Bullets 'n' Babes

There is a documentary airing on Channel 4 in the UK at the moment on Monday nights over 6 parts. It's about the last 100 years and details how it was the bloodiest in History. A few years back the same Historian made a 6 part documentary on the Rise and Fall of the British Empire.

I can tell you now it was one of the best documentaries I've ever seen. I thoroughly enjoy every second and having recently bought a Hard Disk/DVD Recorder I've recorded it from my ageing VHS to DVD (Only parts 2-6 I missed part 1).

He later did a documentary on the American Empire, which was equally good.

To cut a long story short I e-mailed the production company recently asking if they planned to release it on DVD. This was their response:

"I’m afraid that the reality of the market place is that it is not possible to issue any of these productions on DVD simply because of the archive material included in the programmes. It is hugely expensive clearing archive for use on terrestrial television and it is quite beyond the budgets available to clear for DVD releases. So all I can do is offer to make a VHS copy of episode 1 of Empire at a cost of £15 plus VAT, of Colossus at £20 plus VAT (it’s a longer programme) and I think I have DVD copies of The War of the World and you could have the set for £90 plus VAT.

If this is of interest, please send me your address details and I shall raise an invoice and send it to you. Once I have received payment I shall arrange despatch."

Is someone able to explain to me what they're talking about? I fully appreciate that I will be charged more than the going box set rate as I'm only asking for one copy.

BUT £90 for a DVD box set that will cost them £10 if that and little time to copy is bloody expensive.

If I'm reading the first statement correctly it's because they'll need to transfer it from their professional equipment to DVD/Video which takes time etc . . . fine but the DVD box set is well already on DVD.

Why if they can transfer it to Video for the other shows can't they DVD?

I was really asking if they planned to release it properly like many other documentaries are. I guess not . . .

p.s - I'm tempted to get the Colossus video as I don't have that at all (at least £20 is lowish). I can live without the first part of Empire and that DVD box set of the current series well I can put it on DVD myself for the price of 1/2 DVD-9s.

I guess this one needs a bump to get people's attention!

Or perhaps no one knows the answer to the posited question.

I do like the documentaries that Channel 4 do though. I watched the one about the British Empire; very well made.

I think it's because it's expensive to transfer to DVD for one person but I'm sure they could sell a decent amount if they released it to DVD like many, many other documentaries.

What's the difference???

I tell you it does seem to be a wasted opportunity on Blakeway Productions part. We can't be the only two people who enjoyed the show.

If they licensed out the material to a specialist company the returns would have to be higher than the production costs, surely? I presume this is how it works?

It sounds like Blakeway Productions aren't equipped/interested in going down that avenue. I don't think they're a particularly big company.

It's a shame as these sorts of documentaries you need to watch more than once to pick up all the facts. There is so much thrown at you over the course of their running time.

I've decided to pick up American Colossus at £23.50. For a VHS Video it's expensive but it can't be helped, it's been a long time since I last saw it and I missed the first 30 minutes also.

I'll only need the video once to transfer it to DVD . I'm recording The War of the World each week so by the end will have pretty much what I'm being offered for the £105 box set for the cost of 1-2 DVD-9s. If really want to I can even edit out the adverts (which I won't bother doing).

I guess I'm only missing episode 1 of Empire but I'm not interested in paying another £17 to get that. At least with American Colossus I'm paying for the entire documentary (it was one 100 minute documentary).