Tag Archives: dvd

Song of the South Turns 74; Blu-rays Abound

UPDATE: The Blu-ray reviewed in this article appears to no longer be available. Song of the South is still available for viewing over at Archive.org.

Today marks the 74th anniversary of Song of the South. The Academy Award winning and controversial film debuted on November 12, 1946 in Atlanta, Georgia at the Fox Theater. Many photos from the world premier can be found in the Photos section. Lots of memorabilia, radio programs, music and more from the 1946 premier can also be found on the 1946 Campaign page.

With the 75th anniversary of the movie just around the corner in 2021, it’s looking less and less likely for Disney to officially re-release this film. 2020 has proven to be a very active year for news related to Song of the South:

  • March 11, 2020: Disney Chairman Robert Iger states that Song of the South will not appear on Disney+, despite several other movies receiving disclaimers for “outdated cultural depictions”.
  • June 2020: Some Disney fans began petitioning Disney to re-theme their popular theme park attraction Splash Mountain, loosely based on Song of the South’s animated sequences, with The Princess and the Frog. The petition reached over 21,377 signatures before declaring victory.
  • June 25, 2020: Disney Parks announces on their Twitter account plans to “Completely Reimagine” Splash Mountain to The Princess and the Frog. Reactions have been mixed, with the tweet gaining over 78K likes, but a counter-petition to leave the ride as-is garnering nearly 86,000 signatures as of this posting.
  • August 26, 2020: Disney begins removing the Academy Award winning song “Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah” from their theme parks.

Meanwhile — faced with the reality of an unlikely official release of the movie — fan-based, unofficial Blu-ray copies of the film have exploded in popularity this year. Copies can be found all over the Internet and eBay. I had an opportunity to review one such copy, produced by Stinky Tuna. The quality is by far the best out there to date, owing in part to its source — a 16mm film print originally remastered and still available to view on archive.org.

There are also a lot more special features than previous unofficial, lower quality DVD releases, including History of The Tar Baby, Read & Sing-Along Video, Virtual Reality Ride of Splash Mountain, Rare Behind-the-Scenes and B-Roll Footage, and multiple Theatrical Trailers. This particular Blu-ray is manufactured in Japan, where Disney’s copyright on Song of the South has expired — in 2006, Japanese courts ruled that any movies made prior to 1953 were now public domain. The movie is available to purchase over at StinkyTuna.com for $17.99. [Update: Link removed as this link no longer works.]

As long as you’re comfortable with unofficial, fan-made copies, the plethora of Blu-rays saturating the market today almost completely satisfies the need of making this movie available to the public. This makes hunting down official-but-inferior-quality VHS or Laserdisc copies a thing of the past.

Still, we will always hold out hope that Disney will choose to own up to its history and make this film available officially before it becomes public domain in 2041. Whether you love, hate, or are indifferent to this movie, it was one of Walt Disney’s personal favorites (read why), and it won 2 Academy Awards, including the first ever Oscar to an African American man, James Baskett, for his outstanding portrayal of the wise and kind folklore hero, Uncle Remus.

As always, you can sign the petition to release the film, nominate Song of the South to be added to the National Film Registry, and more. Read more about how you can help over on the Frequently Asked Questions page.

Wikipedia Rumor: “Diamond Edition” Song of the South DVD

First, let me say that Wikipedia is by no means a reliable source for Song of the South rumors. The very nature of Wikipedia is that it can easily be revised by pretty much anyone. This leads to a lot of unfounded speculation, which amounts to no more than defacement in my opinion. However, in the interest of Song of the South rumors, I will post this. But, depending on how frequently Wikipedia rumors keep cropping up, I may become more selective as to which ones I report on, or I may stop posting on them altogether.

On May 9th, the following information was added to the Disney Special Editions page of Wikipedia by someone at the IP address 189.82.131.134:

Title Discs UK Release Date US Release Date Notes
Song of the South: 60th Anniversary Edition 2 May 2010 February 9, 2010 DVD and Blu-ray Disc – First release on DVD and Blu-ray Disc

There’s just one problem with this: Song of the South’s 60th anniversary was in 2006. This blatantly errant entry was removed two days later, on May 11th, by IP address 76.186.137.190.

Then, on May 23rd, the same IP (76.186.137.190) added Song of the South back on the list:

Title Discs UK Release Date US Release Date Notes
Song of the South: Diamond Edition 2 March 2012 March 13, 2012 Platinum Edition (US) (DVD/Blu-ray Disc) First Digital Release

Notice how the release date is now 2 years further away, but now is supposedly part of Disney’s new “Diamond Edition” series. This addition was removedonly 12 hours later by IP address 189.82.136.79.

So there you have it… basically what amounts to a cyber “tug of war” for Song of the South. One thing’s for certain: it hasn’t been released yet, and until it does Disney will just continue to lose money to the bootleggers out there.

Rumor: Song of the South Preview on Upcoming Sleeping Beauty DVD?

It has been reported that a Wikipedia page on Walt Disney’s Sleeping Beauty has a reference to a Song of the South “Sneak Peek” in the upcoming 50th Anniversary Platinum Edition DVD release, scheduled for October 7, 2008:

A 50th Anniversary Platinum Edition release of Sleeping Beauty, as a 2-disc DVD & Blu-ray Disc, is currently scheduled for October 7, 2008. This release will make Sleeping Beauty the first entry in the Platinum Edition line to be released in high definition video. The Blu-ray version will feature BD-Live, an online feature, and the extras will include a virtual castle and multi-player games. (The sneak peek includes Pinocchio, Bolt, The Princess and the Frog, WALL-E, Song of the South and Tinker Bell.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleeping_Beauty_(1959_film)

No additional information has been found on this claim, so it has been labeled a rumor. The DVD is available for preorder on Amazon.com. Has anyone else out there heard anything about this? If so, please contact me. Special thanks to Jeff S. for the news report!

UPDATE 9/28/08: The reference to Song of the South has been removed. One of the nice things about Wikipedia is that all changes are logged. If you view the page history, we can see that the reference to Song of the South has been added, and subsequently removed, multiple times since the beginning of August. The first time Song of the South was added was on August 4th (see edit) by IP address 76.208.167.85.

UPDATE 10/22/08: Now that several people have received their Sleeping Beauty DVDs, this rumor can be put to rest; there is no preview or “sneak peak” of Song of the South as had been posted on Wikipedia.

Song of the South Mentioned at Blu-ray Conference

Engadget has reported on the Blu-ray Press Conference held at CES on Monday, January 7th in Las Vegas. Among many of the panel members was Bob Chapek, President of Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment. During the question & answer session, the following question was posed:

Q. With Blu-ray the aparent winner, are we going to see more catalogue titles?

A. Bob says Song of the South won’t be covered here today, but one of the pinnacle moments was when we decided to bring out Snow White, which signaled it was mass market, since this was a most cherished title. This time they are releasing Snow White this October. “And what’s the price point Bob?” “Wow” — and as a result we know where this is going. David Bishop says most of the panel lived through DVD and just like that, they look at the core and try to release products that are valuable to them.

It’s interesting that he even chose to mention Song of the South at all at a Blu-ray conference. Is he just getting the disclaimer out there to preempt anyone who might ask about Song of the South? At the very least it’s a recognition that there is a lot of interest in Song of the South being released, whether it be on regular DVD or Blu-ray. Read into it however you want. Special thanks to Konrad Haskins for the news report!

Song of the South DVD Release Possible on New Walt Disney Legacy Series?

There is a new DVD series coming out called the Walt Disney Legacy Collection. Could this series possibly be an avenue to finally release Song of the South? Maerj over at the UltimateDisney.com Forums recently went to a DVD signing with Roy Disney:

“I asked about the possibility of releasing Song of the South on one of these Legacy sets and he [Roy Disney] knocked on the nearest peice of wood and said ‘I’m hoping they agree to it.’ So it sounds like he is really pushing for it. I think the Legacy sets would be the perfect outlet for the film. Maybe if the fans really started writing in to the right people it might help the process along?”

Take it for what it’s worth. I’d like to thank the anonymous source that contributed both news reports! Well, this will probably be the last news update until 2007. So until then, I hope you all have a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Song of the South Special Edition DVD To Be Released in 2006?

Today, Jim Hill over at Jim Hill Media posted “what he just heard from his sources deep inside Buena Vista Home Entertainment.” In the article, Jim claims that a Special Edition Song of the South DVD will finally be released in the fall of 2006, just in time for Song of the South‘s 60th Anniversary.

Why would Disney finally release this movie? Well, Disney’s financial reports for the first quarter of 2005 show that DVD sales are down by 20%. According to the source, BVHE is hoping to sell 10-12 million units of this movie, which would translate into big bucks (and certainly put the bootleggers out of business, which Disney has long been losing more and more money to.) Combine that with the fact that Song of the South is Disney’s most requested movie, plus its 60th anniversary on the horizon, and you have a potentially winning combo here.

There is a lot more to this claim than what I have mentioned here, so I encourage you to read Jim Hill’s full article and see for yourself:

http://www.jimhillmedia.com/mb/articles/showarticle.php?ID=1313

More Hope for a Song of the South DVD Release?

A recent thread over at the Home Theater Forum has brought out some very interesting news. Dick Cook, Chairman of the Walt Disney Studios, spoke at the Summer 2004 Annual Convention of the NFFC. The September/October 2004 issue of the FantasyLine Express (the club’s newsletter) reported part of his talk:

“After the formal part of his presentation, Cook took questions from Conventioneers. Among the issues on Conventioneers’ minds:

Will Song of the South ever be released on DVD?

“Yes. Cook said that the public has requested a DVD release of Song of the South more than it has requested any other film. That said, Disney also is aware that some elements of the film reflect the time in which it was made and don’t reflect current attitudes. He said that the Studio has encountered similar issues with other older material. In some cases, such as some of the World War II material in the Walt Disney Treasures DVD series, they’ve addressed the issue through introductions that place the material in context. He said that Disney hasn’t yet found the ideal solution forSong of the South, but he was confident that they would.”

Coming from the Chairman of the Walt Disney Studios, this sounds very hopeful. We now have confirmation that the studio recognizes it is the single most requested movie and that the studio is exploring ways that it can appropriately present this film to today’s audience. We just hope they leave the original film unaltered. Thanks to Lars Karlsen for the initial heads up!

This topic is also being discussed over at UltimateDisney.com, and a couple of other sites have since picked up on this story as well: ign.com’s “Will Song of the South Be Heard?” and FilmRot.com’s “Song of the South Ban Lifted?“

Film Print Fetches $8K on eBay; Song of the South 2nd on Amazon

A 16mm film print of Song of the South was recently offered up for auction on eBay, fetching a substantial $8,100. Pristine or high quality copies of Song of the South have always demanded a premium, with film prints usually demanding the highest prices. Another popular collector’s item, the Hong Kong laserdisc, regularly fetches over $1,000. Or, for those who aren’t bothered by subtitles, the Japanese laserdisc can normally be found in the $150-200 price range.

Meanwhile, several readers have noted that Song of the South has risen to the #2 spot in Amazon’s Most Requested DVDs, surpassed now only by “Twin Peaks – The Second Season.” The other releases that held Song of the South at 3rd place back in August have since been released. Be sure to Let Amazon (and Disney) know how many people want this movie released by going to this page and entering your email address.

Song of the South is Amazon’s 3rd Most Requested DVD

A couple of months ago, a reader pointed out that Song of the South was #5 among a list of Amazon’s Most Requested DVDs. Well folks, that number has since risen to #3. Song of the South is now only surpassed by Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (Platinum Series Special Extended Edition), which is guaranteed to be released in the near future, and “Charmed”, a 1998 TV series.

Amazon.com’s Song of the South DVD placeholder page states: “The studio is currently not producing this title on DVD, but to be notified when it is available, enter your e-mail address at right. You’ll also be voting for this release; we’ll let the studio know how many customers are waiting for this title.”

So, what are you waiting for? Go to this page and enter your email address to let Amazon (and, ultimately, Disney) know how many people want this movie released!

Portions of Song of the South Making Way into Disney DVDs

Several readers have noted that Disney’s new Masterpiece Edition DVD of Alice in Wonderland released on January 27 contains color footage from Song of the South: namely, Uncle Remus singing “Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah” and the animated sequence which follows, “Running Away.” This excerpt is included in the special feature “One Hour in Wonderland,” originally broadcast on Christmas 1950.

Previously, the only footage of Song of the South available on a Disney DVD was on the Disney Treasures: Disneyland USA DVD released back in December 2001. It contains the animated “Laughing Place” sequence in black-and-white, just as it was originally broadcast on ABC’s “Disneyland” TV show back in the 1950’s.

Also, March 2003 saw the release of the Vista Series DVD of Who Framed Roger Rabbit, which contains a publicity shot from Song of the South.

One can hope that this is a sign of Disney testing the waters for an eventual release of Song of the South on DVD.