Munich screeners screwed for BAFTAs
Filed under: Awards, Universal, Tech Stuff, Distribution, Steven Spielberg, Home Entertainment, Oscar Watch
Despite the controversy over Spielberg's political
leanings (not to mention the wishy-washy press
"embargo"), Munich has thus far failed to make as much of an impact on the awards scene as many earlier
predicted. That situation was not helped by yesterday's news that voters for the BAFTAs (Britain's version of the
Oscars) were sent DVD screeners that most members could not watch. It all ties into piracy paranoia. Remember months ago when the studios started signing up with Cinea to encode their DVD screeners? The idea was that voters would be sent special DVDs that could only play on Cinea-specific players, which would also be provided. This seems to have gone off without a hitch in most cases, but a customs snafu kept the screeners out of the hands of voters past the January 3 deadline for early voting. Universal issued an apology, promising that voters would get their screeners in time for the final deadline, and issuing a vaguely threatening warning: "Do not vote without seeing this extraordinary film." Numbers are not yet in in regards to how many voters actually obeyed this command, but those that did probably did not vote at all – when the screeners did arrive, they were encoded as Region One, which only works in the US and Canada, presumably Cinea-player be damned. As the film is not yet in British theaters, those who have not recently gone cinemagoing in the US will be unable to vote for it (if they choose to disobey Universal's orders and vote at all).
I think Eric Bangeman at Ars Technica sums this up best: "Region encoding is stupid, and like many of the other steps taken by the content-creation industry to protect its interests, it hurts consumers, he writes. "I'm wondering what the fallout from the situation withMunich and BAFTA will be. Spielberg is a major player in Hollywood, and I can't imagine he's pleased that his masterpiece will be ineligible for consideration for the British awards." "Masterpiece" might be stretching it, but what good are piracy regulations if keep the films in question from getting awards recognition, which is in itself primarily useful for its ability to jack up box office?
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
1-11-2006 @ 2:57PM
Rik said...
Region coding isn't a 'piracy regulation'. It is simply a method that the studios use to prevent consumers exercising their right to free trade. They do this to prop up the system whereby different companies pay for the exclusive right to distribution in specific regions. Whilst I disagree with it strongly (and don't own any system that does not ignore it completely) it has nothing to do with 'anti-piracy' - we have the lovely CSS for that...
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1-11-2006 @ 3:49PM
karina said...
No, you're right, region encoding is not about piracy, it's about profits. But Cinea, the special encoding system under which these screeners were distributed, is an anti-piracy measure. If any old Region 2 DVDs could have been sent to the BAFTA voters, one imagines that either of the shipping snafus could have been easily surmounted.
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1-11-2006 @ 7:50PM
Rik said...
Sorry, my post came across a little preachy and heavy handed didn't it! I just tend to jump on such things 'cos little things in articles about the evils of piracy/drm (delete as applicable) can make a difference - you know, piracy referred to as theft etc. I don't think that Steve getting annoyed about his BAFTA chances will, unfortunately, do any of us in the 'real world' any good, but it might make a difference to the system used for distribution of awards screeners. The rest of us will just have to put up with laws being placed between us and our rights (and with compulsory Hitch trailers before films...)
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1-12-2006 @ 11:21AM
L'Emmerdeur said...
I use a multi-region, multi-system DVD player. I use DVDDecrypter to use the content for whch I paid in any way I choose, for my personal use.
If they ever come up with a system that blocks me from doing so, I will just stop watching almost all movies altogether. I've already cut my theatergoing to around 2-3 movies per year, because it has become such a nightmare (buy ticket in advance, wait in line for 30 minutes, end up with a front-row seat, sit through 20 minutes of ads).
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1-14-2006 @ 7:15AM
chuck said...
what i find really hard to beleive isa that those bafta-members, movie buffs by definition, didn't have region-free players! this just isn't possible. i beleive it's classic british prejudice against america.
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1-23-2006 @ 10:00AM
Steve said...
Of course BAFTA members have multi-regional players. But Cinea-encrypted discs will only play on Cinea's own dedicated machine, issued to Academy voters expressly for use with screeners. It's the Cinea machine that is region-locked, rendering the MUNICH disc unplayable on any machine in the UK.
There's no reason why the Cinea machines couldn't be multiregional, save that they don't want to offend the very clientele they're courting, ie the big studios. Cinea hope to license their encryption system for protecting rushes and digital release 'prints', where the real business will be.
But at least three of this year's BAFTA screeners were Region 1, sent out to British voters by those same studios.
And as to how secure the Cinea system is -- last night I was shown a downloaded rip of the new, supposedly protected Harry Potter screener, complete with "For Your Consideration" overprint. Cinea's claim is that they'll be able trace this back to the very individual whose screener it came from, so Warner Bros can go after his house. We'll have to see.
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