Thorn EMI Video

Background

Thorn EMI Video was the home video division of Thorn EMI, a multimedia and electronics company, and was originally known as EMI Videogram until 1981. In 1984, the parent company formed a joint venture with HBO that was known as Thorn EMI/HBO Video, later known as HBO/Cannon Video (when Cannon bought Thorn EMI Screen Entertainment) and the U.S. unit was absorbed into the new partnership. Thorn EMI Video remained active outside the U.S. until 1986, when it was absorbed into Cannon Screen Entertainment.

1st Logo (November 15, 1981-March 1982)

Logo: On a blue (or dark blue) background, we see the 1979 Thorn EMI Screen Entertainment logo, only it is in black and white and there is now a black box under "THORN EMI" that says "VIDEO".

Technique: None.

Music/Sounds: None.

Availability: Extremely rare. You can find this on the earliest Thorn EMI Video releases, including their first fourteen releases (The Tubes Video, April Wine Live in London, I Am a Dancer, Can't Stop the Music, Times Square, Death on the Nile, The Cruel Sea, The Day the Earth Caught Fire, The Best of Benny Hill, Scars of Dracula, Sophia Loren: Her Own Story, S.O.S. Titanic, The Royal Wedding, and Queen: Greatest Flix), Heartland, and The Mirror Crack'd. The logo doesn't appear on releases in the United Kingdom; prior to the debut of the second logo, Thorn EMI's releases in their home country usually didn't use any logo at all (even under their prior name of EMI Videogram) and just started with the opening credits or scenes of the film.

Legacy: It was most likely intended as a placeholder logo.

2nd Logo (June 1982-June 1985 [USA]/1986 [international])

Logo: Against a black background, a blue circle of light zooms up into the screen, spins around, and turns rainbow, then splits into two light circles which spin and shrink into a shape that looks like an upside down "T" with pointed ends, most likely representing a thorn. A white box with a blue aura is drawn around the shape, and it backs away. As this happens, a white box with the words "THORN EMI" appears under that box, which has since turned blue, and when that backs away a white box surrounds that, the bottom of which contains the word "VIDEO".

Technique: The circles of light spinning and splitting, then turning into the logo. Also, the "drawing" effects and boxes being added on. Cool Oxberry effects designed by Laurie Calvert of Filmfex in London.

Music/Sounds: A light, synthesized tune that ends in the beating of a drum.

Availability: Rare. Appears on Ready, Steady, Go!: Volume One, the first few collections of Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids, and Danger Mouse. Thorn EMI also distributed releases from Thames Video, Orion Pictures, Hemdale Film Corporation, Regency Enterprises, The Saul Zaentz Company, and Carolco Pictures. Several releases that had this logo were Xtro, The Evil Dead, The Terminator and First Blood. One of the first was The Burning. This logo is also found on various pre-cert releases in the United Kingdom, including First Blood, A Passage to India, certain copies of The Wicker Man and the later pre-cert release of Watership Down (the very first release, from 1982, has no logo at all). At least in the United Kingdom, this began being used in early 1983 and continued to be used until Cannon purchased the Thorn EMI library. This logo also appears on some, if not all, Japanese releases on LD, Beta and VHS that were distributed by King Video, such as The Osterman Weekend.