The Criterion Collection

[dash_hornsby]

Originally Posted by jonsax201

I see these questions pop up every now and then, and I can confirm that Criterion WILL replace OOP discs that have the bronzing issue, like Howards End and the first (OOP) printing of Pierrot le fou. In fact, on Pierrot, they now give you the option during replacement if you want the original version or the newer master. And even though it wasn't a bronzing issue, the freezing issue on Le Cercle Rouge is a known issue and they will also replace that as well (they just replaced mine about a year ago).

That's great to hear that they'll replace the discs, even the OOP ones. I'm not surprised though - they're customer service is great. I'll contact them soon and get them replaced. I bought the blu-rays when they came out and thought it was my blu-ray player that was the issue but now that I know it's the discs I'm going to ask them to replace them.

[DukeTogo84]

Originally Posted by CelestialAgent

Kurosawa scholar Stephen Prince has died at the age of 65

https://vtnews.vt.edu/articles/2021/...en-prince.html

Yeah, he died a few months ago. Someone on this forum was actually a student of his and it sounded like he was a pretty cool professor. An excellent knowledge base to Japanese cinema and I would have loved to have been able to sit in one of his classes.

[latehong]

Originally Posted by CelestialAgent

Kurosawa scholar Stephen Prince has died at the age of 65

https://vtnews.vt.edu/articles/2021/...en-prince.html

Originally Posted by ravenus

He did some fantastic commentaries for the Kurosawa releases in the Criterion line - my personal favs are Kagemusha and High & Low.

Originally Posted by DukeTogo84

Yeah, he died a few months ago. Someone on this forum was actually a student of his and it sounded like he was a pretty cool professor. An excellent knowledge base to Japanese cinema and I would have loved to have been able to sit in one of his classes.

His The Warrior's Camera: The Cinema of Akira Kurosawa was and still is one of the better studies of the director in which the author meticulously follows the director's entire career and convincingly debunks the usual misconceptions and prejudices against Kurosawa's cinema. Probably not for the initiated and light fans because it starts with his lesser-known earlier works and is filled with shot-by-shot analysis, but the book was extremely valuable and pleasure-to-read for this long-time fan in my Kurosawa phase.

And yes, he was one of the better audio commentators, too, not just for Kurosawa movies and other Japanese cinema but also for American films of violence from the 60s and 70s, which was another major field of his.

from Criterion:



from other labels:

[sb5]

I haven’t heard his Kurosawa commentaries, but I’ve loved his Sam Peckinpah ones. RIP.

[drownsoda]

Originally Posted by bwdowiak

I got one, too. Thanks for bringing this to our attention.

I saw DLN once a few years back and didn't really think much of it. It stuck w/ me enough to want to revisit it, though. When a film that I thought I didn't like sticks w/ me like that, usually the second watch will make me a fan of the movie.

Rosemary's Baby, I am content to pick up via the Paramount release. It's a really good film that I saw on Netflix for the first time about 5 years or so ago. Since I didn't have an inkling to return to it so soon, I never picked up the CC release.

Don't Look Now is one of those movies that has haunted me for years. It's probably in my top 10 favorite films of all time. Rosemary's Baby is too, for that matter. Both are perfect horror movies IMO. It's weird—even though I own both and have for years, I am still kind of bummed that the Criterion editions have gone out of print. For some reason I never expected them to. I wrongly presumed they'd stay indefinitely.

[dressedtokill]

Originally Posted by jayembee

Probably. It was released about six months after Criterion's Dual-format release, so (assuming that Eureka's license is for an equivalent length of time as Criterion's) it'll probably come up for renewal -- and get denied -- later this year.

Why the smiley face? How is that a good thing?

[jw007]

Originally Posted by Jowiko96

This is very sweet to read. Glad you changed your mind. I know times are hard and its tempting to do something like this, but seeing posts like this make me happy.

[jayembee]

Originally Posted by dressedtokill

Why the smiley face? How is that a good thing?

"It was...it was a joke, son. Humor, that is."

[dvining]

Originally Posted by DukeTogo84

Yeah, he died a few months ago. Someone on this forum was actually a student of his and it sounded like he was a pretty cool professor. An excellent knowledge base to Japanese cinema and I would have loved to have been able to sit in one of his classes.

I took two classes with him at Virginia Tech. The first was a survey class of cinema, and I mostly remember his main goal at the beginning of the class was to convince us all that black and white was beautiful. This was also where I saw The Passion of Joan of Arc for the first time, and it floored me then as it still does today.

The second class was his director's class. He rotated between Chaplin, Hitchcock, and Kurosawa, and I was in the semester where he covered Chaplin and Hitchcock. He was wonderfully knowledgeable about them both, and his classes were a delight.

The classes always involved evening screenings, usually on Mondays, in one of the auditoriums, the one above the architecture school. After I had finished his classes, I was still a poor college student and I once took a date to one of those without having any idea what was being shown because I wasn't in the class. It turned out to be Double Indemnity.

Steven Prince was a wonderful teacher, and his classes would usually devolve into students asking him his opinions about movies unrelated to the class. He happily took all of those questions just because he loved movies so much. I actually heard an audible groan from the back of the class one day because I mentioned Terrence Malick once too many times.

[monorail91]

Happy birthday to Queen Anna Magnani!

[Brad1963]

Eventually the Paramount releases of these will go OOP and Criterion will re-license them, with newer transfers.

La Dolce Vita
Rosemary’s Baby
Don’t Look Now
Harold and Maude
Nashville
Days of Heaven

[SammymeBlu]

Has anyone ever received a Criterion title from either the Criterion Store or B&N that clearly has been re-shrink wrapped and missing the Blue Criterion sticker on the outside? I had recently just received my purchase of 6 titles and this one with the rewrap and decal missing which was Medium Cool btw.

[ShellBeacher]

Originally Posted by SammymeBlu

Has anyone ever received a Criterion title from either the Criterion Store or B&N that clearly has been re-shrink wrapped and missing the Blue Criterion sticker on the outside? I had recently just received my purchase of 6 titles and this one with the rewrap and decal missing which was Medium Cool btw.

Just received a copy of IF... from Amazon with this issue...it's going right back. Let's see what copy #2 looks like, but I'm getting fed-up with them. Barnes & Noble usually less shady, but if they've received returns or shrink-wrap got damaged on in-store copies, they have been known to re-wrap without the Blue Stickers, as well -- I've seen plenty in-store, and have received one once in a while.

If you received a copy without the precious Blues from Criterion themselves, full mutiny on the company is possible!

[Egbert Souse]

Originally Posted by Brad1963

Eventually the Paramount releases of these will go OOP and Criterion will re-license them, with newer transfers.

La Dolce Vita
Rosemary’s Baby
Don’t Look Now
Harold and Maude
Nashville
Days of Heaven

Source? Half of those were already from 4K masters (La Dolce Vita, Rosemary's Baby, and Don't Look Now). Days of Heaven would be an excellent candidate for a full 4K remaster, though.

[ShellBeacher]

Originally Posted by Egbert Souse

Source? Half of those were already from 4K masters (La Dolce Vita, Rosemary's Baby, and Don't Look Now). Days of Heaven would be an excellent candidate for a full 4K remaster, though.

This has always been Criterion's aim, to return titles to their library if they can...but there's no guarantees of anything anymore, I'd say.
It will be years, if at all.

[Reddington]

Originally Posted by SammymeBlu

Has anyone ever received a Criterion title from either the Criterion Store or B&N that clearly has been re-shrink wrapped and missing the Blue Criterion sticker on the outside? I had recently just received my purchase of 6 titles and this one with the rewrap and decal missing which was Medium Cool btw.

Originally Posted by ShellBeacher

Just received a copy of IF... from Amazon with this issue...it's going right back. Let's see what copy #2 looks like, but I'm getting fed-up with them. Barnes & Noble usually less shady, but if they've received returns or shrink-wrap got damaged on in-store copies, they have been known to re-wrap without the Blue Stickers, as well -- I've seen plenty in-store, and have received one once in a while.

If you received a copy without the precious Blues from Criterion themselves, full mutiny on the company is possible!

Not every new Criterion BD has the blue sticker. Some remain unconvinced, but an explanation as to who is returning all these titles has never been produced.

https://forum.blu-ray.com/showpost.p...stcount=200151

[ShellBeacher]

Originally Posted by Reddington

Not every new Criterion BD has the blue sticker. Some remain unconvinced, but an explanation as to who is returning all these titles has never been produced.

https://forum.blu-ray.com/showpost.p...stcount=200151

Thanks. Interesting. But quality of presentation has ruined me. Regardless of where in the process it's happening, I'll always aim for Blue-stickered "originals"...even if they already are originally-sourced without them.

[Reddington]

Originally Posted by ShellBeacher

Thanks. Interesting. But quality of presentation has ruined me. Regardless of where in the process it's happening, I'll always aim for Blue-stickered "originals"...even if they already are originally-sourced without them.

I hear you. I want that pristine cellophane wrap and sticker every time, too.

[drownsoda]

I have seen many copies of Criterion Blu-rays in Barnes & Noble that don't have the blue sticker on them. Sometimes they're cellophane-wrapped, other time shrink-wrapped. Cellophane seems more common. I bought a copy of If... around Christmastime from B&N, and I remember noticing that all the copies they had were shrink-wrapped as opposed to in cellophane, no sticker. There was no evidence they were used and had been rewrapped, though. I have a sealed copy of Days of Heaven that is shrink-wrapped and has the blue circle sticker, so it seems like a crapshoot.

[softunderbelly]

One of my Criterion flash sale purchases from a few years ago included a copy of If...
I noticed that the outer shrink wrap appeared a little scuffed up (no sticker) but upon opening it, I discovered it had one of those black magnetized security strips in the upper left corner near the disc.
Closer inspection I could see, for lack of better words, the architecture or frame of the plastic case had left a circular impression on the paper back panel with an impression of the center spindle as well.
I had never seen this before. It looked like it had been exposed to a lot of pressure in order to produce that pattern.

Thankfully the disc was pristine.