Universal Studios Goes Blu, Paramount Strangely Silent

[admin]

Universal Studios Home Entertainment has officially announced that it will release its titles on Blu-ray.

http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/Universal/Breaking:_Universal__Studios_Goes_Blu/1483

For its own part, Paramount declined comment on Toshiba's announcement today; instead, the studio issued release details for two HD DVD titles, 'There Will Be Blood' and 'Sweeney Todd.'

http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/Paramount/Last_Man_Standing:_All_Eyes_on_Paramount/1489

It's funny that I would have thought Paramount would be the first to go Blu-ray, while Universal drags its feet around for a while. Not only has Paramount not announced they would go Blu-ray, they announced further details to two HD DVD titles. Weird.

[BR7]

According to Hollywood reporter
Paramount has officially gone Blu

Paramount Home Entertainment quietly came onboard via a statement sent exclusively to The Hollywood Reporter on Wednesday: "We are pleased that the industry is moving to a single high-definition format, as we believe it is in the best interest of the consumer," the statement reads. "As we look to (begin) releasing our titles on Blu-ray, we will monitor consumer adoption and determine our release plans accordingly."

Link to story

[admin]

The rumour is that Paramount want to keep things quiet due to contractual requirements when they went HD DVD exclusive.

Want to guess when we will see the first Blu-ray titles from either Universal or Paramount, and which title it will be? (I don't know when, but I'm guessing the Bourne trilogy and Transformers)

[BR7]

I'm guessing the Bourne trilogy and Transformers

That's what I was thinking
I also think we will see a lot more stuff from Paramount in the beginning .One would think they still have some left over Blus laying around from when they were making them

[admin]

Yeah, the old (unconfirmed) news was that they pulped all the unsold Blu-ray movies from when they went HD DVD exclusive, but I'm sure they have the movies already authored in Blu-ray format saved somewhere, it's just a matter of getting them to disc. So perhaps the first title won't be Transformers, but Blades of Glory, Face Off, Top Gun and Next.

[admin]

For some reason, I couldn't find a news story on it on Google News, but it appears that many of the Paramount Blu-ray titles available before they went HD DVD exclusive will be available to buy again on March 17th, at least from Amazon.com. It looks like they kept their Blu-ray stock and did not just simply pulp them like rumours had suggested. You would think Paramount would be making a big deal about it, but they've been strangely silent over all of this. Guilty perhaps?

In any case, here's the search page link for Paramount Blu-ray titles on Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_d/002-7187454-5852859?url=search-alias%3Ddvd&tag=dvdloc8-20&field-keywords=Paramount+Blu-ray