Goliath wrote:Escapay wrote:However, given that the films weren't exactly big hits, by 2002's Lilo & Stitch, Disney elected to hold off on the two-disc set and chose to make it single-disc (they even allowed Chris Sanders to re-edit the two-hour documentary into the 20-minute featurette that's on the single-disc).
Which makes no sense at all, since they did release a 2-disc version in Region 2.
That's Disney for you. After all, they also said Platinums were limited to the 10 bestselling titles, would go out of print the year after they were introduced, and would be vaulted for ten years.
Now, the number swelled to 14, then to 15, the schedule got shuffled around a few times, vault time got shortened to seven years, and overall they seem less special than they used to be.
Goliath wrote:So they already had all the bonus features ready. It's not like they weren't made yet and it would have cost them a lot of money to make them for Region 1. They were already finished, yet they only released it in Region 2...
IIRC, Disney felt the sales potential of a single release would be better than a dual release of a single-disc and a two-disc. Plus, the DVD came in December, so it was expected to get high sales (which would have given them all the more reason to release the two-disc, but Disney is stupid).
I don't know exactly how BVHE feels about international sales and why they felt the two-disc could get a release everywhere else except R1. Perhaps netty or ichabod can shed some light on that.
Goliath wrote:Escapay wrote:And since it was an evergreen that is highly-regarded (but apparently not regarded highly enough), it was a single-disc set.
This I don't get. *If* it is a highly-regarded evergreen, then why not give it a 2-disc treatment? Giving it a 1-disc *because* it is highly regarded makes no sense to me whatsoever.
The way I see it is this: because it's that well-regarded, it will sell well no matter what's on it (however much or little there is). Because whether we like it or not, Disney is not catering solely to animation enthusiasts with their DVD releases. They are for everyone. A parent can buy
Dumbo on DVD with little to no regard for the special features because they want to introduce their kid to the movie. And an animation enthusiast (be it a veteran one or someone who's just discovering it) will pick up the title regardless. So every 6-7 years, Disney will trot out
Dumbo and it will still sell well because there will always be people who'll be willing to buy it, even if there's a minority that'll say "Hey, why bother releasing it now, it has a good DVD already! If you're going to re-release it, add some more bonus features!".
This is, after all, the DVD generation, where everyone and their brother can now become film collectors, movie historians, etc. all because of the special features that DVD offers in commentaries and documentaries. So now the home video market has to find bigger incentives to get people to rebuy a movie. Unfortunately, in the first 10 years of DVD's life, it's made companies go somewhat bonkers on re-releases. Did Anchor Bay really need to re-issue
Army of Darkness five hundred times with the disc content rarely changing but the packaging getting a makeover like twice a year? And how many editions of
The Princess Bride does someone really need in their collection. With Disney, some of their double-dips/upgrades are worth it for both technical and supplemental reasons. But lately they've been low-key on supplements for re-releases, even if it's a highly-regarded title like
Dumbo. They could easily have added it to the Platinum line (afer all, it's only 7 minutes shorter than
Bambi!). But it's been reliable as an evergreen, and that's likely what its status will be the rest of its home video life.
For example, our family bought the
Mary Poppins VHS when it came out in the Black Diamond Edition. And we never had to replace that VHS even though it would get re-released by Disney every so often, and even when we had started collecting DVD, did not pick up
Mary Poppins until 2004 with the 40th Anniversary. Now, later this month, a 45th Anniversary Edition is coming out, and we're passing on it because we've got the movie on two formats of home video and it's suitable enough until Blu-Ray. But to Disney, our family is just a family that already bought the movie twice. They're not catering to us with the 45th AE, they're catering to someone who still doesn't have it yet. Or someone who simply wants it because of the Broadway featurettes. It's a rotating wheel of consumers, and Disney knows that they may still get repeat buyers, but they're primarily focused on new ones.
Goliath wrote:Escapay wrote:The Pocahontas DVD, for example, really is all archival laserdisc material (though not all of the laserdisc stuff made it to DVD), with the only new things being the commentary, the re-instatement of "If I Never Knew You", and the brief featurette about putting it back in the film.
Well, you shouldn't complain
I wasn't complaining (I hope it didn't sound like I was), and the two-disc is one of my favourites from Disney. I was just saying that the
Pocahontas two-disc likely did not require much work from Disney, and that its archival supplements are just as engaging as newly-produced ones, and for a catalogue release, shows better care than Disney's flimsy single-disc sets for
Home on the Range,
Chicken Little, etc. In relation to
Atlantis, the
Pocahontas set can definitely be seen as lighter (but that's just quantitatively), but provides a thorougly engaging experience for the viewer that is on par with that of the
Atlantis supplemenets.
If you have multi-region capabilities, you should definitely import the two-disc set as it's one of Disney's better efforts post-2004.
albert