Audio Video News

B<I>reno Mello, Marpessa Dawn, Lourdes de Oliveira, Lea Garcia. Directed by Marcel Camus. Aspect ratio: 1.33:1 (widescreen). Dolby Digital 2.0 (mono). 107 minutes. 1959/1999. Criterion Collection 48. NR. $20.96.</I>

According to figures released last week by the <A HREF="http://www.cemacity.org">Consumer Electronics Manufacturers Association</A> (CEMA), an additional 900,000 DVD-Video players were shipped to retail in the third quarter of 1999, bringing total year-to-date hardware shipments to 2.2 million. The CEMA statistics also reveal that DVD-Video experienced approximately a 225% rate of growth in the third quarter of 1999 vs. the third quarter of 1998, shipping 600,000 more hardware units than shipped in the third quarter of 1998. CEMA estimates that total players shipped in 1999 will exceed 3 million units.

Until recently, the ticket price for consumers wishing to get into the high-definition TV game was $5000-$6000. With a new receiver/monitor combination that began shipping the first week of October, <A HREF="http://www.rca.com/">RCA</A> has slashed that price in half. The model MM36100 is a 36"-diagonal digital high-resolution television monitor with a suggested list price of $2499. A companion receiver/converter box, the DTC100, carries a suggested retail price of $649. The pair are expected to sell together for around $3000.

Think there's a huge market for personal video recorders, or PVRs? So does Wall Street. On September 30, <A HREF="http://www.tivo.com/">TiVo Inc.</A>, the Sunnyvale, California-based maker of hard-disk time-shifters, earned more than $88 million with an initial public stock offering. TiVo shares rose from an opening price of $13.94 to $29.94 each in the first day of trading, a gain of 87%. A total of 5.5 million shares were sold at $16 each.

Digital television (DTV) sales to dealers exceeded 50,000 units at the end of August, according to figures released last week by the <A HREF="http://www.cemacity.org/">Consumer Electronics Manufacturers Association</A> (CEMA). At CEMA's recent DTV Summit, the organization's fifth, CEMA president Gary Shapiro stated that "DTV is moving forward at a promising pace, and we expect continued success in the third and fourth quarters."

Last week, <A HREF="http://www.warner.com/">Warner Home Video</A> announced North American shipments to dealers of 1.5 million DVDs of <I>The Matrix</I>, generating $23.4 million in revenues and establishing yet another benchmark in DVD's market acceptance. Setting another industry record, <I>The Matrix</I>, released on DVD September 21, generated sales to consumers of approximately 780,000, or 52% of the shipment totals mentioned above, making it the most successful DVD in first-week sales. According to VideoScan, first-week consumer sales of <I>The Matrix</I> on DVD were three times greater than the next-highest-selling title to date.

J<I>imi Hendrix, The Who, The Doors, Free, Joni Mitchell, Jethro Tull, Joan Baez. Directed by Murray Lerner. Aspect ratio: 1.66:1 (widescreen). Dolby Digital stereo. 120 minutes. 1995. Sony/Legacy LVD 49335. NR. $19.95.</I>