So what do you do when your boutique Conservative™ movie flops hard at the box office? Well, obviously you release it on DVD as quickly as possible. But what if you're afraid that won't go over so well either? Simple! Just convince the few people interested to buy it four times! And that is what the Atlas Shrugged people
have done: they've released four slightly different DVDs of the film, but they really want you to buy them all. The four versions are the Special Edition, the Atlas Society Edition, the FreedomWorks edition, and the Reason (Magazine) Edition. All four editions contain the same version of the movie, but with ever-so-slightly different bonus features which don't seem terribly substantial to begin with, and could all probably fit on one DVD. Lucky Randites, however, are definitely going to want to buy the Collector's Box Set, which features all four DVDs of the same movie four times with their slightly different bonus features, or the Galt Collection, which features the same movie four times plus geegaws, or the Deluxe Galt Collection, which features the same movie four times plus slightly different geegaws.
This is textbook core-audience soaking, like when Marvel cynically puts out the same comic book with five different front covers. It's just free enterprise at work, people! You may also wish to purchase actual frames from the release prints (or "Cels" as they incorrectly call them), which are certain to be in pristine condition. There's also an overpriced aluminum bracelet (?) which is actually attractive, and a lapel pin of the film's ugly logo which I only like because it reminds me of the
old K-tel logo. Oddly enough, trucker hats are not available, so they obviously don't know their audience very well.
I hope fans of the movie and/or Ayn Rand really do buy and wear those lapel pins, because it's hard to imagine a better warning sign (other than a Gadsden Flag draped over the shoulders).
14 comments:
How about the cheesy Who is John Galt? poster for $24.95?
Gawd. Ayn Rand is somebody you should be outgrowing in high school, not lugging with you into the Federal Reserve.
Does this mean George Lucas is a closet Randian?
I know what you're saying, Matty, but this is a little different. Sure, Lucas keeps coming out with different editions of the Star Wars movies, but usually only when a new format becomes dominant. The present case of the Atlas Shrugged movie is an obvious attempt to get the same people to simultaneously buy more than one of the same product.
You're right, that's an important distinction. Your original comparison of five covers for the same comic book is much more apt.
Can you link to the attractive overpriced bracelet?
The bracelet is, agreed, both attractive and way, way overpriced! Only thing on the page I'm even remotely interested in, but of course I'd never wear it because somebody might think I liked the movie.
"Cels"? They call them "cels"?!? As Bugs Bunny would say, what maroons.
Some poor chumps were excitedly preparing to buy the entire Boxed Set! Yow!
For unimaginable reasons, there are comments allowed on the bracelet page. This is from "Cruise_man," whose Christian faith in an avowed atheist seems to have been profoundly shaken:
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"I purchased the bracelet for my wife on May 7, 2011, from your site. My wife loved the bracelet and what it stood for. She wore it to church last Sunday, and somewhere between singing in the choir, and meeting with people afterwards, it was gone. She never knew it had fallen off. She said that the magnet held the bracelet on ok, but, if it was bumped, it would easily come apart. We had planned to take it to a jewelery store to have a safety chain clasp added, but, it wasn't soon enough. Needless to say, the bracelet should have the option provided, even for a few extra dollars, to have a safety clasp available, in addition to the magnet."
Props to you, jg, for finding that gem in the comments. I only managed to get through a couple of pages before I had to take the vapors.
I'd definitely go for a trucker hat, though.
Needless to say, the bracelet should have the option provided, even for a few extra dollars, to have a safety clasp available, in addition to the magnet."
Well of course! The bracelet appears to be priced at $500, and, as one commenter laments, it's not even made of silver!
There's a sucker born every minute!
Oh, no I take that back. The whole "collection" is $500, including the tacky aluminum bracelet.
The randian goo-gaw set demands stricter bracelet regulations.
"Who is Ayn Rand?"
-John Galt
You know, I just played Bioshock 2 on my vacation, a game set in an undersea Objectivist Utopia, created by one "Andrew Ryan." All of the architecture is that cool 30s/40s Late Gothic Revival with lots of Deco touches, but with deep-sea fish swimming by the windows.
Anyway, Ryan is pretty much Galt, creating his city, Rapture, under the sea where everything can be had, for a price, with no damn "parasites" or governments to sponge or forbid the artists and scientists and businessmen from doing what they want, and they develop some remarkable, almost god-like technology.
It pretty much ends the way you think, with most of the surviving population turned into gun-toting, stark raving mad -- yet privileged! -- junkies, and the whole place basically devouring itself.
I guess my whole point is that they should probably throw the whole damn movie to the bottom of the ocean.
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