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1. DVD culture

2. learning outcomes Outlinethe history of filmconsumption within the domestic sphere. Discussthe issues and debates surrounding the presentation of film on DVD. Analysecontemporary DVD culture through identifyingelements of contemporary DVDs and describing DVD-viewing practices in relation to the broader concepts of media convergence and fandom.

3. ‘”…the ways of presenting the DVD are changing the ways movies are viewed at home, increasing viewer options and, ultimately, viewer knowledge of the movies’” (Barlow: 2005:108) intro “as the twentieth century drew to a close, we were increasingly likely to encounter cinema through other media – on television, home video, DVD or the internet” (Cartwright: 2002:417). Remediation - “old media is recycled, reformatted and delivered through a different channel” (Atkinson: 2007: 23). “What is new about new media comes from the ways in which they refashion older media and the ways in which older media refashion themselves to answer the challenge of new media” (Bolter and Grusin, 1999:15). As part of the contemporary era of media convergence, film, according to Lisa Cartwright, has “disintegrating into – or integrating with – other media” (2002: 417)

4. film in thedomestic sphere 1896 1940s 2000s 1980s 1950s 1970s In 1896, just two years after Edison’s Kinetoscope was launched, manufactures began to produce projectors for off-theatre locations (Klinger: 2006: 6). This was considered to be one of the contributing factors in the drop in box office receipts (others included the Paramount decree and people moving to the suburbs). Between 1946 and 1956, box office receipts dropped from $1.692 billion to $1.298 billion (Balio, 1985: 401). The UK depicted a similar trend. According to TinoBalio, the number of television sets in use in the United States increased from 14000 to 172000 between the years 1947 and 1948, and by the end of the 1950s, 90 per cent of households in the United States had a television set (1985: 401). During the 1950s the film industry saw a range of technological innovations including 3D, Technicolor, widescreen and so on. The film industry also made moves to make television an ancillary market (see Balio 1990). • The US home video market (VHS and DVD) currently supersedes the US box office. • 2010 - home video supersedes box by 2.5 times • BUT • The home video market is in decline! • Rentals in the US in the first quarter of 2010 dropped by 14% and sell-through numbers by 11% (see Caranicas, 2010, internet). 1975 – Sony launches betamax 1976 – JVC launches VHS “A film could be recorded and re-watched in one’s living room, but also bought in a shop in video format. What consequently emerge are, on the one hand, new forms of access to filmic experience and, on the other, new surroundings in which this experience might take place” (Casetti: 2009: 62). 1980s – Studios saw lucrativeness of the market (see Klinger, 2006: 89)

5. discussion point As one industry insider argued “Saving Private Ryan” suffers on [video]cassette. If you see it at home, you are by no means as impressed with it as you were in the movie theatre. And ‘Shakespeare in Love’ is a more intimate picture, it plays well on cassette. It may actually be enhanced by watching it at home”. In response, Dreamworks’ marketing chief, Terry Press, countered: “That goes to a larger issue. You’re a member of the Motion Pictures Academy, not the television video academy. These movies are meant to be seen in movie theatres, all of them. They are not meant to be stopped and started and paused when the phone rings or to feed the dog”. (see Klinger, 2006:2)

6. contemporary DVD culture

7. references Atkinson, Sarah (2007) ‘The Versatility of Visualization: Delivering Interactive Feature Film Content on DVD’ in Nebula, Volume 3, Number 2, pp21-39. Cartwright, Lisa, (2002) ‘Film and the Digital in Visual Studies: Film Studies in the era of convergence’, Visual Culture Reader, Ed, N. Mirzoeff, Great Britain: Routledge, pp417 – 432. Bolter, D.J and Grusin, R (1999) Remediation: understanding new media, Cambridge, Massachusetts, MIT Press, Klinger, Barbara (2006) Beyond the Multiplex: Cinema New Technologies and the Home, California: University of California Press.

8. references Balio, Tino, (1985) ‘Retrenchment, Reappraisal, and Reorganisation, The American Film Industry, Ed. TinoBalio, Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, pp 401-422. Balio, Tino (1990) ‘Introduction to Part II’, Hollywood in the Age of Television, Ed. TinoBalio, London: Unwin Hyman, pp259-296. Caranicas, Peter ‘Studios hit with homevideo slump’ in Variety, 1st May 2010, <http://www.variety.com/article/VR1118018573?refCatId=13>, accessed 29/12/10. Casetti, Francesco (2009), ‘Filmic experience’ in Screen, Volume 50, Number 1, 2009: 56 – 66.

9. references Elsaesser, Thomas (2009) ‘The Mind-Game Film’, Puzzle Films: Complex Storytelling in Contemporary Cinema, Ed. Warren Buckland, West Sussex: Wiley-Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2009: 13 – 41. Gray, Jonathon, Show Sold Separately: Promos, Spoilers, and Other Media Paratexts, New York: New York University Press, 2009. Hudson, Dale and Patricia Zimmerman“(2009) ‘Cinephilia, Technophilia, and Collaborative Remix Zones’ in Screen, Spring, 50:1 ,pp135-146.