Big News and New Site

On Sunday, no matter in what state the new site is, it will be finally launched. This site, as you know it, will be deleted. Everything has been changed, from the back end to the front end.

Besides going into a strange site and trying to find your way around, there are at least seven or eight very exciting bits of news. Exciting is actually an understatement. I'll give you a short description for now and expand on it when you get to the new site this Sunday

1. Mr. Lee will be releasing an album together with a world renown metal band. The band's manager, Mr. DeMaio, said " Mr. Lee of course would be the featured performer. This would be a Grand epic with dramatic orchestration". This is not the right place to use these words but Mr. Lee will be back doing what he loves the most and he is going to kick some b***. Orchestra, choirs and a mixture of metal and classical, what else can a Mr. Lee fan hope for? Young versus experience, modern versus "the baritone". Mr. Lee will be performing in full costume in what looks to be a modern day opera. I am not yet allowed to mention this band's name until the deal has been sealed but I know it will be definitely going ahead in November. Hats of to the band for having the vision to get the very best entertainer, they will not be disappointed.

To quote John Rhys Davies in his intro to TMOAL "Christopher has this extraordinary ability to be on any age. When a man is senior and important in a industry, he sometimes finds it difficult to relate to ..."

2. Christopher Lee Web has secured the exclusive rights to "Dare to Dream". This is a 43 minutes documentary on the making of Jinnah: The Movie. The master has just been given to us by the producer and it's of magnificent overall quality. Our plans is to extend the documentary by including even more comments from Mr. Lee and other members of the cast and crew. The documentary is at least as good as the film and you are guaranteed to be in tears at the very end. The hardship and determination that the cast and crew put into this film can almost be compared with that of Jinnah. To Dare to Dream is to Dare to Succeed and will be coming to you in the next release of "The Making of a Legend" as a free bonus feature for owners of Volume I. After all, this was made posible by the sales generated by it.

3. Those of you who have helped support the series "The Making of a Legend" by buying the first DVD and putting up with an uncut version, which received hardly any treatment due to budget shortages and time, are going to be rewarded for this next release in ways you would have never imagined. We appreciate very much your support because without you, no DVD, no series, nothing. It is mainly thanks to you, that this next release is going to be a world class DVD. We now have a decent budget and even more important, Mr. Lee's full determination to complete the whole series. To start with, you will receive a 50% discount for preorders of the first commercial edition release which will be a double DVD covering Volumes I, II, III and "Dare to Dream" thrown in for free. Yes, Volume I has been remade and transferred using Hollywood quality codecs and much higher bitrates. Picture and sound quality will be second to none. Since we will only be producing 5000 complete copies to match the sales of Volume I, only those of you who have volume I will be able to buy this edition, so please keep your receipts handy. There will be more copies produced and given to Amazon, etc, but will be sold at the full price and without "Dare to Dream" included. Furthermore, the first 100 owners of Volume I to preorder, will be credited as co-producers together with Mr. Lee. This next release will be an NTSC region 0 which is compatible with every DVD player in the US, Europe and almost every other continent in the world. It will be in full Widescreen but also compatible with 4:3. We are still chasing after Tim Burton to do the introduction to this super DVD. Full details, chapters, etc will appear in the new site as well as the ability to preorder and yet another surprise. The artwork for this release will be produced by the second best illustrator in the world as opposed me scanning old pictures and he will also be working with the splash screens and menus. Before this DVD is released, it will go through quality control tests to make sure everything is perfect. Besides going to Dolby Laboratories to make sure the sound encoding is perfect, picture quality will be tested by a famous UK company who has the BBC as one of the main clients.

4. "Christopher Lee Past and Present". Colin Bushby, has been working in secret for the last two months on an official magazine as an employee of CLW. He is the editor for "Christopher Lee: Past and Present". A full colour glossy magazine full of exclusive information, interviews, articles, etc. When Colin sees fit, he will update you on its progress and what to expect. A new issue will be printed every 3 months. The magazine will form part of a replacement for premium membership, which will also include other exclusive goodies and which will be limited to 500 copies only, so to preserve the collector's value.

5. New film to be confirmed and announced by Mr. Lee. Take it seating down and have a glass of whisky ready!!!

6. Remember the ring Mr. Lee wore in his Dracula films?You will be able to buy your own exact copy taken from the same mould and manufactured by the original artist, together with "Don't fall of your chairs" a Dracula autograph. These will be limited to only 20 worldwide because the autographs were signed a while ago and Mr. Lee will not sign anymore. The old premium members will be given priority to buy these and at a very special price too.

7. Interactual. You have been patiently waiting without complaining for this, well you can expect exclusive and mostly never seen footage of Mr. Lee, including golf, singing, clips from his own private library and to top it all, some very funny moments and what happens when things go wrong. For instance, Mr. Lee is talking and concentrating on what he is doing and someone in the room falls of the chair and makes a huge noise, the look in Mr. Lee's face!!! The phone rings unexpectedly and a complete exaggeration is in order to get rid of the caller. Mr. Lee is filming and a the door bell rings, it's just a maid who wants to take Mr. Lee's chair away....best of all, she does not speak English or has any idea who Mr. Lee is. A German interviewer is boring Mr. Lee, what does he do? He pretends that he does not understand what she is saying and takes over the TV program completely and in German. All these are very precious moments which will bring a smile to your face and make you realise that Mr. Lee is human too. The running time of these clips is about 1 full hour in length.

8. Some of you, will be able to follow live Mr. Lee while he is doing a session for The Making of a Legend with real-time full video and voice. You will also be able to talk to him during his breaks and ask him things. Thanks to a new state of the art server using Mpeg4 professional codec. Note that this is not your low quality webcam stuff, so broadband will be required.

9. As it was the case with Alfonso, Matt and Colin, who are not allowed to enter the next competition as they would probably win again, a fan here at the site will be coming to London and meeting Mr. Lee. Flights and Hotel paid. Hopefully, no one will cheat this time.

10. Enjoy the new site because I believe once it has been completed in total and brought up to date, it will be by far one of the most modern, feature loaded site on the web. Since Bafta have been overlooking Mr. Lee for an Award all these years, we intend for his site to win a technical award. We are competing for these awards officially and have as much of a chance as any of the other entries. They may have huge budgets, plenty of staff but we have the best subject. All we can do is work hard and dream but it would be ironic if Mr. Lee goes and collects an award which has nothing to do with films. Anyone out there with graphic or designs skills who wants to help me with ideas, creation or anything at all, please e-mail me, you will be credited in full. I am as you know, to put it mildly up to my neck in work. Keep watching the "What's New" section on the new site. For now, I am under pressure to swap sites and did not have much time to concentrate on the design, just the backend which is by far the most important thing but trust me, the looks and design will change almost everyday until it looks like how it should.