Miramax = Rip

[s52e368]

http://www.empireonline.com/news/feed.asp?NID=26861

RIP Miramax
Disney shuts down the arthouse studio


It sprang to life in 1979 as the brainchild of bullish movie producers Harvey and Bob Weinstein, and was named after their parents, but after a slow death from thousands of cuts, Miramax was officially closed today by Disney.

During its early years, the Weinsteins scrappily kept the ship afloat, shoved boundaries and helped bring the world the likes of Sex, Lies And Videotape, Clerks, The Piano, Reservoir Dogs, The Crying Game and The English Patient.

Rumours of the Weinsteins' bullying tactics and hard demeanor were rife, but they certainly seemed to have a keen eye for talent and an understanding of how to channel that into success.

Though it was bought for $70 million by Disney in 1993, the brothers continued to run Miramax with an enviable level of creative control, and pushed their already legendary Oscar-hunting style to new heights with the expanded funding offered by the Mouse House. Among the successes as winners or nominees were Shakespeare In Love, Chicago and The Talented Mr Ripley.

 

[j_garcia]

Picturehouse is going away also, or is being rolled up in to Paramount (?).

It sucks, but that's the industry today.

 

[BoredSysAdmin]

I hope Kevin Smith will find a new studio and producers

 

[Seth=L]

I hope Kevin Smith will find a new studio and producers

I thought he was working with Warner's Newline already anyway? I might have been seeing things again.

 

[BoredSysAdmin]

I thought he was working with Warner's Newline already anyway? I might have been seeing things again.

yea, looks like Zack and miri was his last Weinstein flick.
Cop out is WB production.

 

[jostenmeat]

Wow, I had to scan their filmography, and boy they were involved with many excellent films!

The posters in the OP's link probably won't talk about the first thing I think of, and that is that Miramax has produced some of the finest live action movie transfers to bluray that I have seen, including Kill Bill 1/2, and No Country for Old Men. I guess I am supposed to thank Disney? Oh, scanning some of their list, I see that Gangs of NY is on there, and that was supposed to be a DNR travesty, IIRC. Hmm, well . . .

 

[j_garcia]

A remastered edition of Gangs of New York came out this month. Not sure I would have bothered. It was an average movie at best.

 

[jostenmeat]

A remastered edition of Gangs of New York came out this month.

Sadly, my hopes are still low. Scorcese films have a pretty bad reputation for PQ. In fact, I would say the worst reputation for any of the well known directors. I don't know why that is. I might have seen this title in its entirety, only by chunks. I think I watched the end before the beginning, heh.

I did recently order Aviator because it was $7.99, and I still can't get over Cate Blanchett's total metamorphosis into Katherine Hepburn. My aeronautical engineer friend, however, cringes at some of the inaccuracies, but that's a given with anything involving flight with him, heh.

 

[j_garcia]

Aviator was good, and that's a great price from Amazon.

*I just saw the list Gangs comes out tomorrow.

 

[jostenmeat]

Aviator was good, and that's a great price from Amazon.

Cool, if you say it's a good price, then I'm sure it is. I stick with the zon for a couple of obvious reasons, and I just can't be bothered to drive to Fry's and window shop, etc.

Three days ago, I submitted an Amazon bluray thread sale to the Deals section, but it never got posted. Here is part of it:

michael clayton 9.99
machinist 12.99
2001 7.99
unforgiven 8.99
true romance 7.99
Aviator 7.99
phantom of the opera 9.49
perfect storm 7.99
traitor 8.99
raging bull 8.99
dark city 7.98
wyatt earp 7.99
la confidential 11.99
kill bill 2 16.49
benjamin button criterion 16.99

Perfect Storm is said to be horrible, but I listed it anyways. Of what I have seen from the above, the last two look the best by far, but of course they are twice the price. I particularly enjoyed Michael Clayton for the acting and story, but the PQ is average.

 

[j_garcia]

Dark City and True Romance are the other smoking deals there

 

[zhimbo]

Dark City and True Romances are the other smoking deals there

Yeah, holy crap - I'm glad to see the Director's Cut of Dark City is now the standard release. Only studio executives with coke-rotted brains would think it was a good idea to give a spoiler voice-over in the opening minutes of a film.

 

[j_garcia]

Miramax sold by Disney: http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=4936