No more Shaw DVDs for Germany, Austria & Swiss!

Recently, the CO of Distribution of the MiB – Medienvertrieb in Buchholz company, a distribution partner of the German licensing company MCL – MediaCom & Licensing Ltd. has informed SBR about the current situation of pending Shaw Brothers movie releases in German speaking countries.

Sadly, the statement issues a final death sentence for future Shaw DVDs in the region. As of February 2010, MCL has abandoned all negotiations with the global rights holder Celestial Pictures Ltd. in Hong Kong. All negotiations and former contracts are now void and terminated and therefore not even the 30 titles announced as early as Autumn 2008 will ever see a release in Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

As a reason for this failure to secure distribution rights, MCl states utopian financial arrears by Celestial Pictures which they seemingly insist on. Word is, that the Hong Kong based company asked for about 1 Million Euros in advance for a packet of 30 movies. Furthermore the choice of titles would have been limited to 15 top titles and 15 weak ones – a factor which surely renders any hope for a successful marketing futile.

MCL tried its best and asked for 15 titles only, as they wanted to monitor the market in terms of sales and potential TV commercialization prior to buying another 15 titles in case everything went smooth and successful. But Celestial declined. Strangely, as the statement of MCL indicates, the strategy of a 15/15 split only exists for German speaking regions and nobody at both German companies can explain why Celestial insists on such a special practice.

Due to MCL statements, the licensing rights have been offered to major German labels as well, but have been turned down as no big player sees any potential for a successful business.

Final Verdict: In Germany, Austria and Switzerland Shaw Brothers movie DVDs do not exist anymore. German speaking fans and customers have to get their Shaw fix somewhere else…

"Thank God that most of the IVL releases from 2002 until 2007 are still available and for some titles there is always the possibility to get legit versions from USA, France, Denmark, Singapore, Japan and other places..."