Starting Monday, the studio will sell copies of 150 films from the silent era to the 1980s Brat Pack that have never been released on DVD. Internet downloads of the movies will cost US$14.95, while DVDs sent in the mail (to US destinations only) are $19.95. Both can be ordered online.
The initiative, which Warner claims is the first of its kind for a major studio, is an effort by the Time Warner subsidiary to combat what could be a fundamental decline in demand for DVD purchases - a falloff that can be blamed on market saturation as much as the recession.