CommanderBond.net

James Bond Helps United Artists Turn 90

Celebrations include film festival featuring 'Dr. No'

Wonder which 20 cities will be the lucky ones...

I'm glad to see UA celebrated. It's ticks me off when I read how "MGM is responsible for Bond, Rocky, Pink Panther," etc. MGM had nothing to do with the creation of these franchises. It was UA. Just because you buy a company doesn't mean you can suddenly co opt it's legacy.

Let's get those UA logos back on the DVDs! Fight the power!

I've always been a bit confused on the whole UA/ MGM thing. From what I understand, UA was a totally seperate studio, with no affliation with MGM when the early films came out. Then, at a certain point in time, MGM bought them out, and taking over the distribution rights to their films. So films would still be made by UA, just they would be distributed by MGM, with the lion roar attached to the UA logo. Kinda like how Sony has slapped the Columbia logo onto almost everything MGM does now. Just wondering if I'm correct in my thinking.

Cause if that's the case, then UA really is in charge of some of the best film franchaise and MGM's just robbed them of the title. All MGM does is release the films, which they don't even do anymore. So, if they were doing the MGM ahead of UA logos all this time, shouldn't it now be a Fox logo, since Fox now has the distribution rights? And with the recent revival of the company will the UA logo ever return to Bond, maybe on the start of Bond 22? I really miss it. But one thing I'm just wondering a little bit, I just was looking at my UE DVD of TWINE and it has a UA logo on the back, but the film itself just has MGM, what happened there?

I was thinking the same thing.

mister-white, check out this article. The 1970s and 1980s section answers your question on the UA - MGM relationship.

Pretty cool. Hope we alot more Bond involvement in these upcoming events.

I'm assuming the Dr. No DVD here is probably just the recent Ultimate Edition release.

Do a google search with the terms "United Artists" and "Heaven's Gate" and you'll find out what happened to UA. MGM came in and, as you said, took over. Film studios, by and large, were struggling for many years by now. Paramount was taken over by Gulf + Western.

As far as Bond is concerned, "OP" was the first film to use the MGM lion, although a quick, shrunken UA credit followed. "TLD" saw the return of a UA logo after being totally absent in "AVTAK" (unless you count seeing "MGM/UA" above the lion). And then "LTK" was solely the UA logo at the time. Later, "GE" and "ND" had the updated UA logo. But then with "TWINE" up through "CR" it's been back to the MGM lion...and of course the addition of the Columbia lady.

Curiously, the two Dalton films seem to retain the UA logo and music/sound of the time when the films were released while the other films use updated MGM/UA/Sony/Whatever logos. I'm sure it's not an oversight. An armada of Hollywood lawyers enforce the use of appropriate studio/distributor logos for all time.

So, I've got the basic idea of what happened. Just wondering why the UE's of some of the films, even some of the first ones with Connery, all have the MGM lion without the UA logo, just wondering about that now? And does anyone know if we might see the return of the UA logo on Bond 22? It'll be nice to see it back (but kinda weird if they just put that and the Columbia logo on the film- without the lion).

Out of curiosity, can anyone confirm that the Bond films in this collection are the same ones as the Ultimate Edition releases?

"The campaign includes the first-ever traveling United Artists Film Festival, a 20 plus market tour of independent theaters and cinema houses in key cities throughout the United States that returns some of UAs' brightest stars and most beloved films to the big screen with premiere screenings of DR. NO, A FISTFUL OF DOLLARS, ROCKY and ANNIE HALL, among others."

Anybody heard anything more about this traveling 'Film Festival'?...