In what is frankly a head-scratching display of skewed reasoning, Sony has said today that it will not promote the sleeper hit Moon (starring Sam Rockwell) for an Oscar award because the movie does not come out on DVD in the U.S. until later this month and the company does not want to have screeners leaked to the Internet.
Last week, director Duncan Jones tweeted his displeasure at Sony’s decision to not send screeners out, citing the fact that Moon had been successful (awards-wise) in many other smaller awards shows. You can view his tweets here.
Sony’s response (via MovieLine): “The DVD and Blu-ray come out on Jan. 12 — next Tuesday — and it was felt that to preserve the integrity of the film, we didn’t want to send screeners. We’re concerned about piracy. The thing about Moon is that its particular genre is very predisposed toward being uploaded onto the Web. We really just wanted to protect that aspect of it. I’’s a simple as that. […] A lot of publicity for Moon is coming out next week. Hopefully that will remind all the consumers, all the readers — and especially any awards folks — that this terrific title is out there.”
That is all good and well Sony, however, it is notable for me to publish that DVD copies of Moon have been available online since late October, and Blu-ray copies have been available since November.
Result for: displeasure
In what can equate to an “I told you so”, director Michael Bay has spoken out again about Blu-ray and its recent “victories” over the rival HD DVD format.
Earlier this week, both Netflix and Best Buy seemingly chose Blu-ray as their HD format of choice although Best Buy said it will continue to stock both. Bay, taking the time to knock HD DVD had this to say at the Visual Effects Society’s sixth annual award show, “Blu-ray’s better, and I told everyone … I was very vocal about it. I knew HD [DVD] was not going to make it.”
Ironically, despite his support for Blu-ray, his best selling HD Title is far and away Transformers which is available on HD DVD.
“Am I thrilled? It really wasn’t my fight, but remember what I said in the press? I was kind of saying HD [DVD]’s going to lose,” he added. “No one believed me.”
Despite the fact that both formats support the same video and audio codecs and each have excellent interactive layers, Bay says he simply prefers the way his movies appear on Blu-ray Discs. “It’s just sharper,” Bay added. “It’s just [that] the tools are better. I just think it’s closer to what it should look like.”
This is not the first time Bay has talked about his preference for Blu-ray. He first voiced his displeasure with HD DVD when Paramount decided to go HD DVD-exclusive, and taking Transformers with it. Bay even went as far as to say that he would not come back to direct Transformers 2 as a boycott to the decision.
“I want people to see my movies in the best formats possible. For them to deny people who have Blu-ray sucks! They were Progressive by having two formats. No Transformers 2 for me,” said Bay back then.
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Result for: displeasure
Although it has previously disclosed it displeasure with the fact that broadcasters have been making their shows available on the Internet for free, it seems the company is doing an about-face on the matter and is looking to gain market share.
Time Warner has announced that it will be releasing a wireless modem device that “will make streaming internet video content on one’s TV much easier.” The wireless modem will supposedly link all the devices in a person’s home.
There was no timeframe for the device’s release but the company did say it would probably be 15 months or so until it became popular.
Time Warner would have to compete in the steadily growing market for set top boxes, which is now led by Apple and Netflix.
We will keep you updated.
