VSDA - Thursday


	VSDA ‘99 - Thursday, July 8


	The first of the VSDA show days is over and it is already clear that this show is considerably slower than last year’s. Some of the major studios are completely missing from the exhibition floor and the visitor number also seems drastically lower than at last year’s convention in Las Vegas. While this may seem a bad thing at first, on the upside it gives us a better chance to meet the people we want to see and to spend some time chatting with them.


	ELITE ENTERTAINMENT After making a complete round through the exhibit hall to get a general feel for the show, we started today’s meetings with Vini Bancalari from Elite Entertainment, a company that brings us some of the finest horror DVDs as many of you certainly know - although quite sporadically. During our conversation, Vini gave us good overview over the titles Elite is planning to release in the next months. Here’s a long list of titles that will have horror fans salivating... Expect Tower Of Evil, Horror Hospital, Don’t Mess With My Sister, Mutant, House On Sorority Row, a double feature of Roger Corman’s Bucket Of Blood and Attack Of The Giant Leeches on one disc, The Brain That Wouldn’t Die, The Slime People, Castle Of Blood, The Night Evelyn Came Out Of The Grave, Kiss Of The Tarantula, Last Man On Earth, Gian Gila Monster, Vampire Bat in its uncut 72 min. Version, The Screaming Skull, I Eat Your Skin, Mario Bava’s Black Sabbath, The Ape - from a rare 35mm safety print - Werewolf vs. The Vampire Women, The Wasp Woman, Night Of The Blood Beast and Mario Bava’s Kill Baby Kill. Elite is also working on a DVD-Triple Feature called Masterworks Of The German Cinema, containing the 1959 version of Nosferatu, the 1920 silent film Der Golem and The Cabinet Of Dr. Caligary. We will fill in all the details for these titles in the coming months.

IMAGE ENTERTAINMENT
Image has almost completely switched to DVD these days and hardly anything reminds visitors to the booth of the former glory of the format that was mostly proposed through Image. Garrett Lee was there to welcome us with a big smile and told us a little about the company’s future plans. For someone who was literally a “living” Laserdisc, Garrett has undergone a phenomenal metamorphosis to one of the most infectious DVD lovers we know.
The most exciting news from Image is certainly that they just licensed the entire Wade Williams Film Collection, which consists of some 90-120 films. Containing many of the early B-horror movies and other classic films, the collection also gives Image access to all of Ed Wood’s films, including Glen Or Glenda and Plan 9 From Outer Space. This library will further help bolster up Image’s impressive film output on DVD in the months to come.
We have also asked Garrett about their packaging, hoping that a



		The Image crew at work... executive posing

switch form their cardboard Snappercases to Amaray would be in sight, but still there is not much movement in sight. The company has however evaluated options to switch to Amaray cases. Given their current production lines however, a switch to Amaray cases is prohibited by a number of factors. Nevertheless it is an issue on Image’s agenda and whenever circumstances allow they will switch to different cases.
While sticking around the Image booth, we ran into fellow webmaster Bill Hunt from “The Digital Bits”, and soon all of us were entangled in a good conversation.


	FULL MOON PICTURES DVD is becoming more of an issue with independent filmmaker Full Moon as well - as with literally everyone else. To promote one of their upcoming titles, “Zorita”, the company had Shauna O’Brien there to sign autographs for show attendees and to chat with them. We have been able to grab an extra autograph for one of our lucky readers, which we will give away in a cool contest after the show. In the afternoon vampire princess Denise Duff was back, but unfortunately we did not have the chance to catch up with the star of the “Subspecies” series this year.

		Shauna O’Brien, star of Full Moon’s upcoming “Zorita”

PARAMOUNT HOME VIDEO
At the Paramount booth a pleasant and a not so pleasant surprise was awaiting us. Paramount Home Video has finally hired a dedicated DVD PR person and fortunately it was a familiar face. So far Paramount has always been very elusive and information was hard to come by. All that should change with the company’s change in perspective and the flow of communication will hopefully pick up. On to the bad news. There have been rumors floating around the Internet for some time now that Paramount was preparing the Indiana Jones Trilogy for release on DVD this fall, but sadly this rumor turns out to be untrue. While Paramount had been working on a home video release of Indiana Jones, it was a special VHS release that is coming later this year, with no DVD in sight. On the good side however, Paramount has just confirmed the

release on numerous Star Trek and Star Trek: The Next Generation episodes on DVD. To be precise, on August 17, Star Trek The Original Series Volume 1 and 2 will hit the streets, including the following episodes Where No Man Has Boldly Gone Before (Episode #2), The Carbomite Maneuver (Episode #3), Mudd’s Women (Episode #4) and The Enemy Within (Episode #5). The discs will feature 5.1 Dolby Digital soundtracks and contain special bonus features and the original trailers.
The reason why the upcoming Titanic release will not be the expected special edition but a bare-bones version of the film has

	obviously to do with the fact that director James Cameron himself wants to get involved in that particular project and did not have the time to work on it. Since Paramount did not want to delay the release any further, they decided to release the film now. Why that release is not 16x9 enhanced is still a riddle though. Some new title announcements from Paramount includes a day&date release of their comedy The Out Of Towners starring Steve Martin and Goldie Hawn, Breakfast At Tiffany’s and Barefoot In The Park on September 21 for $29.99 and all of them will be 16x9 enhanced. While visiting Paramount’s booth Peter Bracke, webmaster of the “DVD File” also stopped by for a nice chat.

	This is a showcase at Paramount’s booth to present the film’s DVD


	20^TH CENTURY FOX HOME ENTERTAINMENT After that we had an extensive meeting with one of Fox’s representatives in one of their suites. Fox is not having a booth on the expo floor but instead welcomes visitors in their separate meeting rooms. It was a very nice and informative meeting shedding some light on Fox’s take on the DVD market. The biggest thing seems to be that Fox is not yet seeing DVD as the future standard in home video. Hence they do not put all their focus and energy on the format yet and still evaluate other options, such as digital VHS. Once that hurdle is taken we will certainly see a much stronger DVD commitment from this particular studio, because there can be no doubt in our personal minds that DVD IS the home video format of the future, so once again it only becomes a matter of time. Fox is committed to making the releases they are working on as good as they can. Although speculations have had it lately Fox had dropped all their 16x9 enhancements this is definitely not an enforced company policy. 16x9 enhancement is still decided upon on a case-by-case basis and the currently scheduled titles happen to fall in the non-anamorphic category. Whenever budgets allow it and whenever the film lends itself to it, we will still see 16x9 enhanced DVDs from Fox in the future. The Abyss is still in their pipeline - somewhere - and scheduled for a release on DVD sometime, but just as in “Titanic’s” case, “The Abyss” needs James Cameron’s attention and because he currently doesn’t have enough time to work on the project it has been postponed. No plans have been made at this point to release the DIVX-only titles like Tim Burton’s “Ed Wood” to DVD in the near future. [Editor: However with the recent demise of DIVX this could be re-evaluated literally at anytime.] Although we had wished we could bring you some news on Star Wars on DVD, there is not a single word to be had from anyone at Fox. Their lips are sealed on that subject. Some of the new title announcements from Fox Home Video include the horror film Ravenous, day & date with VHS on September 21, Kathryn Bigelow’s Strange Days on September 7, Office Space on August 31 and Simply Irresistible on August 17.

ANCHOR BAY ENTERTAINMENT
Once the show closed Anchor Bay hosted selected guests to a cocktail party in the Wilshire Grand Hotel in the heart of Los Angeles. And what a party that was! Imagine this... you’re at a party sipping on a beer, chatting away with Bruce Campbell about his current book project, talking to Linda Blair and stars from the original Halloween movie, and having an exciting conversation with German director Werner Herzog about the upcoming DVD release of his powerful film “Fitzcarraldo”. Anchor Bay created an atmosphere that mingled guests with celebrities, filmmakers with other filmmakers, taking down all the barriers. It was a star-studded event with a very personal note and for a small group of less than 150 guests. And still, it was impossible to keep track of all the directors, producers, actors and actresses at the same time. It was great wind-down from the long day at the show. Tomorrow we will catch up with them an some more serious matters and check out what they have in the making. Of course we will tell you all about it,



	A very approachable Bruce Campbell, star of the “Evil Dead” films, talks to some guests

so make sure to check back tomorrow. Until then, take a look at these pictures and you will get the idea of the finest party of the show so far.



		Linda Blair... and that’s not a possessed smile


		Bruce Campbell... which smile would you want?



	Irwin Yablans, Peter Barton, Kevin Brophy, Linda Blair, Tom De Simone and Bruce Cohn Curtis - the “Hell Night” team


		Bill Lustig talking about the “Halloween” special edition


		An icon of German cinema. Director Werner Herzog and Anchor Bay’s Jay Douglas


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