Last week we received more orders for Gone Fishing on BluRay than we had in all the moths since it was released (and I just put them all in mailers today – see pic)! About half were from the USA, and the others from the UK. Could this signify that BluRay has finally got a foothold in the consumer market? I rent BluRay’s from Blockbuster and there always seems to be as many customers looking at BluRay rentals than at traditional DVD ones, and the BluRay is only 25% of the whole store. And with PS3 offering BluRay and players now being sold for under £100, it does look like this Christmas may well be the one where finally, we all have something that can really show off that whopping great HD TV we convinced our partners were essential to life as we know it! (I managed to convince Lucia by buying her the entire Harry Potter collection on BluRay. I know the Twilight saga will follow).
So why buy Gone Fishing on BluRay? After asking people who did buy the BR disk, I was surprised by one common theme in the answer… (and I am amalgamating the comments here)
‘It’s a wonderful little movie, everyone who sees it, loves it, and it’s a perfect film to showcase my new TV and BR player as it’s got the big action highs as well as the big emotional highs, and it’s only 13 minutes long – we can watch it in about the time it takes to drink the cup of coffee I just made!’
I had never really thought about it that way – you can ask friends round and show them the film without it dominating the whole evening in a way that a feature film would. Interesting.
Anyway, if you want to buy a BluRay of Gone Fishing, you can do so here (the disk was mastered at Abbey Road Studios where the Beatles recorded that famous album) – and just for the run up to Xmas, if you buy the BluRay version, we will throw in an extra DVD into the mailer bag too (in its own signed case). You can give that extra DVD to your mum for Xmas, I promise she (and her neighbours) will love it!
For the techies, the disk is masterd in full 1080P, direct from the HDCamSR we showed at the premiere at BAFTA.
Onwards and upwards!
Chris Jones, Film Maker and Author
I definitely think Blu-ray has reached a level of saturation and a price-point that make it appealing to almost everyone. Terminator and Harry Potter are under $20 in Blu-ray and they are brand new releases. I think you are correct that we have turned the corner with Blu-ray.