Missing blockbusters on Movie Central?

[Tripster]

I was just perusing the IPG and had All Channels set, in there I get to see what TMN-HD is airing. Something interesting caught my eye.

War of the Worlds is airing tonight in HD there, indeed it is premiering tonight on TMN and premiers on HBO Saturday night.

I'm out west so I'm stuck with Movie Central, who apparently aren't even airing this movie at all. It is not on their July schedule and isn't even in the list of "coming soon" movies for August.

Are they really not airing this movie while the rest of North America can get it in HD?

Time for Movie Central to go if they cannot offer a service on par with TMN.

[Tripster]

Movie Central has long term arrangements with major studios such as Paramount, Fox, Universal, Warners, Columbia, MGM, Miramax and Revolution Films. These agreements guarantee that all of the Big Blockbusters they theatrically release will be provided for exhibition on Movie Central within a year of theatrical release. Unfortunately we do not have contracts with all of the major studios, and "War of the Worlds" falls under the later category. We are in continual negotiations to add more studios to our roster and will continue to provide you with the most recent released movies.

Best Regards
Movie Central

[Tripster]

Missing from MC ... Flightplan .. which is airing on TMN this month.

Flightplan is distributed by Buena Vista Pictures, production by Tombstone Pictures and Imagine Entertainment.

Those are some pretty major studios to NOT be buying movies from for what amounts to the only game in town for western Canadians.

I don't think most subscribers are aware of the disparity between these two services when it comes to programming, TMN is by far the better service and yet we are all stuck paying the same rate even though MC keeps skipping blockbuster movies.

Edited to add: The Ring Two ... playing in HD on TMN, not playing on MC SD or HD.

[Altaman]

Old thread, but still I've got my view ;)

Movie Central is a waste, cancelled it last January and have not missed it one bit. If they don't support their viewers (especially in HD) they they are one of the few channels that can be cancelled without a lose of other channels. Wish that they would end the East/West monopoly of these channels...westerners really lose out under the current setup.

Alt

[Tripster]

I also canceled MC recently, I was going to keep it going for Rome but decided I simply wasn't willing to support MC even though I wanted to see Rome. I'll find alternate methods of getting the new eps for now.

Probably lucky I did too, a friend reported that he watched the premiere the other night in HD and the audio was out of synch, which seems to happen quite often with their HD services. I guess it goes along with the DVD quality picture.

I'm hopeful that Allarco Entertainment will bring some fresh content to the premium tiers but with them being the old SuperChannel team I doubt much will change, actually I wouldn't be surprised if they sit on the license for a while before actually launching. That might actually have been the plan all along, get the license then not launch to let their buds at MC/TMN continue on as always.

If they launch I think we probably will see MC/TMN merge.

Someone mentioned in another forum that MC has moved their offices to Toronto, I think I'll investigate that a bit further. Doesn't make much sense for us to have a separate movie service out west that is being ran from the Toronto.

[john edwards]

MC excludes Dreamworks,Touchstone,Disney movies as Pirates of the Caribbeen Dead Mans..,Eight Below, Chronicles of Naria,The Prestige, War of the Worlds,etc. What makes MC worse is,for the same money TMN includes ALL major movies,more HD,more channels etc. MC response is rehearsed and so what! Maybe Allarco will make MC do the right thing.

[cjkerry]

Curious to know why Disney isn't there. That wasn't always the case because I know I saw the first Pirates movie on Movie Central.

[TVViewer]

I don't know why I have not cancelled it yet either, I never watch it, But I think I watch channels that are in the same package.

[Tripster]

Curious to know why Disney isn't there. That wasn't always the case because I know I saw the first Pirates movie on Movie Central.

Not sure, but I think at this time from the major studios MC doesn't have contracts with are ...

Disney
Touchstone(? not sure since this is a Disney studio but I would imagine they're tied for distribution)
Dreamworks

TMN meanwhile is showing material from the above studios and in HD for most of it.

The CRTC should really take another look at their arrangement if Allarco decides to never launch, the regional premiums should either be on par programming wise or else forced to compete with each other since it isn't fair that one side of the country gets access to programming the other half doesn't get.

Look back at the early seasons of The Sopranos, MC didn't have it for about 2 years after TMN was airing it because MC had a lawsuit going against HBO and pretty much all the US channels. HBO decided to not sell MC rights to any of their material because of it. Nice.

Maybe they were suing Disney Channel as well and they still haven't got over it :D

[cjkerry]

Actually at one time we did in fact have two competing national movie networks [First Choice and Superchannel]. The two of them almost went bankrupt and as a result divided the country up between the two of them, First Choice taking the east and Superchannel the west. I don't think you will in all likelihood see us go back to that model.

[Tripster]

Actually at one time we did in fact have two competing national movie networks [First Choice and Superchannel]. The two of them almost went bankrupt and as a result divided the country up between the two of them, First Choice taking the east and Superchannel the west. I don't think you will in all likelihood see us go back to that model.

Actually we had like 5 regional services at the start, that morphed into a couple after the weaker ones got weeded out and eventually it left First Choice and SuperChannel separate and yes competing for a very short period. However, the market was completely different in those days, things were analog, they weren't carried on all systems, very few people would have had access to more than one movie service, etc.

They even morphed into "First Choice/Superchannel" at one period and then after a while split into the two separate entities we see today.

Today they have much better subscription levels thanks to digital services, more people are subscribing to them and they are both profitable.

The CRTC has licensed a competing service (Allarco Entertainment) which is supposed to launch in 2007, although most think it will be 2008 at the earliest. Even if they do not launch however there will eventually be a national competitor as other applicants were interested in this license. Allarco may end up being little more than a delay tactic by "friends" of the current services, but others want a piece of the premium pie and the CRTC has licensed it so eventually some new service will be born.

If/when a competitor launches the current services will most certainly reposition themselves and one of the best ways to do so would be to merge together again and take on the new competition, if they remain regional they will have a disadvantage over a national service.

[cjkerry]

Getting a licence and getting on air does not necessarily mean surviving. There are numberous examples of channels appearing and then disappearing into oblivion. Anyone remember the Women's Sports Network for example.