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ERA HOSTS AGM, BASE PRESENTS
NEW MEMBERS JOIN ERA BOARD
TIKTOK OUTLINES ITS AIMS
BASE AWARDS SHORTLIST FINALISED
HIITMAN SCORES AGAIN
DUNE RETURNS AHEAD OF NEW VERSION
THING AIN’T WHAT IT USED TO BE
CARPENTER RANGE ASSEMBLED
SERVANT DELIVERS
INDIAN SUMMER’S DAY
FRANKIE SAYS BUY ME
REAL CRIME REVELATIONS
UP TO OLD TRIX
FACT RAIDS DODGY STREAMERS
QUOTE OF THE WEEK
AT THE MOVIES
TWEET OF THE WEEK
TRAILERS OF THE WEEK
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It’s been a quiet time for industry get-togethers over the past year or two – don’t you know there’s been a pandemic on – but Era held its AGM this week, coupled with activity with BASE, including a look at the state of the industry and more. The event, held at the Everyman in Kings Cross, north London, looked at the health of the entertainment business, as well as the retail landscape and more. We’ll have more on this in next week’s newsletter, with a closer look at elements and BASE’s presentation to retailers and more about the state of the nation as outlined by there two organisations on next week’s newsletter, but in the meantime, ERA ceo Kim Bayleyt pay tribute to the work of retailers and the industry over the past 18 months during the pandemic. She said: “Lockdowns, homeworking, the closure of shops, cinemas and the concert business, the level of disruption has been off-the-scale. But the way you collectively responded more than met the challenge. The response of ERA’s members has been dynamic proof that crisis is the best test of character. Even after 19 years working with you all, I was taken aback by the efforts you made, the mountains you moved, to keep on keeping on. I am enormously proud of you, ERA’s members and the ERA team, who rose to the challenge like never before. Lockdown clearly played a part in the growth of entertainment sales to an all- -time high of £9.3 billion but much of the groundwork for its success had been laid before lockdown. The constant innovation from our streaming services underpinned huge growth in these sectors but high street retail also rose to the challenge, many shops pivoting online almost overnight. Particularly in music where the closure of the live music business devastated the incomes of many artists, your work in keeping the recorded music business going provided a financial lifeline to many. Congratulations to all of you. You can be very proud of what you did.”
The ERA AGM also saw online retailers Rarewaves and The Hut joining the board of ERA, alongside indie Crash Records and ecommerce site Music Glue. Rarewaves will be represented by owner Brad Aspess, an industry stalwart, and The Hut by another familiar face, product director Markhus Bhatia. Crash and Music Glue are represented by owner Scott Gamble and Alex Kennedy respectively. Chief content officer of 7digital Sam Sawyer, Amazon head of music Paul Firth and Spotify UK md Tom Connaughton were reelected to the board for new three-year terms. ERA ceo Kim Bayley said: “With the digital and physical market leaders of virtually every segment of the music, video and games markets, ERA’s membership is more diverse and arguably more representative than it has ever been in our three decade history. There can be very few organisations in which a world-class executive from a global technology platform sits side by side with an owner manager who may only have one or two employees – but that’s ERA. I would like to congratulate everyone who has been elected or re-elected to the board. It is their commitment and expertise which makes ERA such a potent force.”
The ERA AGM heard a keynote speech by TikTok’s UK head of music operations Paul Hourican, one in which he recalled his start in the 12” singles department at the Virgin Megastore in London’s Oxford Street. He highlighted how the app was working with artists and labels and stores and platforms were using it to help push their wares. This included Record Store Day activity. He concluded: “We want our role to grow in the UK music industry and in the markets we’re working in across Europe and beyond. We want to be a good partner, to be value add and contribute to the ecosystem that keeps our business going. From nurturing new talent, supporting established acts, being a home for campaigns, for creativity, to test, to learn and to connect those with a passion for music - whatever that music may be - around the world.” More from the ERA AGM and BASE presentations next week.
Sticking with BASE, the organisation has announced the final raft of nominees for this year’s BASE Awards, with the third shortlists being unveiled for the event, due to take place on November 18 at London’s Roundhouse. These include Physical Retailer of the Year, where the nominees are Amazon, Asda, hmv and Tesco. In Digital Retailer of the Year, the three retailers shortlisted are Amazon, Rakuten and Sky Store. In Retailer/Platform Initiative of the Year, those shortlisted are Asda Movie Night In Campaign from Sky Store, New Release BOGOF from Tesco, Prime Video Cinema from Amazon Prime Video and VIP Movie Night In Campaign through Sky Store. For Campaign of the Year Catalogue Single Product the shortlist includes Back to the Future: The Ultimate Trilogy Collection (Universal), Flash Gordon: 40th Anniversary Edition (Studiocanal), Disney’s Marvel Studios Infinity Saga Collector’s Edition and The Shining: 40th Anniversary Ultimate Collector’s Edition (Warner). Shortlisted in the Campaign of the Year Catalogue Multiple Product are DreamWorks 25th Anniversary Campaign (Universal), Disney’s Epic Collections from Marvel Studios & Star Wars, Universal’s Japanese Artwork Series and Warner’s Titans of Cult Steelbook Range. Finally, the shortlist for the Outstanding Innovation gong are Dogwoof on Demand, Lionsgate Live, The Digital Messaging Playbook from Sony, the Weekly Film Newsletter from Strike Media and Sky Store’s Wonder Woman 1984 Multi-Buy Campaign. BASE chief executive Liz Bales said: “With the full Shortlist now confirmed I would like to congratulate all of this year’s entrants on their incredibly hard work – not only their Awards entries but also for the fabulous achievements seen across the entire category in the past 18 months. The ongoing strength of our industry is thanks to you, and the BASE team and I cannot wait to celebrate together at the Roundhouse in November – book your tickets now and pop the date in your diary!”
Sitting pretty at number one in the Official Film Chart is a title we covered ahead of its release and one we’ve seen being promoted all over social media over the past week or two. The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard has lived up to expectations and star Ryan Reynolds has further enhanced his reputation as home entertainment gold, aided, of course, by the likes of Samuel L Jackson and Salma Hayek. Commenting on its success, Lionsgate’s Katy Machin said: “We’re extremely pleased with the performance of The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard at home entertainment. After the theatrical and PVOD release, to still continue to sell so well and end the week at #1 in the charts is a great achievement. Our very own branded ice cream van was also a great hit with influencers and the public and we gave away over 1500 ice creams! All teams pulled together to collaborate on this title and it really shows in the results!”
Also performing well – it was number six in the previous week’s Official FIlm Chart – and set to continue right through until Denis Villeneuve’s new big screen take on the classic fantasy tome – is Arrow. Video’s latest triumphant 4K set, this time of the original David Lynch take on Dune. Its success was welcomed by Arrow’s Jerome Mazandarani, who told The Raygun: ““It’s incredibly exciting to see that British UHD and Blu-ray collectors are as excited about our 4K restoration projects as we are at Arrow Video. David Lynch’s DUNE storming the UK home video chart again 16 years after the DVD release did so and some 26 years after its original theatrical release is a testament to the passion our hard working team has brought to this project, and it caps off what has been a stellar year so far for Arrow Video with our release of True Romance 4K UHD in July, which topped the UK home video chart for its week of release. Our DUNE UHD and Blu-ray is going to continue to perform very strongly at retail throughout the year as buzz continues to build for the brand new adaptation from Warner Media and director, Dennis Villeneuve.”
It’s a good week for gorgeous-looking releases, and chief among this is a sumptuous 4K UHD set from Universal, which has worked with Studiocanal in a smart bit of cross-distributor activity surrounding noted genre director John Carpenter. For the major’s new set featuring an ultra high definition version of Carpenter’s classic horror The Thing mirrors Studiocanal’s beautiful-looking sets of some of the director’s other acclaimed titles such as They Live, The Fog and Escape From New York from a few years back. Commenting in the strategy, Universal’s head of catalogue and TV marketing John Partridge said: "We were looking for a way to make our The Thing 4k UHD release essential to collectors of John Carpenter films, particularly as Arrow did a pretty definitive Blu-ray edition a few years ago and we did not have any new on-disc bonus. The team were big fans of StudioCanal's John Carpenter releases from a few years back so we reached out to them and asked the question – can we make The Thing the fifth release in that range? They were up for it so we contacted the artist Matt Ferguson who did their artwork, we got the CD soundtrack from Quartet Records and we put the Collector's Edition set together and also a Steelbook - both in the Studiocanal line look. Fan response has been very positive and we think this level of collaboration between studios to make product as appealing to the superfan collector as possible is a great way forward for the market."
It’s also given Studiocanal the opportunity to re-issue ifs Carpenter titles, enabling fans to complete collections and get a set of similarly packed gorgeous Carpenter titles. Studiocanal’s Carys Gaskin said: “We collaborated with Universal on their release of The Thing to ensure the best outcome for the John Carpenter fans out there who already owned our earlier 4K releases of Escape From New York, They Live, The Fog & Prince of Darkness featuring the stunning new artwork from Matt Ferguson. We have some giveaways planned and reprinted our Collector's Editions to coincide with their release which has been a huge success on all fronts, so thank you to Universal for joining forces with us!”
Studiocanal has its own new restoration landing in stores on Monday too, in the shape of Joseph Losey’s classic The Servant, starring James Fox and Dirk Bogarde as the wealthy gentleman and his butler, whose relationship starts shifting as Bogarde increasingly takes over his master’s life. It arrives in the back of a theatrical re-release which saw the film adding to its reputation even further, thanks in no small part to the restoration work, and climaxed in a screening in Chelsea, where much of it was filmed, featuring star Fox being quizzed afterwards by Richard Ayoade. Commenting the release, Studiocanal’s Tara Hutton said: “Having screened at Edinburgh Film Festival in August, this 4K restoration of Joseph Losey's 1960s classic The Servant had its official theatrical opening last Friday and is screening throughout the country. Richard Ayoade (a superfan of the film) hosted a wonderful Q&A for us with his father in law James Fox at Fulham Road Picture House Saturday September 11. The film is looking glorious on the big screen and has received five-star reviews with comments about how Bong Joon Ho cited it as inspiration for Parasite. The three-disc UHD collector's edition, released on Monday, is a thing of great beauty with newly commissioned artwork complete with essays, artcards, brand new interviews and a video essay. A film that every self-respecting cinephile should own!"
Also due on Monday in stores is the latest release from Curzon Artificial Eye. It’s a newly restored version of classic late 1950s US jazz masterpiece Jazz On A Summer’s Day, a live document of the Newport jazz festival featuring some of jazz’s biggest names. Released at cinemas last month as audiences started to return, it’s a feel good special for fans of the genre and one that sits nicely alongside Disney+’s outstanding Summer Of Soul also released this year. Commenting on the release, Curzon Artificial Eye’s Damian Spandley said: “The release of A Jazz On A Summer's Day is the culmination of an exciting new journey for this exquisite restoration of Bert Stern's seminal 1958 music documentary, that included a successful nationwide event release in cinemas in August, at a moment when audiences needed a tonic in difficult times.”
Out on Monday is Cannes favourite Frankie, which boasts an all-star international cast, headed up by Isabelle Huppert and including such various luminaries as Brendan Gleeson and Greg Kinnear. Huppert plays the eponymous French actress who, facing death in a few months’ time, retreats to the beauty of Sintra, Portugal, to see out the rest of her days with family and friends. Comment on the release came from Picturehouse’s Martin Hearn, who said: “It's great to be releasing Frankie on DVD, Blu-ray and Digital this Monday. Ira Sachs is an incredibly talented filmmaker and the film is a visual feast for the eyes. Set against the stunning backdrop of Sintra in Portugal, the film also features some outstanding performances, not least from the legendary Isabelle Huppert who dominates the screen alongside Brendan Gleeson, Marisa Tomei and Greg Kinnear.”
Also in stores is a return to the shelves for long-standing UK independent Revelation, now a production powerhouse too, bringing one of its own titles, The Real Manhunter, to the market after successful martialling it through creation, production and TV transmission. It looks at UK crime through the eyes of expert copper Colin Sutton. Commentary came from the company’s Trevor Drane, who said; “Rarely do we get to hear and see a genuine genius at work in his prime. I was privileged to produce the TV series The Real Manhunter for Sky TV which details ex-Metropolitan Police murder squad SIO/DCI Colin Sutton’s case book. Sutton is rightly regarded as the best detective of his generation and we are releasing two of the feature length episodes from the series as DVD's and on digital, the disc releases include unseen interview segments as extra's. Both these cases were covered in Colin's autobiographical books about them, which have been turned into drama series by ITV with the estimable Martin Clunes playing Colin. In The Real Manhunter viewers get to see how SIO/DCI Colin Sutton caught some of London's most notorious murderers, two of his most infamous cases feature on our releases, Levi Bellfield, The Murders of Amelie De Lagrange, Marsha MacDonald and the attempted murder of Kate Sheedy and The Night Stalker Delroy Grant were amongst the highest profile criminal cases of the century so far and Colin solved them using pure only old school detective work, there were no forensics available from Bellfield’s crime scene's as he was forensically aware, and those that were available in the Grant cases (200 plus elderly victims over 17 years) led investigators further and further away from him due to a catastrophic error involving DNA during the ongoing investigation in 1999, 10 years before Colin took it on. Bellfield was a monster who hated woman, a serial abuser of his wife and previous partners, Grant was likewise, and two aspects of Grant’s defence at trial will take even seasoned true crime viewers’ breath away.”
Monday’s big releases – certainly for fans of The Raygun and editor Tim Murray’s work – come in the shape of a pair of separate Hong Kong titles from 88 Films. Both Robotrix and The Story Of Ricky were early 1990s favourites from the territory, both pushing the boundaries of what was allowed and released as Cat III films – the equivalent of an X certificate for extreme violence and content. Both come in the kind of packaging that 88 Films has made its name on, and both feature lengthy pieces by The Raygun’s very own Tim Murray, one on the Hong Kong cinema boom in the UK in the early 1990s, the other speaking to the man who provided the English language voices for the dubbed version of many HK films such as The Story Of Ricky. The pair presage a welter of further activity from 88 Films. The company’s MD Rich Elliott said "we are delighted to continue our range of successful Hong Kong releases with this latest pair of Category 3 shockers, in the case of Robotrix for the very first time uncut. Following on from the success of Erotic Ghost Story which sold out before release date we anticipate these limited editions won’t be around for too long. Moving into Q4 we are further adding to this range with a beautiful Steelbook of DragonsForever and our own brand newRestoration of the Jackie Chan classic, Armour of God, both of which are already pre-ordering strongly.”
FACT, the Federation Against Copyright Theft, has joined forces with West Midlands police to raid a pirate TV streaming network that in turn provided cheap illegal access to pay TV for more than 100 different unlawful streaming services. The successful operation effectively shut down the operation, disabling the streams and posting a message to consumers – believed to be in the “hundreds of thousands” – telling then the service they were viewing was illegal. A number of suspects were arrested. The service offered up live sports, TV and video from around the world at a fraction of the cost. Detective Sergeant Allan McDonald from the West Midland Polices Economic Crime Unit, said: “Two men aged 53 and 35 and a 40-year-old woman were arrested on suspicion of copyright infringement, fraud and conspiracy to commit fraud. Our joint investigation is ongoing.” Kieron Sharp, CEO of FACT said: “We’re pleased to support West Midlands Police in their work to dismantle such a major network. This should be a serious warning to anyone motivated by the financial gains from engaging with piracy – it is a crime which will be taken seriously by Police. Users and subscribers of illegal services should be aware that not only are they committing an offence themselves, but they’re also exposing themselves to risks including identity theft, malware and viruses. Engaging with piracy in any way is simply not worth the risk.”
QUOTE OF THE WEEK
“The project is meant to be a smaller-scale feature film for Nolan, which in his case, meant a production budget of around $100 million and an equal marketing spend, according to sources. He asked for total creative control, 20 percent of first-dollar gross, and a blackout period from the studio wherein the company would not release another movie three weeks before or three weeks after his release. And he asked for what insiders say was around a 100-day theatrical window. (Some sources have said the number was 110 days, with one person saying it was 130 days.)”
The Hollywood Reporter which broke the story on Christopher Nolan and his next film, which will now be at Universal after the studio agreed these terms… The film is about the father of the nuclear bomb, Robert Oppenheimer…
AT THE MOVIES
There’s an absolute remake frenzy currently going on in Hollywood, the trickle of weekly announcements turning into a veritable flood this week. Chief among them is The Lost Boys, which, after ditching plans to turn it into a TV series, Warner is now eyeing as a new feature film. And among the boys it’s lining up are Noah Jupe from A Quiet Place and Jaeden Martell from It. The TV series had a wide-reaching plan for seven series, which will obviously be cut short by a feature length outing…
More Warner remake news and the same studio is also looking at reviving its 1992 blockbuster The Bodyguard, the Whitney Houston and Kevin Costner vehicle that spawned a massive album and single success for I Will Always Love You. Playwright Matthew Lopez will pen the script…
Oh, and as if that wasn’t enough, the Twins sequel is on the way, as director Ivan Reitman is working on Triplets, which will see Tracey Morgan joining the family of Arnold Schwarzenegger Danny DeVito. Reitman himself said: “Secretly, there was a third baby born, a Black baby, who hasn’t been in touch with his siblings. They don’t know each other and very early in the movie they meet and it’s how they achieve a bond together after all these years. It’s really a film about family and, no matter how different we all are, we have to learn to get along. These guys have great chemistry together, and you can see that in the reel, and how much energy they bring out in each other."
TWEET OF THE WEEK
Follow us on www.twitter.com/theraygun
TRAILERS OF THE WEEK
Spielberg’s forthcoming biggie…
New Del Toro…
I Know What You Did Last Summer… the series…
More Evan…
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