avi@pegasus.UUCP (01/14/84)
Cable TV has finally been made available in my area and I want to choose a good movie channel. Disney is somewhat below my tastes (and the playboy channel is not available) so I must choose between HBO and Showtime. Showtime is a bit more expensive, but does not seem to have any major advantages over its competitor. Both channels seem to repeat the same movies (sometimes at the same time!!!!.) Are there any major advantages in choosing either one? The way I see it, getting a VCR will allow me to capture any movie shown on a channel at any time. At worst, I will have to wait a few months before I get to see a movie on the channel I choose. I know HBO has some privately made shows -- like the Paper Chase. Can anyone suggest other selection criteria? Comments? -- -=> Avi E. Gross @ AT&T Information Systems Laboratories (201) 576-6241 suggested paths: [ihnp4, allegra, cbosg, utcsstat, hogpc, ...]!pegasus!avi
jlilien@sdcrdcf.UUCP (01/26/84)
HBO, Showtime, and The Movie Channel are all "about" the same. The differences are minor, at best. HBO was the first, and their "we were here first" attitude is present in most of their previews and ads on real TV. They show mostly movies, with some specials and sports. The specials are often entitled "Standing Room Only", which are films of fairly recent live shows. The classic to date was probably Simon and Garfunkle's concert in Central Park. The sports in mostly boxing, although they do have shows like this week in the NHL, and provide some Tennis coverage. The locally produced program's are typically trashy, full of lots of mushy stuff that always works out OK in the end. The Paper Chase is locally produced by Showtime, not HBO. One local show, "Not Necessarily the News," is a news comedy show that is consistently very good. One thing to note is that HBO considers itself to be a family station, and only shows R rated movies at night. We don't subscribe to Showtime at my house, so I can't really comment on it directly. When they have "sample weekends", I really can't tell the difference between it and HBO. The Movie Channel only shows movies. No sports, and no specials. They don't have a particularly larger selection in any given month though, so its just more reruns. My objection to all of these services is the programming and scheduling. The programming is based on the selection of a few movies as "feature" movies of the month. Normally, these movies haven't been shown on cable before, and were in the Theater 9-12 months ago. They proceed to run these movies into the ground. They are on not less than 10 days on each station. And since the stations all pick the same feature movies, you have a pretty good chance of overlap. Sometimes, two stations even begin the same movie at the same time. To this set of feature movies they add a other movies to round out the month. These movies were either feature movies a few months ago, or else they are classics over 25 years old. They rarely have a movie on between 3 and 20 years old; I guess there weren't any good ones then! :-) These schedule is made by merging the feature movies, sports, and specials with the support movies. They really don't care much about times of day (except regarding kids). If they show a particular movie on some weeknight, this does not mean that on the same weeknight at the same time in the following week, the same movie wont be shown. Another problem is with irregular length movies. If a movie is 2 hours and 6 minutes long, it will not get scheduled as often as one that is 1 hour 47 minutes. The times it does get scheduled are not necessarily convenient, either. Well, much more of this and I would have to submit it to net.flame ~~~~- Joel
preece@uicsl.UUCP (01/26/84)
#R:pegasus:-86600:uicsl:12200045:000:505 uicsl!preece Jan 25 10:16:00 1984 You should be aware that there is going to be a greater diversity between the services in the future. Some movie studios are signing exclusive agreements (most notably, Paramount, I believe, has accepted a huge contract specifying that it will not release its new product to HBO for a long time after it has been released to Showtime/Movie Channel). I wouldn't give up HBO, 'cause I'd miss Fraggle Rock, but there are also some exclusives on the other services. scott preece ihnp4!uiucdcs!uicsl!preece
chuqui@nsc.UUCP (Chuq Von Rospach) (01/26/84)
One thing that has not been pointed out about HBO is that they show a fair
number of stage shows, both on and off Broadway. I subscribed to it for
about a year, and during that time I was able to see the following shows:
Table Manners (off broadway with Robert Klein and Mindy Cohn)
Camelot (on Broadway with Richard Harris)
Sherlock Holmes (Frank Langella)
FDR (one man show with Robert Vaughn as Franklin Roosevelt)
Those are simply the ones that stuck in my mind off-hand, they picked up a
new show every month to 6 weeks. All of them are quite well staged and if
you like going to the theater and can't afford plane fare to NY all of the
time, this is a great substitute.
I should also point out that HBO does a lot more sports than Boxing. In the
year I watched it they also showed a fair amount of gymnastics and ice
skating (two favorite spectator sports of mine). They show at least one
match a day (plus highlights) of Wimbledon up to the place where the
networks move in. If you haven't watched two weeks of Wimbledon tennis, you
don't really understand what it means to win that tournament!
If you like comedy, HBO is a must, because they do a LOT of comedy oriented
material. I have seen GOOD shows by Robin Williams, George Carlin, and
Robert Klein on HBO, and there have been a lot more since I stopped
subscribing (because I moved to an area that didn't have it yet. That is
about to change... I can't stand the networks anymore!)
Their movie mix is a little on the mild side, but I never subscribed to HBO
for the movies alone (which is why I would never subscribe to TMC, since
there tends to be such a small selections in movies). What I found, though,
was that there were a large number of 'marginal' movies that I never would
have bothered to go and see, but because they were 'free' (the theater on
HBO pays for itself in my opinion) I didn't mind watching them, and many
times I was very suprised. In fact, I never would have watched one of my
favorite movies (Continental Divide, which proved that John Belushi did
have talent in there somewhere) if it hadn't been on HBO against Three's
Company. Now, I wouldn't miss it.
In this HBO/Showtime feud, it should be pointed out that people who like
older films, classics, and are looking for films they missed the first time
around should look into Cinemax. This baby brother of HBO is programmed to
be non-competitive with HBO (very different film mix, thank Ghod) and does
a large number of retrospectives and classics as part of its programming.
--
From the house at Pooh Corner: Chuq (a Silly Old Bear)
{fortune,menlo70}!nsc!chuqui
have you hugged your Pooh today?
The difficult we gave up on yesterday, the impossible we are giving up on now.neff@ihuxf.UUCP (j) (01/26/84)
One possible consideration might be that Showtime has recently signed an deal with a major motion picture company (I'm not sure, but I think it was Paramount) that gives them exclusive cable rights to their motion pictures for five years. Some recent pictures that will be shown on cable only on Showtime are, reportedly, Flashdance and Raiders of the Lost Ark.
neff@ihuxf.UUCP (q) (01/26/84)
One consideration might be that Showtime recently signed a deal with a major motion picture company (Paramount, I think) that gives it exclusive cable rights to its pictures for five years. A couple recent movies that will be shown on cable only on Showtime are, reportedly, Flashdance and Raiders of the Lost Ark. This contract does not exclude noncable companies such as ONTV from showing the movies.
twt@uicsl.UUCP (01/27/84)
#R:pegasus:-86600:uicsl:12200046:000:192 uicsl!twt Jan 25 17:26:00 1984 HBO does NOT have Paper Chase. Showtime does, and I'd sell my brother-in- law's soul to be able to get Showtime (for PC) in my area. Other than that I am very happy with HBO/Cinemax. Mary
preece@uicsl.UUCP (02/02/84)
#R:pegasus:-86600:uicsl:12200049:000:187 uicsl!preece Feb 1 10:30:00 1984 The press reports on the deal Showtime/Movie Channel made with Paramount said that Raiders of the Lost Ark was explicitly NOT included in the arrangement and would be offered separately.