, and we're battening down the hatches for the maelstrom of 'Batman Begins' TV ads this week.

Seems that the MSM has pegged Batman as the last hope for a decent theatrical take at the box office this season. If the early reviews are any indication, that won't be a problem.

[Via Fast Company Now]

Breaking News: Warner Brothers Preempts Chinese DVD Pirates

According to the Los Angeles Times, Warner Brothers released 'The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants' on DVD in China the same day it appeared in North American theaters:

...several industry executives said they believed it was the first time a major U.S. studio had taken a movie scheduled for a wide-scale theatrical run and released it simultaneously on DVD in another country.
"It's a necessary move," said movie industry analyst Tom Adams of Adams Media Research. "It's obviously not as good as having control of the Chinese market, but it's about the next best thing that you can do."

The move comes during a recent debate over DVD release windows here in the United States. Another recent experiment in the Chinese market, which is widely known as a bootleggers paradise, included Sony's svelte 45-day release window for 'Kung Fu Hustle', which resulted in an impressive 2 million copies sold.


[Via the Los Angeles Times]

James Dean Festival a Marketing Flop for Warner Brothers

Originally anticipating up to 100,000 visitors per day, the James Dean Festival should have been a coup for the Warner Brothers marketing team. The reality is a much bleaker picture: preliminary attendance figures show only 6,000 showing up over three days. This poor attendance, combined with losses stemming from damages incurred during severe weather, have cost Warner Brothers a good sum for what was probably the most expensive DVD release party on record:

Warner Bros. Studios lost an estimated $75,000 on the festival, said Brian Jamieson, the studio's vice president of worldwide marketing and international projects.

He said Rocco Productions, which the studio hired to promote and produce the three-day festival, lost at least $1 million - and possibly as much as $1.3 million - on the festival.

Warner Bros. paid to bring in a 100-foot-wide movie screen and high-tech digital projection equipment to show Dean's three motion pictures, Jamieson said.

That $75,000 figure is probably way off. It's hard to tell from the article, but our guess is that Warner Bros. may have some sort of contractual obligation to share in Rocco Production's losses, making this one costly promotional event if that's the case.


[Via the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette]

Studios Clamoring For Trailer Slots in Front of 'Star Wars: Episode III'

According to the Los Angeles Times, the highly-anticipated 'Star Wars: Episode III Revenge of the Sith' is bowing in 3,700 theaters, and movie marketing executives are jockeying for coveted trailer slots. Further exacerbating the demand is Lucas' demand that no more than five trailers bow before his feature. Given how lackluster the box office has been so far this year, many films are banking on this added push to help get butts in seats:

Others in the mix, according to another studio: New Line's 'Wedding Crashers,' DreamWorks' 'The Island,' Universal's 'Cinderella Man' and Warner Bros.' 'Batman Begins.' And some studios are also sending trailers for other films directly to exhibitors in hopes of screening with 'Revenge of the Sith.' Sony, for example, is distributing a new "teaser" trailer for 'The Da Vinci Code,' even though the movie doesn't come out for a year

The article mentions that the only film guaranteed placement is 'The Fantastic Four.' Of all of these films, the films that probably need the marketing boost most are New Line's 'Wedding Crashers,' and Universal's 'Cinderella Man.'


[Via the Los Angeles Times]

Reaction Negative to Paris Hilton's 'House of Wax' Promo Podcast

If the comments surrounding Paris Hilton's promotional podcasts for 'House of Wax' are any indicator, Warner Brothers' experiment with the format has been poorly received by members of the podcasting community.

According to the message boards on Podcast Alley, a leading source for podcasting shows and info, people are finding the rambling musings of Paris as she wanders around as "boring celeb-spam." Here's an example from one post written yesterday:

I started listening to podcasts in January, and I gotta say that, after hearing the first Paris Hilton "podcast", I am really impressed with how fast the whole thing appears to be going right down the tubes...The Paris Hilton "podcast" is exactly the kind of drivel that drove people to take broadcast content into their own hands in the first place. *This* is what the podcasting community should boycott, and if it is on Podcast Alley only because of the cash involved, P.A. is in real trouble..."

Backlash from insiders is one thing, but are these podcasts going to get anyone interested in the film? After having listened to the show, my verdict is a resounding no. The production values are embarrassing, Paris' unfettered ennui is tiresome, and the grating theme had me reaching for the mute button on my keyboard.

So what have we learned from this experiment?

1. Poor production values -- If you're going to do a commercial podcast, do it right. Hire professionals to record, edit and mix the audio.

2. Boring content -- They should have structured the content to complement the film and build interest in it. We're not talking hiring a crack team of writers or anything -- but even a little bit of structure would have been nice.

3. Wrong audience for the film's demographics -- podcasting is still in it's infancy, and is largely a tech-savvy audience catering to hip, literate men and women in their mid to late twenties. Paris Hilton, awash in disinterest and perpetually disengaged, is about the worst person you could pick to reach out to these people.

So what kind of film would have benefited from a podcast? I can think of two:

Seems like big-budget sci-fi fans are the perfect demo to consume podcasts -- for example, imagine how popular one for the upcoming 'War of the Worlds' film could be, especially if it was a 2005 version of the famed Orson Welles broadcast...

Or maybe a studio could use a podcast to cheaply add web value to a preexisting franchise -- think "Shrek" or "Napoleon Dynamite". Perhaps you could have Napoleon run a fictional Idaho radio station, playing his "flippin' sweet" tunes...

These are just off-the-cuff examples, but I can see something in line with these ideas having a greater impact and the potential for a "viral effect."

You can catch the first two 'House of Wax' podcasts here.

[Via Always On]

Warner Bros. to promo 'Batman Begins' during 'Smallville' Finale

According to Brand Republic, Warner Brothers will promote the upcoming release of 'Batman Begins' during the season finale of the hit series Smallville.

The finale, which will air on May 18th, will be showing an exclusive clip at some point during the show:

The eight minutes of footage will air within the 90-minute season finale of 'Smallville'. The two [Batman and Superman] have always been linked in comic book fiction and bringing the Man of Steel and the Dark Knight together is designed to further explore the relationship on the screen of two most popular superheroes in the history of American pop culture.

We've seen the broadcast of exclusive clips become an integral part of the movie marketing process over the past year, but none have been so topically on the mark as this one.

Batman begins is due out in theaters on June 17th.


[Via Brand Republic]

A closer look at the MGM/Sony/Time Warner Triangle

According to Variety, the negotiations between MGM and Sony have hit a roadblock. The much simpler and tax-efficient Time Warner offer could win out.

With all of the buzz going on about this lately, I thought it would be interesting to backtrack and provide a "Q&A" of sorts. After all, understanding the financial value of a film property/library and the implications when a company purchases one can help put individual title marketing into perspective.

By the way -- if you have a Q&A you'd like to add (serious and funny accepted), put it in the comments, and I'll update the list.

Why is MGM a target for acquisition?
In the golden age of DVD, content is king, and MGM has a 4,000 plus title library. Current valuations (depending on if you're buying or selling it) range from $3.8 to 5.5 billion dollars. Here's a link that's a must read as a backgrounder on MGM's value to a potential buyer.

How do you value a film library?
Film Library Valuation typically uses an "income approach" -- that is, based on historical revenue from each title, you make a determination of expected future revenue from all streams (Video, DVD, TV sales and VOD). For titles without any historical data, a weighted average is used to compare similar films. Next, a "decay rate" is used to determine the annual decline in value of the asset.

After this, you add up all future revenues, and deduct contribution margins (Contribution margin is sales revenue less variable costs) and taxes. You discount this future cash flow to present value, and bam -- the magic number.

Many details are missing for simplicity's sake, and I'm not an accountant, so lemme know if I'm way off base here.

What's The Basis for Time Warner's dispute over MGM's valuation of around $5 billion?
My guess is that TW has a problem with two things: MGM's decay rates (they are probably rosy about the long-term DVD growth prospects) and the income stream projections for lower-quality titles (MGM has 200-300 "major" titles that drive up the library's average per-title performance).

What will happen to the MGM brand?
Despite the company's reduced output of new films in recent years, MGM has one of the highest brand-recognition factors of any major studio. Whoever purchases the company, expect to see an effort to leverage the brand (TV channel? Consumer Products? Print?) -- especially if purchased by a diversified media company like Time Warner.

Since Time Warner (or Sony, if they come up on top) already has a well-oiled distribution arm, what will happen to the staff at MGM?
The reality, unfortunately, is that we can expect massive lay-offs. There have been reports (unsubstantiated rumors, actually), that Time Warner may divest the distribution and marketing arm of MGM. Potential buyers could include someone like Steve Jobs (Pixar) or Harvey Weinstein, both of whom are at odds with Disney. Both men would very like have the access to capital necessary for a deal of that scope.

Related Links:
MGM
Time Warner
Buying Universal puts GE in the movie business
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