Dragon Dynasty is a joint venture started by

The Weinstein Company The Weinstein Company (usually credited or abbreviated as TWC) was an American independent film studio, founded in New York City by Bob and Harvey Weinstein in March 2005. TWC was one of the largest mini-major film studios in North America pri ...

and

Genius Products Genius Products (also known as Genius Entertainment) was an entertainment company based in Santa Monica, California, United States. The ''Baby Genius'' line was one of a number of "smart toys" that came out in response to a study book about the ...

. The company was created on May 23, 2006 for the sole purpose of distributing East Asian films on DVD in the U.S., whose licenses are held by, or will be acquired by,

. Dragon Dynasty showcases classic and contemporary Asian cinema, particularly those films which fall under the

action Action may refer to: * Action (narrative), a literary mode * Action fiction, a type of genre fiction * Action game, a genre of video game Film * Action film, a genre of film * ''Action'' (1921 film), a film by John Ford * ''Action'' (1980 fil ...

and

martial arts Martial arts are codified systems and traditions of combat practiced for a number of reasons such as self-defense; military and law enforcement applications; competition; physical, mental, and spiritual development; entertainment; and the preser ...

genre.

History

Quentin Tarantino Quentin Jerome Tarantino (; born March 27, 1963) is an American film director, writer, producer, and actor. His films are characterized by stylized violence, extended dialogue, profanity, dark humor, non-linear storylines, cameos, ensembl ...

, who is well recognized for his passionate interest and broad knowledge of Asian cinema, was said to actively work with the Weinsteins in all aspects of Dragon Dynasty. On March 12, 2007, Dragon Dynasty unveiled its new website featuring an enhanced features and a new layout. While the website had been available since the creation of Dragon Dynasty, the website only had minimal information related to the company and its releases and the website went without updates for several months. The new website features information on its catalog titles, upcoming releases and a blog by

Hong Kong cinema The cinema of Hong Kong ( zh, t=香港電影) is one of the three major threads in the history of Chinese language cinema, alongside the cinema of China and the cinema of Taiwan. As a former British colony, Hong Kong had a greater degree of pol ...

expert Bey Logan. In an interview with

Hong Kong Cinemagic Hong Kong Cinemagic, sometimes referred to as HKCinemagic, is a bilingual (French and English) website providing a repository for information about Chinese language films from Hong Kong, China and Taiwan, and the people who created them. The websit ...

on March 6, 2008, Logan confirmed that Dragon Dynasty also intend to roll out their catalogue in the U.K. In September 2009, Logan left The Weinstein Company, embarking on a new career as a

film producer A film producer is a person who oversees film production. Either employed by a production company or working independently, producers plan and coordinate various aspects of film production, such as selecting the script, coordinating writing, di ...

in Hong Kong. He confirmed that Dragon Dynasty would continue releasing East Asian films after his departure and that he would retain a consultancy role to assist the company with future acquisitions. Vice President of Asian Brand Management and Post Production, Brian White, also left The Weinstein Company in April 2009 to pursue independent production projects, but will maintain his long association with Asian cinema by providing consultancy and production services for the U.K. brand Cine Asia. As part of the formation of Dragon Dynasty, The Weinstein Company obtained the

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and th ...

n distribution licenses for all 43 titles from Fortune Star Entertainment, the distribution division of News Corporation's

STAR Group A star is an astronomical object comprising a luminous spheroid of plasma held together by its gravity. The nearest star to Earth is the Sun. Many other stars are visible to the naked eye at night, but their immense distances from Earth ...

which owns the world's largest contemporary Chinese-language feature film library. As well, they have obtained distribution licenses to a special collection of 50 classic

Shaw Brothers Shaw Brothers (HK) Ltd. () was the largest film production company in Hong Kong, and operated from 1925 to 2011. In 1925, three Shaw brothers— Runje, Runme, and Runde—founded Tianyi Film Company (also called "Unique") in Shang ...

movies and a number of independent acquisitions.

Criticism

On 19 June 2007, Dragon Dynasty released the film ''

My Young Auntie ''My Young Auntie'' aka ''Fangs of The Tigress'' is a 1981 Hong Kong action film from the Shaw Brothers studio. The film is directed by Lau Kar Leung and stars Kara Hui, Hsiao Ho, Wang Lung Wei, and Gordon Liu. In a change from Lau Kar Leung's ...

''. The film was originally produced in Hong Kong by

in 1981 and was accordingly released with a

Cantonese Cantonese ( zh, t=廣東話, s=广东话, first=t, cy=Gwóngdūng wá) is a language within the Chinese (Sinitic) branch of the Sino-Tibetan languages originating from the city of Guangzhou (historically known as Canton) and its surrounding a ...

soundtrack as standard. However, Dragon Dynasty's DVD features only the Mandarin and English dubbed soundtracks. Whilst it is true that some of the cast spoke Mandarin during filming (as is often the case with Hong Kong film productions), the main star (

Kara Hui Kara Wai Ying-hung BBS (; born 3 February 1960) is a Hong Kong actress best known internationally for her roles in wuxia films produced by the Shaw Brothers Studio in the 1970s and 1980s. Wai has since portrayed a wide range of roles on screen ...

) and many other cast members spoke Cantonese. On 10 February 2009, Dragon Dynasty released the film ''

My Father Is a Hero ''My Father Is a Hero'' (, released in the United States and United Kingdom as ''The Enforcer'' and ''Jet Li's The Enforcer'') is a 1995 Hong Kong action film starring Jet Li and the late superstar Anita Mui, directed by Corey Yuen, who also co- ...

'' under the title ''The Enforcer''. This was the second release from the company that did not include the original Cantonese language soundtrack, containing only the dubbed English audio that had originally featured on the 2000 release from

Dimension Films Dimension Films is an American film production company owned by Lantern Entertainment. It was formerly used as Harvey and Bob Weinstein's label within Miramax, which was acquired by The Walt Disney Company on June 30, 1993, to produce and r ...

(also owned by The Weinstein Company). Complaints from customers elicited a statement from the company :

"Dragon Dynasty strives to provide fans with only the highest quality DVD releases, including restored video and audio and extensive never-before-seen bonus features created exclusively for the label. Though no usable version of the original Cantonese-language track was available in time for this release, every effort was made to bring together the best elements in the world in creating the greatest version of ''The Enforcer'' ever experienced on DVD in the U.S."

Other criticisms of Dragon Dynasty DVDs take issue with their release of shorter U.S cuts of films when longer uncut versions are available in Hong Kong and other Asian countries. The film '' Police Story 3: Super Cop'' (released as ''Supercop''), which is tagged as the "Ultimate Edition" on the cover artwork, comes in for particular criticism. Although it is the first western DVD release of this film to contain the original Cantonese audio, the DVD still contains the shorter U.S. cut. Contrarily, the DVD features an interview with star

Jackie Chan Fang Shilong (born 7 April 1954), known professionally in English as Jackie Chan and in Chinese as Cheng Long ( zh, c=成龍, j=Sing4 Lung4; "becoming the dragon"), is a Hong Kong actor, filmmaker, martial artist, and stuntman known for ...

, in which he argues that he has already edited the film once, questioning the American distributors' need to re-edit. More recently, similar (and often identical) criticisms have been leveled at the label's

Blu-ray Disc The Blu-ray Disc (BD), often known simply as Blu-ray, is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 2005 and released on June 20, 2006 worldwide. It is designed to supersede the DVD format, and capable of sto ...

releases, following their adoption of the format in early 2010.

References

External links

Dragon Dynasty - Official Site

The Weinstein Co.
{{Authority control The Weinstein Company DVD companies of the United States Companies established in 2006 Home video lines Films about dragons