‘Dalmatians’ day
The next Disney animated film to get the Platinum Edition DVD treatment will be 1961’s “101 Dalmatians.” The two-disc special edition will be released March 4. The last Disney Platinum Edition DVD, “The Jungle Book,” topped the national DVD sales chart when it was released in early October. “Dalmatians” extras include a “Virtual Dalmatian” game that lets viewers train and take care of their own puppy, a “Puppy Profiler” that lets viewers find out which dog they’re most like, deleted scenes, trivia pop-ups and a new “Cruella De Vil” music video performed by Disney Channel star Selena Gomez.
High-def ‘Prison’
“Prison Break” will be the first TV show 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment will release on the next-generation Blu-ray Disc format, the studio said. Season 1 of the prison drama will be released Nov. 13 on a six-disc set. Fox executives said that rather than compress the show, they wanted to push the bit rate to the maximum to take advantage of Blu-ray’s superior picture; they also noted that in the future, Fox shows might migrate over to the higher-capacity 50GB Blu-ray Disc.
Busy ’08 for Fox
Fox will release at least 30 new theatrical features to Blu-ray Disc in 2008, part of the studio’s overall stepped-up commitment to the format, according to senior vp marketing and corporate communications Steve Feldstein. Counting catalog and more TV-DVD releases, the studio’s total Blu-ray output likely will top 50 titles.
Marticorena upped
Dorinda Marticorena is the new senior vp HD media at Warner Home Video, replacing Steve Nickerson, who left to head the home entertainment division at new studio Summit Entertainment. Warner is the No. 1 player in the high-definition disc arena, largely because the studio is the only one of the six majors to support both Blu-ray Disc and HD DVD.
