[Michael Brooke]

A successful release boils down to two core elements: availability of rights, and availability of decent materials.

Usually the first is the biggest stumbling block, but it can sometimes be the second - for instance, Night of the Living Dead is notoriously in the public domain thanks to a copyright registration cock-up, but you're not going to get your hands on high-quality pre-print materials without a formal agreement with the film's producers, who understandably aren't inclined to charge mere pennies.

But the much more common problem is with rightsholders, and the sad fact is that some will sublicense their catalogues to labels like Arrow and some won't. For instance, Arrow has put out films held by Universal, MGM and Fox but not Disney, Paramount, Sony or Warner Bros, which either distribute their own stuff (Disney, Warner) or have exclusive deals with other labels (Paramount, Sony).

And even if a label is prepared to release some of its titles, they'll hang on to their crown jewels. I suspect there's a reason why Arrow released Psycho II and not Psycho, and it's almost inconceivably unlikely that Warners would give up The Shining even if they allowed Arrow access to other titles.

And if the person who owns the film says no, I'm afraid that's that - the ball's in their court and it's up to them to change their mind. But never say never - the UK situation with Sony titles has changed dramatically in the last year with Criterion UK, Eureka and the currently Sony-only Indicator putting out titles that seemed very unlikely even as recently as last summer.