This is as good a time as any to look back over the last year in home video.
By now everyone knows that home video has been Hollywood`s savior. For the last 12 months alone, the industry is expected to generate $11 billion-twice Hollywood`s $5.5 billion intake from the nation`s 24,000 movie screens.
Surveys have also confirmed that, while cinema enthusiasts are always going to demand big-screen fare, the average moviegoer actually prefers renting a tape to hitting the mall cinema complex.
What was the video scene all about in 1991? Here are some highlights-and some lowlights.
Highlights:
– The number of sell-through titles (priced at under $30) was way up in 1991, including some major hits. Among the leaders: CBS/Fox`s ”Home Alone,” which sold more than 10 million copies, and Warner Home Video`s ”Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves,” which sold more than 5 million.
– If watching the Persian Gulf war on television wasn`t enough, a host of video companies-Turner, Strand/VCI, MPI-rushed more than a dozen videos onto the market regurgitating everything from network specials on the war to mini- profiles of major players.
– After years of procrastination, Walt Disney announced a 50-day sell-through program for ”Fantasia,” which went on sale Nov. 1. The studio sold more than 11 million copies of the tape at a suggested price of $24.99, making it the best-selling tape of the year.
-l problems that have plagued its parent company, nonetheless released two of the year`s biggest and most successful videos. Kevin Costner`s ”Dances With Wolves” sold more than 600,000 copies, while the studio also released on video one of this spring`s biggest Oscar contenders, ”The Silence of the Lambs.” The move highlights a growing trend in home video: getting hits into video stores as soon as possible.
– ”Terminator 2”-the most eagerly awaited rental title of 1991- sold more than 700,000 copies to retail stores, making it the top rental title of the year.
– ”Gone With the Wind” became the first full-priced video (as opposed to low-priced consumer titles) to sell 1 million copies.
Lowlights:
– Orion Pictures, parent of Orion Home Video, filed for bankruptcy in December, despite producing two of the year`s biggest hits, ”Dances With Wolves” and ”The Silence of the Lambs,” and overseeing a third (”The Addams Family”) that the cash-strapped company eventually sold to Paramount. – Although a federal judge struck down a Missouri state law making it illegal for minors to rent violent movies, anti-video laws flourished elsewhere and were confronted, often successfully. Some called for special taxes on home videos. Others sought to create special censorship boards.
– Increasingly, more videos are coming equipped with pre-movie commercials for everything from soft drinks to used copies of the tapes themselves.
– Sears became the exclusive outlet for those wanting to buy ”E.T.,” a move that does nothing to enhance the notion of choice. Other home video companies also began aggressive tie-ins with non-related companies in 1991, as witnessed by Paramount`s Indiana Jones campaign with McDonald`s.
