pulserate
09-21-07, 10:47 PM
As you may already know; WB wouldn't let Darren Aronofsky do a commentary for The Fountain.
But he went ahead and did one anyway. And now you can download it from his website and play it while you watch the movie:
http://www.darrenaronofsky.com/fountain_com.html
What I think is interesting is the possibilities that things like this have when used in conjunction with HD-DVD's interactive and community features...
In the future, movie studios could release a 'bare bones' disc or standard edition, which had the movie at its highest audio and visual quality, with the native language soundtrack and/or English subtitles.
Then, with future players having large built-in hard drives, the owner could connect online and download the extra features that interest them -- like other language tracks, other language subtitles, commentaries, featurettes etc.
At first, I thought HDD space would be an issue as your collection grew, but let's look at it realistically; how many people actually watch special features more than once anyway? Some are rather throwaway generic made-for-TV productions that are nice to gloss over...then you could delete them, unless you were absolutely certain the extra was brilliant and you would watch it again. And even if you did delete it, you could still download it again later anyway if you changed your mind.
But where it would get REALLY interesting is the community-based functions:
Critics, fans, other filmmakers etc. could release their own special features for a movie.
Imagine Tarantino recording his own commentary for Rio Bravo. Or cast/crew from Spielberg films finally providing commentary for the classics. But it wouldn't end with celebrities -- you could record your own commentary for your favourite film/s to share with friends, family or the public at large. Why would anyone be interested in some average joe's thoughts? Look at YouTube. People DO care what nobodies have to say.
This would also be in the studios' interests, because they would have to put less work into ensuring the extra features were ready for a release. They could concentrate on the bare bones disc, and have ther own special features ready to download shortly after release.
It would also provide a nice balance between the arguments for physical media and downloadable movies. The movies still come on discs for people to 'collect', but then they can control what/how much of the additional content they actually watch.
If you just love movies, then you have the bext picture and sound you could hope for. If you're a special features junkie, you could download all 328 commentaries recorded about The Matrix in the future.
Of course, official special features from the studio would only be downloadable by owners who have bought and paid for the movie disc. Then features produced by others could be free, or charged a fee for, ala iTunes.
But he went ahead and did one anyway. And now you can download it from his website and play it while you watch the movie:
http://www.darrenaronofsky.com/fountain_com.html
What I think is interesting is the possibilities that things like this have when used in conjunction with HD-DVD's interactive and community features...
In the future, movie studios could release a 'bare bones' disc or standard edition, which had the movie at its highest audio and visual quality, with the native language soundtrack and/or English subtitles.
Then, with future players having large built-in hard drives, the owner could connect online and download the extra features that interest them -- like other language tracks, other language subtitles, commentaries, featurettes etc.
At first, I thought HDD space would be an issue as your collection grew, but let's look at it realistically; how many people actually watch special features more than once anyway? Some are rather throwaway generic made-for-TV productions that are nice to gloss over...then you could delete them, unless you were absolutely certain the extra was brilliant and you would watch it again. And even if you did delete it, you could still download it again later anyway if you changed your mind.
But where it would get REALLY interesting is the community-based functions:
Critics, fans, other filmmakers etc. could release their own special features for a movie.
Imagine Tarantino recording his own commentary for Rio Bravo. Or cast/crew from Spielberg films finally providing commentary for the classics. But it wouldn't end with celebrities -- you could record your own commentary for your favourite film/s to share with friends, family or the public at large. Why would anyone be interested in some average joe's thoughts? Look at YouTube. People DO care what nobodies have to say.
This would also be in the studios' interests, because they would have to put less work into ensuring the extra features were ready for a release. They could concentrate on the bare bones disc, and have ther own special features ready to download shortly after release.
It would also provide a nice balance between the arguments for physical media and downloadable movies. The movies still come on discs for people to 'collect', but then they can control what/how much of the additional content they actually watch.
If you just love movies, then you have the bext picture and sound you could hope for. If you're a special features junkie, you could download all 328 commentaries recorded about The Matrix in the future.
Of course, official special features from the studio would only be downloadable by owners who have bought and paid for the movie disc. Then features produced by others could be free, or charged a fee for, ala iTunes.