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Posted by:

Victor_Von

Date:

February 8th, 2007 1:06 AM

Header:

The Last Unicorn-- Ultra Special Edition

Bulletin:

Not exactly a comics post, but likely to interest a lot of people here.

Ganked from dirkdada who ganked it from an e-mail sent out by penitent_tom. The words belong to the latter; I definitely share the sentiments.

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Just thought I'd mention the fact that the good people at Conlan Press have decided to do what they can to rectify a situation that has been bothering me for some time. For a couple of decades now, one of my favorite fantasy novels has been Peter S. Beagle's The Last Unicorn. Like many people in our age range, I have fond memories of not only reading the book, but of watching the animated film (both on television and in the theaters), starring the voices of Mia Farrow, Angela Lansbury, Rene Auberjenois, and Christopher Lee, among many others. The film's music was performed by the then-popular rock group America, and in fact its soundtrack still rates as the highest-selling film soundtrack of all time. In short, the companies that produced this film (Rankin/Bass and the Saul Zaentz Company, and more recently the British company known as Granada) have made lots of money over the years through distribution and merchandising rights.
Peter S. Beagle has made almost none. And not only is the film based on his novel, he also wrote the script. . . . Granada has refused to give Beagle his contractually dictated share of the profits, citing "interest charges" as their reason. So the holding companies continue to make money with every DVD sold, and Beagle continues to not earn a cent of it. According to Beagle himself, he can't even raise the money to sue Granada, as his finances are tied up dealing with the failing health of his 100 year old mother.

Enter Conlan Press. They're offering copies of the recently released 25th Anniversary edition of this classic film on-line for $15, or $25 if you'd like a personally signed edition. Fully one half of the total sale price (not the company's profits, but the full value) of each DVD they sell will go directly to Peter Beagle. I thought this was a very stand-up sort of thing for Conlan to do, and figured I'd spread the word among the various people I know who might be interested in both obtaining a signed copy of this film and in helping out the author.

DVDs can be purchased at the following link: http://www.conlanpress.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc

Mind the Gap,
Mike
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Sounds to me like everyone wins. I'm definitely buying a copy.

Also: why does Hollywood hate movies?

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