HD DVD’s Last Chance For Limelight

Posted on Saturday, March 1, 2008 by MegaZone

As HD DVD plays out its last days on the market, it has had one last shot at the limelight. For the week ended 2/24 HD DVD managed to grab 23% of the high-def market, with Blu-ray taking the other 77%. This makes them 76:24 for the year, and 65:35 since inception. But the real story is American Gangster. It managed to do something HD DVD has done in quite a while, take the top spot for best selling high-def title. In fact, it is the only HD DVD release to make the top 10, outselling second place Blu-ray Michael Clayton 3:2. This is one of the last major HD DVD exclusive blockbuster titles, there aren’t many titles left. And it is possible that some of those announced titles could be dropped, just as Paramount did with their post 3/4 titles.

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MegaZone is the Editor of Gizmo Lovers and the chief contributor. He's been online since 1989 and active in several generations of 'social media' - mailing lists, USENet groups, web forums, and since 2003, blogging.    MegaZone has a presence on several social platforms: Google+ / Facebook / Twitter / LinkedIn / LiveJournal / Web.    You can also follow Gizmo Lovers on other sites: Blog / Google+ / Facebook / Twitter.
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  • http://bjdraw.com Ben Drawbaugh

    It’s only fair to mention that American Gangster outsold Michael Clayton on DVD by over 3:1. If AG was available on Blu-ray, the blu version would’ve probably outsold red by over 4:1.

    We’re going to see the same thing next week as Beowulf was released against a sorry Blu-ray lineup. But that’s it after that. There are only 14 HD DVDs left from major studios (2 from Universal and 12 from Warner) and there’s no reason to think they’ll be canceled.

  • http://www.gizmolovers.com/ MegaZone

    EDIT: Oh, never mind, I misread what you wrote and saw ‘DVD” as ‘HD DVD’. Oops.

    Are you sure it is 3:1? Going by this table it looks like 3:2. The #1 title, American Gangster, is indexed at 100%. Michael Clayton, the #2 title, is 62.24% Meaning for every 1 AG sold, MC sold .6224 – or just shy of 2 MCs for every 3 AGs.