DiabloikDVD.com: A Ruthless, Cutthroat Force in the World of Independent Horror
horror retailers plans could be to stomp out competitors and join the corporate elite
DiabloikDVD.com is a genre film retailer that has turned into a genre distribution company under the imprint, Cauldron Films. They also run Exhumed Films, which specializes in projecting often low-quality 35mm prints for a high price to the fans. Exhumed Films has been known to refuse to book more controversial genre films for audiences. Additionally, rumors have been stirred of them not paying licensees the agreed upon amount for the screenings. It is long rumored that DiabolikDVD has been sabotaging deals for other genre film distribution companies, including Synapse Films, Vinegar Syndrome, 88 Films, Kino Lobar, and CodeRedDVD. It has been suggested to us that they may attempt to sabotage these companies by threatening to stop stocking their titles in the future.
This could cause major issues for the other companies, as they rely heavily on DiabloikDVD for a large portion of their sales. DiabloikDVD would be able to easily get away with this because they are one of the only companies that specializes in genre film retail sales. DiabloikDVD is also known for importing foreign bootlegs before the domestic release is available in order to get the first sales on the film over the company that is releasing the film. This not only hurts the legal licensor; it tricks the customer into buying an inferior product.
The film labels may be trying to fight back; some are considering not allowing DiabloikDVD to wholesale from them anymore to combat DiablikDVD’s ruthless practices. It appears so far they have not been successful in making any real impact against DiabloikDVD, as they continue to act unchecked. It is unclear what will happen next, but it is clear that DiabloikDVD is a force to be reckoned with for many years to come.
DiabloikDVD has developed a bad reputation among other vendors over the years at many horror conventions. Multiple vendors have stated that they are rude, unprofessional, and place an overblown value on their own importance. Others say that they are always trying to undercut vendors' prices. Whatever the case may be, it seems that DiabloikDVD has a lot of enemies among other vendors.
Additionally, we have been told that the owners of DiabloikDVD have demanded from convention officials that other retailers such as Grindhouse Video not attend the same convention as them. A source claims that DiabolikDVD has made complaints to convention workers, hinting that they don't want competition taking away from their sales.
According to an anonymous insider who has worked with the team at DiabloikDVD, they may be talking to multiple world-wide rights owners with plans to attempt to discontinue their work with other genre companies in an attempt to monopolize the market. This could be a huge blow to the genre film community and a way for their imprint, Cauldron Films, to reign supreme.
How did they do it? A second source claims that DiabolikDVD has been using the connections of another label to obtain licenses and stop others from obtaining them. We have been told that some lower-level employees who work in PR for other labels have given DiabolikDVD access to their contact list without the label owner's knowledge. This is a huge problem for other companies, as it could mean that their own employees are acting as in-house competitors, devulting confidential information to entities such as DiabloikDVD.
This has effectively sabotaged deals and forced other labels to stop releasing these titles in the United States. This will allow DiabolikDVD to corner the market on some great titles. They're set to quickly become the go-to source for hard-to-find titles, and they're not afraid to use whatever means necessary to get their hands on the licenses.
Recently, the co-owner of DiabloikDVD, Jesse Nelson, threw a complaint-filled tantrum on his personal Facebook page where he shamed horror fans for enjoying the gory-goodness of Terrifier 2. Mr. Nelson claimed these horror fans were not really into films and they simply just got off on women being mutilated. Looking at what DiabloikDVD stocks in their webstore, this is obviously hypocritical. DiabolikDVD stocks films that feature excessive rape, necrophilia, gore, vomit, scat, and real animal murders, not to mention many foreign 1970s films that include nudity from actresses that are under the age of 18. Is this type of virtue signaling done to help the social credit scores of DiabloikDVD, Mr. Nelson, and their cronies? Could this lead to a time where DiabloikDVD is no longer selling films that horror fans rely on them for? Are they attempting to become a brand that is bought by the corporate world, as so many genre legacy brands have become? Mr. Nelson's comments would suggest that this may be their long-term motive, a motive that is selfishly motivated and not done for the good of the horror fans.
The bad news is, all of this would indicate that DiabloikDVD might no longer be interested in working with other companies that specialize in genre films and has plans to transcend to the corporate side of the industry. This could have a major impact on the availability of these films, as DiabloikDVD is a major retail source for many titles. But once they become the distributor for them all, they may very well become the Amazon. A scary thought
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