Spice World, released in 1997, is finally set to re-enter distribution – but lots of other films are still stuck in limbo. More here. Spice World might not be getting the kind of Criterion approach that Stanley Kubrick’s filmography is about to be treated to, but – snobs be damned – it’s a whole lot ... Spice World | Why it’s not (yet) available, and the increasingly muddled world of film rights
Spice World, released in 1997, is finally set to re-enter distribution – but lots of other films are still stuck in limbo. More here.
Spice World might not be getting the kind of Criterion approach that Stanley Kubrick’s filmography is about to be treated to, but – snobs be damned – it’s a whole lot of fun. Creaky? Yep. Messy? Yep. Fun? Also yep.
The 1997 film is also, you might notice, one of several that you simply can’t find on any home format. It’s been over 20 years since the last UK physical media release – hence, someone trying to ask £223 for a second hand copy at the time of writing (50% of the cost of the Kubrick set!) – and that’s only been on DVD. No Blu-ray, no 4K remaster, and you won’t find the film on streaming, either.
Specific to Spice World, it’s been widely reported today that the rights have been sorted – by the Spice Girls themselves. Chatting to Louis Theroux, Melanie Chisholm has confirmed that the film will be available in the “not-too-distant future”, presumably in time for its 30th birthday next year.
She noted that “there were a lot of people that owned it. It was kind of all over the place. So we’ve had to come together. The Spice Girls now fully own it.”
As such, it can now (legally) re-enter distribution.
But it raises other points.
Spice World was distributed in the UK by Polygram Filmed Entertainment in the 1990s, which was ultimately swallowed up by Universal.
But looking at other Polygram films from that era, and several are also unavailable. Tim Robbins’ Oscar-winning Dead Man Walking hasn’t had a physical release in the UK since a DVD edition in 2001, and isn’t on streaming (nor is Robbins’ directorial debut, Bob Roberts.)
Early Brad Pitt movie Kalifornia, quite the conversation point back in 1993, is out of print and not on streaming in the UK. Jonathan Pryce and Emma Thompson-headlined Carrington, widely tipped for awards attention in 1995, is absent. As is Danny Boyle’s A Life Less Ordinary, starring Ewan McGregor and Cameron Diaz.
Were it not for legacy DVD releases of these films, you wouldn’t be able to legally watch them at home in the UK (save for importing).
In these instances, it’s not just affected streaming rights, it’s worth adding that there’s no recent physical media release to fall back on. Often, as is the case with Spice World, just an old DVD that’s struggling to pass muster on a modern telly, which was released two decades ago. A firm tap of the physical media sign here of course: owning a disc puts us less at the whims of streamers.
But also less at the whims of rights problems.
Spice World is a high-profile enough example that in the end, somebody was going to sort it out, and the Spice Girls have the resources and financial muscle to do so. But that are umpteen films from that same era – and again, I’ve just pulled some examples from one company – that are unavailable, without a global music group to sort it out.
I’d end this on a Spice Girls pun, but I don’t wannabe that person.
