A moratorium is the practice of suspending the sales of films on

home video Home video is recorded media sold or Video rental shop, rented for home viewing. The term originates from the VHS and Betamax era, when the predominant medium was videotapes, but has carried over to optical disc formats such as DVD and Blu-ray. ...

DVD, VHS, and

Blu-ray Blu-ray (Blu-ray Disc or BD) is a digital optical disc data storage format designed to supersede the DVD format. It was invented and developed in 2005 and released worldwide on June 20, 2006, capable of storing several hours of high-defin ...

and boxed sets after a certain period of time. Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment was famous for this practice, known as the " Disney Vault," in which it would only sporadically sell home videos of animated films in the Disney catalogue, until 2019 when a program of undeletions and re-releases ultimately restored all Disney titles into simultaneous print on home entertainment for the first time and on the

Disney+ The Walt Disney Company, commonly referred to as simply Disney, is an American multinational mass media and entertainment industry, entertainment conglomerate (company), conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios (Burbank), Walt Di ...

streaming service. The

20th Century Fox 20th Century Studios, Inc., formerly 20th Century Fox, is an American film studio, film production and Film distributor, distribution company owned by the Walt Disney Studios (division), Walt Disney Studios, the film studios division of the ...

film library (with the notable exception of '' The Rocky Horror Picture Show'') was placed into moratorium and removed from theaters following Disney's acquisition of 21st Century Fox in 2019 according to a ''Vulture'' article; the decision noted the different policies between Fox, which had made most of its film archive available to theaters at all times, and Disney, which did (and does) not.

History

Disney was the first studio to put its films on moratorium. In 2002,

Universal Pictures Universal City Studios LLC, doing business as Universal Pictures (also known as Universal Studios or simply Universal), is an American filmmaking, film production and film distribution, distribution company headquartered at the 10 Universal Ci ...

used this practice with the release of the ''

Back to the Future ''Back to the Future'' is a 1985 American science fiction film directed by Robert Zemeckis and written by Zemeckis and Bob Gale. It stars Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd, Lea Thompson, Crispin Glover, and Thomas F. Wilson. Set in 1985 ...

'' DVD boxed set due to widescreen framing problems. George Lucas also used this practice with the 2004 ''

Star Wars ''Star Wars'' is an American epic film, epic space opera media franchise created by George Lucas, which began with the Star Wars (film), eponymous 1977 film and Cultural impact of Star Wars, quickly became a worldwide popular culture, pop cu ...

'' original trilogy DVD boxed set. However, the moratorium was lifted on ''

'' in 2009 before the release of the 25th anniversary

set on October 26, 2010, and on ''Star Wars'', once '' Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith'' was released to theatres on May 19, 2005, and releasing the original theatrical versions of the original trilogy on DVD on September 12, 2006.

Controls

Disney itself stated that the practice of moratorium was done to both control their market and to allow Disney films to be fresh for new generations of young children. The practice of moratorium has been frowned upon by consumers because it forces higher sale prices. A normal DVD that is sold under moratorium can sell at retail for a very high price relative to the general run of DVDs. However, prices are known to drop near the end of the issue. In the past, a moratorium created urgency for people interested in a film to obtain it before it became unavailable. A side effect of the moratorium process was the fact that videos and DVDs of films, once they are placed on moratorium, would become collector's items. Additional unintended side-effects to the practice of moratorium had made films a prime target for internet piracy and bootleg sales.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Moratorium (Entertainment) Criticism of intellectual property Retail processes and techniques Scarcity

History

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See also

References