I have the Hong Kong version of "Shaolin Soccer", which I purchased from www.sensasian.com.

The rights to the film have been purchased by Disney, and is longer available from American Hong Kong DVD sites like HKFlix* and Poker Industries.

If their treatment of "Shaolin Soccer is anything like their treatment of "Jackie Chan's Project A", you can expect the DVD to be dubbed badly, have 15 to 20 minutes of the film edited out, and the original score missing.

Concerned?  Check out what is going on at the www.cityonfire.com forum.  We are mounting a campaign to let Disney (including Dimension, Buena Vista, and Miramax, it's subsidiaries) know that these practices are unacceptable.

*posted at the HKFlix site:

"URGENT NOTE: According to Disney, who claims exclusive North American distribution rights to this film, it is a violation of United States law for any North America-based company to sell this title. Any such competitors of ours selling this title are doing so in violation of U.S. law. We are as unhappy about this as you, and we thank you in advance for your continued support of HKFlix.com. 

Please note that many people make an argument that "Disney only owns the rights to the English version", or "... only for their own edited version". This argument is nothing more than a thin excuse to continue selling imports. Anyone who had actually read Disney's contracts with the overseas film studios would know that Disney owns the rights to all versions of the film; and it is up to them how they release it here. It doesn't matter if Disney edits or dubs a film, that is up to them, and they still retain rights to all versions sold in this country."

I'll post the list of DVDs that have been effected by this Disney edict in another thread.

Sherry

