Young Frankenstein: Mel Brooks’ masterpiece can’t be rented or purchased digitally
Ever since Disney acquired 20th Century Fox, many classic movies produced by the studio have become surprisingly difficult to find. Some notable examples include the 1972 classic The Hot Rock, starring Robert Redford (which is actually airing on TCM tonight, so set your PVRs), Ron Howard’s Cocoon, the Thanksgiving classic Dutch, Kathryn Bigelow’s Strange Days, and so many more. However, one that’s puzzling in its absence is Mel Brooks’ Young Frankenstein, which celebrated its 50th anniversary last year. Despite being considered one of Brooks’ all-time classics, and one of the greatest comedies of all time, the film isn’t available on 4K disc, nor is it streaming anywhere. You can’t even buy it or rent it digitally from iTunes or any other service. The only way to obtain it is through the 2008 Blu-ray Disc, which, fortunately, is still in print and relatively easy to purchase. That said, it’s a seventeen-year-old disc…
What’s strange is that the movie was restored in 4K last year. It screened fairly widely, with numerous revival screenings taking place all over North America. It played a cool arthouse theater here in Montreal – the Cinema Moderne – and sold out every screening. You’d think Disney would have reissued it shortly after (it’s also getting a TV spinoff on FX). Still, it seems like they’ve all but gotten out of the physical media business, with them rarely issuing discs unless it’s for a huge catalogue title like Die Hard, Speed, Predator or one of the Alien movies (although Alien 3 and Alien: Resurrection still aren’t out in 4K).
This is a pretty unacceptable turn of events, as the Fox catalogue is legendary. It’s crazy that they haven’t followed other studios like Warner Bros, Universal and Paramount, who, having cut back on their own physical media releases, have licensed them to places like Arrow Video, Kino Lorber, Shout, Vinegar Syndrome and others. Indeed, any of those companies would love to get their hands on Young Frankenstein. The movie is so well regarded that I’m sure Criterion would love to add it to the collection (it’s streamed now and then on The Criterion Channel).
At least, the movie is still available on Blu-ray, which is more than can be said for many other movies. But, there’s something unacceptable about the fact that Young Frankenstein is relatively hard to find these days, driving home the importance of physical media, a sentiment echoed by director Christopher Miller, whose tweet about this spawned this article:
In addition to Young Frankenstein, what other movies are shockingly tough to find?
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