postal posts

UMVD Visual Entertainment has decided to enter the high-definition arena with the Blu-Ray release of Postal, due out August 26 of this year. Postal is set to debut in theaters later this month, and will be showing on only four screens, a significant reduction from its original count of 1,500.

Given that the home release has been announced before the film's theatrical debut, one might suggest that prospective viewers hold out for a rental. The film, directed by maligned video-game-to-movie director Uwe Boll, follows in the vein of the PC games by favoring pure shock value over anything resembling a real storyline.

The Blu-Ray release of Postal is estimated to be priced at $34.98, which is most likely 34 dollars more than should be spent.

Uwe Boll's movie adaptation of Running With Scissors' Postal action game series seemed to be a marriage made in heaven. Both Boll and Running With Scissors have generated tons of controversy with their previous products and both have been slammed by most mainstream critics. However the clips we have seen of the Postal movie definitely have a dark humor appeal.

After a number of delays, the Postal movie finally got scheduled for a wide release in theaters on May 23 via the distributor Freestyle Releasing. But according to a press release from Boll's production company and sent to Kotaku, the major theater chains in the US are "boycotting Postal because of its political content." Thus a planned opening of the movie on 1500 screens has been reduced to just four theaters. Of course, another reason for theater owners not wanting Postal may be Boll's awful box office record; his last theatrical movie (In The Name Of The King: A Dungeon Siege Tale) made just under $3 million in its opening weekend last January.

Uwe Boll. You love to hate him and you certainly hate to love him. The German movie director behind such films as House of the Dead, Alone in the Dark and the upcoming Postal and Far Cry films (to name just a few) has been responsible for some of the worst reviewed movies ever made, video and PC game based or otherwise. A recent chat with Boll on the Fearnet web site, however, gave a ray of hope for those folks who want him out of the film business. He said he would consider a move to stop making movies if an online petition asking him to do that very thing reached 1 million signatures. So far, about 234,000 name are on that site.

Now Stride, the gum company, has announced a unique way to promote their product. Basically if the "Stop Uwe Boll" petition reaches that 1 million number by May 14 Stride will give each petition signer a downloadable coupon for one free pack of Stride gum. That coupon will be made available on May 23 which just happens to be the release date for Boll's Postal film adaptation. According to Stride's marketing director Gary Osifchin, ""Look, it's nothing personal against the guy. Maybe his non videogame-based films are unbelievable! But we've seen such intense passion for this cause that we couldn't help but get involved." Of course this is no guarantee that Boll will indeed stop making movies; he's free to ignore this movement. But hey, it's a cool way to promote gum, don't you think?