One of our readers, Michael, sent this e-mail he received from Netflix regarding the movie "Chariots of Fire:"
Dear Michael: The movie: Chariots of Fire(1981) has been removed from your Netflix Rental Queue. Unfortunately, we will no longer offer it for rental on our web site. We realize this is disappointing and want to reassure you that we only remove movies in unusual circumstances. We apologize for the inconvenience and hope you find many other movies to enjoy on our web site. Thank you, The Netflix Team
When I go to rent the movie, it allows me to save it but does not show a release date. The movie was released on DVD on August 22, 1997 and is available for sale on Amazon.
I know that Netflix owns copies of some movies and pays royalties on the rest. Might be some a royalty issue with the owners of the movie.
That happened to me for some old B&W movie that my wife ordered. I don't read too much into it. Maybe folks stole or lost all their copies, and Netflix doesn't feel like replacing them.
Posted by: plong | April 13, 2004 at 02:06 PM
I got this notice too. It's interesting that so many people wanted the movie too.
Posted by: John Robb | April 13, 2004 at 02:55 PM
Odd indeed -- I actually had it out recently although I believe we just sent it back.
-Motts
Posted by: mottsmcg | April 13, 2004 at 03:30 PM
Crazy. It's not very old, it's not B&W, it's not in a foreign language, it's not violent, it's not controversial, it's not a bad movie (just the opposite: best picture Oscar). I can't think of any reason not to rent (or watch!) this movie.
Posted by: | April 13, 2004 at 04:04 PM
I've run into this with NetFlix a couple of times in the past. Since NetFlix is considered a rental company ala Blockbuster they are subject to the same issues with the releasing company. When the publishing company plans to release a new version (Directors Cut, Special Edition, whatever) they pull all copies out of the supply chain in anticipation of the new release.
Indeed, if you check out the following page you'll see that a Special Edition is due out this year. http://www.dvdangle.com/articles/se_list.html
Posted by: Roger | April 13, 2004 at 04:22 PM
I'm with you, Roger. I think they are having license issues with it, possibly related to the pending SE release. I had "Room With A View" in my queue for the longest time, under status "long wait--out of print", until the SE came out, then it was place in my "awaiting release" queue.
Posted by: Becky | April 15, 2004 at 01:57 PM
Netflix did this with my request for "Meet the Feebles", supposedly a very disgusting movie by Peter ("LOTR") Jackson. It was probably a licensing issue, though at the time we wondered if PJ were just so embarrassed by his past, he stole all of Netflix's copies!
Posted by: pam | April 20, 2004 at 07:15 PM
no joke, my friend has the netflix copy of "chariots of fire", they are returning it today, they also cancelled their netflix membership.
Posted by: in the know | April 30, 2004 at 11:08 AM