Lionsgate, Studiocanal and Miramax announced today that they have entered into a worldwide home entertainment distribution deal. Under the long-term deal, Lionsgate and Studiocanal will distribute more than 550 titles from the Miramax film library on Blu-ray. The studio will soon release the Scream trilogy, and Pulp Fiction will finally get its Blu-ray release in June.
Lionsgate will partner with international distributor Studiocanal to distribute Miramax titles in the UK and Europe.
The first home entertainment release under the deal will be The Switch in the US, the romantic comedy about friendship, fertility and family, starring Jennifer Aniston and Jason Bateman, which will be released on Blu-ray on March 15.
While commenting on the distribution agreement just announced between Miramax, Lionsgate and Studiocanal, Miramax CEO Mike Lang revealed that upcoming titles include all three films in the Scream franchise, tying in with the theatrical release of Scream 4 (due out April 15). Pulp Fiction, in turn, will come out in June.
Lang noted that, while he is aware that "the packaged DVD media market is maturing and consumers are beginning to look for digital alternatives," he also believes that "we're seeing renewed interest in Blu-ray — and this will be especially true for Miramax given the fact that many of our titles have never been released on the format."
The announcement was made by Steve Beeks, President and Co-Chief Operating Officer of Lionsgate, Olivier Courson, Chief Executive Officer of Studiocanal and Mike Lang, Chief Executive Officer of Miramax.
"The Miramax library will be one of the most treasured jewels in our home entertainment crown," said Beeks. "With our longstanding commitment and expertise in aggressively managing library titles, we are thrilled to bring together under one roof such Miramax film icons as Shakespeare in Love, The English Patient, Pulp Fiction and Good Will Hunting with our existing classics such as Dirty Dancing and Monster's Ball to create what is unquestionably one of the most powerful and prestigious filmed entertainment libraries in the world. We are looking forward to working with Mike and his incredible team on this exciting venture."
"We are pleased to expand our existing partnership with Lionsgate to encompass this exciting new venture with Miramax," said Courson. "The Miramax library features some of the best of American independent cinema, representing a wonderful mix of creative excellence, award winning films and commercial successes. The Miramax slate is a perfect fit for Studiocanal's core values and vision and we believe it will resonate with European audiences."
"With their expertise and success in the home entertainment marketplace, we consider both Lionsgate and Studiocanal to be the perfect partners to distribute these films," says Lang. "We are thrilled to have the opportunity to collaborate with them as we work to expand the availability of our library across all platforms to reach new audiences around the world."
From Miramax I would like to see the above be released in the US and also one called Enchanted April. Hopefully their releases are not as the MGM ones.
I'm just glad to see that Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair won't be released by Vivendi Visual Entertainment, who botched the Grindhouse release. Any chance Lionsgate could re-release that with HD sound?
It's about time. I sold Pulp Fiction and Jackie Brown years ago because they've long been rumored to be coming out on Blu-ray. I also sold the Scream Trilogy a while back, but that's because it was out-of-print and people were overpaying on eBay. I figured we'd see that on Blu-ray to tie into Scream 4's release.
I'm interested in picking up the first Scream. And to the poster who brought up Halloween 4 and 5, you reminded me that I have a major soft spot for Halloween H20 and would love to see that released!
PS: Does anyone else find that Lionsgate blus take FOREVER to load?
@ Jardel: Are you confusing Lionsgte with Warner or Paramount? Seriously! LG produced the best AV reference material with pristine video transfers and ALWAYS a 7.1 DTS-MA audio, not to mention they are ALWAYS loaded with Extras! Sure, a lot of their movies are kinda crappy, cinematic content wise, but they are on the top of my list for demo discs.
Pulp Fiction ehh... Well I hope the $35 i sent to Poland for my copy (which is absolutely stunning BTW) isnt gonna go to waste. and besides, when this gets released you can count on a minimum $25 price tag on it guaranteed so maybe it wont be all that much of a rip off! have to wait and see i guess.
Lionsgate has some good releases like the Coppola stuff, but overall they are quite poor for older films.
Chaplin just came out from them and got terrible reviews.
they used an old dvd master and that is what they like to do.
If new masters are being created for these Miramax titles they could be fine; if not watch out.
the whole key to good catalog releases is NEW HD masters
simple as that.
Would love to see Pulp Fiction, Jackie Brown and the Scream Franchise ( I could wait till they get around till the end of the year for Wes Craven's true UNCUT version of #1 and if the new movie is any good)
I'm looking forward to eventual releases of Pulp Fiction, Kill Bill-The Whole Bloody Affair, The Thief and the Cobbler (AKA Arabian Knight), Chocolat (hopefully better than the 1080i version released in Canada), Amelie and The Importance of Being Earnest.
I've always considered Pulp Fiction to be inferior to Reservoir Dogs, but it's still a fun movie. I think the coolest part will be getting that great soundtrack in lossless.
With Crow creator James O' Barr set to release a new "The Crow: Author's Edition" which will be the original Crow mini-series collected in a possible hardcover format with new pages and much more as early as this summer, 2011 would be a perfect time to release The Crow on Blu-ray. I personally feel it should be a Director-approved release with cut footage added back in and a lot of the supplemental material as well.
Pulp Fiction and the Scream trilogy!!! I am glad to hear these two mentioned ant wait to see what else comes out. Now I can get rid of my 1080i Scream trilogy from Canada that I found at Newbury comics for $18
I'd like Scream, Pulp Fiction, Mighty Joe Young 1998, Phantoms, Arachnophobia, Deep Rising, Marrying Man, Kill Bill uncut, Grindhouse ala the Japanese box set version.
I'm laughing at the people praising LG transfers. Sure, they put out some top notch transfers for new movies, but their treatment of back catalogue tiles is terribly inconsistent, with most of them being smacked with the DNR stick, or just plain shitty old transfers.
Just look at the review of Chaplin, on this very site.
I think it's fair to say I want to cry. Why didn't Miramax stuff just go to Criterion here in the states. They would respect and have the skill to treat these titles with the care they deserve. Woe is me.
I think I remember reading somewhere that Kill Bill was one of the few movies the Weinstiens were able to hang onto the rights of. Therefore any future releases will be through them.
heres hopeing the scream trilogy will port over special features from the dvd sets, as someone else posted Lionsgate is great with their releases and transfers. just ashame we will never have a complete scream box set with Scream 4 being distributed on bluray by anchor bay latter this year.
but the other great thing with lionsgate is they are quite reasonable with their msrps so most of these miramax titles will probably be available on amazon in the 12.99 to 13.99 range upon first being up for pre order.
While it sucks that i have allready started getting it signed by various cast members i will probably go ahead and sell off my Alliance scream set, once the pre order for the new set come up.
I didn't think Pulp Fiction would be out until Christmas time. Awesome! I wonder when Good Will Hunting will hit stores. I'm buying both. Pulp Fiction on release day, obviously One more reason to look forward to this summer!
THANK YOU! I was hoping new BD editions of the first 3 Scream films would come out before the new one! That's awesome! Plus I can't wait to pick up Pulp Fiction in June, finally.
Did the Hollywood Pictures library go with Miramax? I didn't think it did; it was Disney's own imprint (never under the Weinsteins or post-Weinsteins Miramax).
I'm almost certain Disney kept Princess Mononoke; they now deal directly with Studio Ghibli under the Disney brand.
I hope this means we'll FINALLY get a release of the Director's Cut of "Scream". The last domestic release of that was on laserdisc in the mid 90's. I imported a DVD just to have that cut. I know it's only a few seconds, but it really bugs me not to have them when that's the version I'm used to watching.
Pulp Fiction, Jackie Brown, The English Patient, and The Grifters. If all of those came out by the end of the year I would be very happy. I was wondering how long it was going to take for someone to pick up the Miramax library and finally distribute it on blu ray. Lionsgate does a pretty decent job with their blus so I am excited.
Lionsgate is absolutely awful on any catalog property to Blu-ray, their transfers are often manipulated or just dumped on the market with problems. I guess this means that the existing Miramax BDs from Disney will go out of print.
YES for the 'Scream' trilogy! I was about to pick up the Canadian box set to hold me over but now that there's confirmation of an impending U.S. release, I'm more than happy to wait. Hopefully they do it right: release the director's cut of the first, port over all of the bonus features from the DVD box set, and perhaps even throw in a few new extras.
Finally we hear news of the US Release of The Scream Trilogy!!!!!!!! I hope the release will be at least abit before the release of Scream 4 (possibly containing movie money for Scream 4 or something)...
And finally PULP FICTION!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Can't Wait!!!!
Although it's not made completely clear in the news item above, my inference is that Lionsgate are going to be handling the US, UK and Canadian distribution of the Miramax library on Blu-ray, with Studio Canal handling Continental European distribution. This article from the LA Times backs this position up:
A few other websites are reporting that Studio Canal is handling UK distribution, however, which is mighty confusing.
Another thing to note is that the Blu-ray distribution rights for The Switch, which was mentioned above, actually belong to Lionsgate in BOTH the US AND the UK; moreover, The Switch appears to have different Blu-ray distributors in different Continental European countries.
Whilst I fully acknowledge that Lionsgate are far from perfect, I'd much rather have them as distributors than I would Studio Canal -- and that's any day of the week.
So, who out of Lionsgate and Studio Canal would you rather have as your local distributor?
Lionsgate owns the pre-Disney Miramax titles as well, right? I remember they distributed Madonna: Truth Or Dare, The Crying Game and some of the other early pre-Disney titles as well on DVD
I'm not going to deny that Lionsgate has released some rough looking BD discs (Which company hasn't?) But I think there quality % speaks for itself.
Apocalypse Now, Requiem for a Dream, Stargate (Remastered), Monster Squad, Dirty Dancing (Remastered), Lord Of War, Rambo films, Wallace & Gromit collection, Running Man, Universal Soldier, Hard Candy, Air America, and any others I can't think of off the top of my head in this moment.
All the titles mentioned by previous posters are good and need release. I must say I would really like to see Madonna:Truth Or Dare too! Even though it is more of a doc it has some brilliant concert footage in there.
The Crow is my most anticipated Miramax release,i wouldnt mine Scream but only the first one,didnt care for 2 & 3 at all.
Pulp Fiction and Good Will Hunting of course as well.
I hear Studio Canal and world-wide distribution deal and my first thought is a US release for Mulholland Drive. Can somebody do a deal to make this happen already?!
NICEEEEEEEE!!!!! Happy for the Scream trilogy coming to Blu-Ray in the US. Now i could watch all 3 Screams before Scream 4. And also happy for Pulp Fiction. Looks like it's going to be a great year for Blu-Rays (Thumbs Up)
Got tired of waiting for Miramax so I broke down and bought several of their titles from Canada and Europe. "Amelie" is the best PQ (from Canada). "Cold Mountain" is pretty good too. "The English Patient" though is the worst. Terrible quality. "The Crow" from the U.K. is also a shoddy release. "Bridget Jones" is good though. And "Jackie Brown" from Germany is also a terrible release. So I look forward to (hopefully) better releases in the U.S. for most of the above.
Let's also not forget that "SWINGERS" is a Miramax release too, folks. Maybe now we'll get a proper HD transfer rather than a DVD to blu-ray port job like on the Canadian & Australian releases.
Can't wait to hear Dead Souls by NIN when they release The Crow in DTS-MA 7.1. This is truly great news, Lionsgate Blu-rays are of the highest possible quality. I'm really excited. Bring on the Miramax titles!!
I wouldn't mind seeing Cinema Paradiso & Malena released in blu! (as long as they're remastered prints). and I have to second the Evita petition, that's probably the worst DVD I have :O
With this deal, lionsgate controls the home video rights to the entire Highlander film franchise (I-The Source). With the remake coming out at the end of the year, this could be a very valuable. Maybe we'll see a release around the time the remake hit theaters, or when the remake hits bluray.
this would be excellent news if Buena Vista (Disney) still were handling the transfers of these classics.......no studio is up to par with Disney in transferring for blu ray.....
With this announcement, I'm hoping for one of my favourite films to finally come to Blu - BASQUIAT!!
Some of the Woody Allen films would be great as well - Mighty Aphrodite and Everyone Says I Love You, especially.
Hopefully they put out Jackie Brown at the same time as the Pulp Fiction release, like when the special edition DVDs came out.
I'd also love to see Frida, Kids, Cry The Beloved Country, From Dusk Till Dawn, Iris, The Shipping News, Garden State, Confessions Of A Dangerous Mind, The Hours, and City Of God
One more reason to look forward to this summer! 
