The Criterion Collection

[ShellOilJunior]

If there's anything that could top the March slate it's the Cleveland Cinematheque's new schedule which includes:

Noir Town (8 Films - Jan 5 - Feb 23)

Gilda
White Heat
Sudden Fear
D.O.A.
Odds Against Tomorrow
Lady in the Lake
Force of Evil
The Big Combo

[TheHighRoller]

Originally Posted by iScottie

Source?

Jon Mulvaney hinted at it in an email I sent him asking for information on a possible Sleeping Beauty Criterion release (2011, not the Disney one). He said it would be an appropriate title for a peak summer release (and July is the peak).

[paul000]

Originally Posted by Cinemach

As much as I tire of the rampant Malick fanboyism, I am actually interested in seeing Badlands because it's supposed to be more in the Days of Heaven camp than the every-other-Malick-film one.

It's the most straightforward of his films in a lot of ways, in my opinion. I think with his work, you should definitely start at the beginning and move on in order. You might appreciate his style a bit more if you do and I would imagine that most people who find things they can't stand in his films would be surprised with this one.

[Snicket]

Originally Posted by ShellOilJunior

This is the last poll. Many thanks goes out to those who have participated. I hope to post the results in a week or so.

Vote for Best Criterion Collection Blu-ray Release of 2012:

http://goo.gl/26BMD

Voted!

Thanks for putting that together!

[IronWaffle]

Originally Posted by Snicket

Voted!

Thanks for putting that together!

Agreed. Thanks for taking it upon yourself; it's appreciated!

[Snicket]

Originally Posted by TheHighRoller

Jon Mulvaney hinted at it in an email I sent him asking for information on a possible Sleeping Beauty Criterion release (2011, not the Disney one). He said it would be an appropriate title for a peak summer release (and July is the peak).

Just before a B&N sale...excellent.

I may have to ask him if they have any interest in Wendy and Lucy.

[TheHighRoller]

Originally Posted by Bateman84

Damn. Not a member

You can become a 2-month trial member, and still receive the benefits of the sale, the member discount, and the $8 off coupon. Since you won't have your card yet, you will have to give them your phone number you used to sign up (you will get your card a week after you sign up).

Google "Barnes and Noble Trial Membership". That's what I did! In fact, mine ends on the 23rd, so I need to cancel on the 22nd.

[starman15317]

The Blob, Badlands AND Verdoux?!?!

[Whirlygig]

Criterion + Disney --> March = the new September

[dsman71]

Im getting the Blob as I have waited for a long time for this announcement...I may rent Ministry of Fear..

[Beta Man]

Originally Posted by ShellOilJunior

If there's anything that could top the March slate it's the Cleveland Cinematheque's new schedule which includes:

Noir Town (8 Films - Jan 5 - Feb 23)

Gilda
White Heat
Sudden Fear
D.O.A.
Odds Against Tomorrow
Lady in the Lake
Force of Evil
The Big Combo

See you there good sir!

[georgec]

My current CC wishlist is looking like this:

Brazil
Following
Two-Lane Blacktop
Ivan's Childhood
On the Waterfront
Sansho the Bailiff
Badlands
The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp
A Man Escaped
Monsieur Verdoux

Please, Criterion, stop announcing things I want to buy.

I'm not sure if I'll shop the BN 40% off sale. Might just wait until 50% off next July, since that overlaps with the B2G1 usually.

[Hawkguy]

Originally Posted by Joe Dalek

You really need a "both" option on that last question.

I was glad to see that 'none' option, I wouldn't have even expected that to be a selection

[Hawkguy]

Originally Posted by TheHighRoller

He said it would be an appropriate title for a peak summer release (and July is the peak).

Their best business comes from mid-Summer? I would have thought it'd be late in the year.

[drbikeshorts]

Originally Posted by Monty70

I love the cover art for The Life and Death of Col. Blimp.

Yeah, I think it's great.
Interesting to compare it to the UK edition of Colonel Blimp, which is easily one of the saddest and most uninspired covers in the history of the blu-ray format.

[RojD]

Originally Posted by R o d

What is the psychosexual part of Four Feathers?

My effort to deal with my chronic Korda-phobia. The ideology and cultural values in the Korda movies I know usually end up just making me mad, so I'm trying to think of Four Feathers as a big weewee-ing contest (I read the forum rules on language) focused on a guy working out his gender issues.

[Show spoiler]After he fails his masculinity exams, loses the girl and is awarded his feathers--with their sissy-boy connotation--Faversham goes through a long period of beautifully-filmed masochistic suffering to redeem his manhood and lose the feathers. After he succeeds, he's readmitted to robust heterosexuality and gets the girl.

But dang, that reading is as dissatisifying as the racist imperialism in Korda films that I can't stop myself from responding to. I guess it's my 2012 taste that makes me value the scope of vision and humanity in P&P's 1943 Colonel Blimp over the Victorian worldview of Four Feathers, made only four years earlier.

[NoirFan]

Originally Posted by RojD

My effort to deal with my chronic Korda-phobia. The ideology and cultural values in the Korda movies I know usually end up just making me mad

The aggressively jingoistic and pro-military sentiments in Four Feathers made me so angry that I actually turned the film off halfway through (which I never usually do with a disc I've bought) and sold it on Amazon the very next day. I had bought it during the brief crossover between the B2G1 and 50 percent off Criterion sale, so I did end up making a small profit on the resale, but I would have sold it anyway, so irritating and ugly did I find the film's tone and message.

[pro-bassoonist]

OFFICIAL PRESS SHEET:

THE BLOB – Blu-ray Edition
A cult classic of gooey greatness, The Blob follows the havoc wreaked on a small town by an outer-space monster with neither soul nor vertebrae, with Steve McQueen (The Great Escape) playing the rebel teen who tries to warn the residents about the jellylike invader. Strong performances and ingenious special effects help The Blob transcend the schlock sci-fi and youth delinquency genres from which it originates. Made outside of Hollywood by a maverick film distributor and a crew whose credits mostly comprised religious and educational shorts, The Blob helped launch the careers of McQueen and composer Burt Bacharach, whose bouncy title song is just one of this film’s many unexpected pleasures.

1958 • 82 minutes • Color • Monaural • 1.66:1 aspect ratio

BLU-RAY SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES
• New high-definition digital restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack
• Two audio commentaries: one by producer Jack H. Harris and film historian Bruce Eder and the other by director Irvin S. Yeaworth Jr. and actor Robert Fields
• Trailer
• Blobabilia!, a gallery of collector Wes Shank’s rare trove of stills, posters, props (including the blob itself!), and other ephemera
• PLUS: An essay by critic Kim Newman

TITLE: The Blob (BLU-RAY EDITION)
CAT. NO: CC2235BD
UPC: 7-15515-10331-2
ISBN: 978-1-60465-699-2
SRP: $39.95
STREET: 3/12/13

MINISTRY OF FEAR – Blu-ray
Suffused with dread and paranoia, this Fritz Lang (M) adaptation of a novel by Graham Greene (The Third Man) is a plunge into the eerie shadows of a world turned upside down by war. En route to London after being released from a mental institution, Stephen Neale (The Lost Weekend’s Ray Milland) stops at a seemingly innocent village fair, after which he finds himself caught in the web of a sinister underworld with possible Nazi connections. Lang was among the most illustrious of the European émigré filmmakers working in Hollywood during World War II, and Ministry of Fear is one of his finest American productions, an unpredictable thriller with style to spare.

1944 • 87 minutes • Black & White • Monaural • 1.37:1 aspect ratio

SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES
• New 2K digital restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the
Blu-ray edition
• New interview with Fritz Lang scholar Joe McElhaney
• Trailer
• PLUS: An essay by critic Glenn Kenny

TITLE: Ministry of Fear (BLU-RAY EDITION)
CAT. NO: CC2236BD
UPC: 7-15515-10341-1
ISBN: 978-1-60465-700-5
SRP: $29.95
STREET: 3/12/13

BADLANDS – Blu-ray
Badlands announced the arrival of a major talent: Terrence Malick (Days of Heaven). His impressionistic take on the notorious Charles Starkweather and Caril Ann Fugate killing spree of the late 1950s uses a serial-killer narrative as a springboard for an oblique teenage romance, lovingly and idiosyncratically enacted by Martin Sheen (Apocalypse Now) and Sissy Spacek (Carrie). The film also introduced many of the elements that would earn Malick his passionate following: the enigmatic approach to narrative and character, the unusual use of voice-over, the juxtaposition of human violence with natural beauty, the poetic investigation of American dreams and nightmares. This debut has spawned countless imitations, but none have equaled its strange sublimity.

1973 • 94 minutes • Color • Monaural • 1.78:1 aspect ratio

DIRECTOR-APPROVED SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES
• New 4K digital restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the
Blu-ray edition
• Making “Badlands,” a new documentary featuring actors Martin Sheen and Sissy Spacek and production designer Jack Fisk
• New interview with editor Billy Weber about director Terrence Malick’s unique approach to editing
• New interview with producer Edward Pressman
• Trailer
• PLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by filmmaker Michael Almereyda

TITLE: Badlands (BLU-RAY EDITION)
CAT. NO: CC2244BD
UPC: 7-15515-10421-0
ISBN: 978-1-60465-708-1
SRP: $39.95
STREET: 3/19/13

THE LIFE AND DEATH OF COLONEL BLIMP – Blu-ray
Considered by many to be the finest British film ever made, The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp, by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger (The Red Shoes), is a stirring masterpiece like no other. Roger Livesey dynamically embodies outmoded English militarism as the indelible General Clive Candy, who barely survives four decades of tumultuous British history (1902 to 1942) only to see the world change irrevocably before his eyes. Anton Walbrook (The Red Shoes) and Deborah Kerr (Black Narcissus) provide unforgettable support, he as a German enemy turned lifelong friend of Blimp’s and she as young women of three consecutive generations—a socially committed governess, a sweet-souled war nurse, and a modern-thinking army driver—who inspire him. Colonel Blimp is both moving and slyly satirical, an incomparable film about war, love, aging, and obsolescence shot in gorgeous Technicolor.

1943 • 163 minutes • Color • Monaural • 1.37:1 aspect ratio

SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES
• New 4K digital master from the 2012 Film Foundation restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray edition
• Audio commentary featuring director Michael Powell and filmmaker Martin Scorsese
• Video introduction by Scorsese
• A Profile of “The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp”
• Restoration demonstration, hosted by Scorsese
• Interview with editor Thelma Schoonmaker Powell, Michael Powell’s widow
• Gallery featuring rare behind-the-scenes production stills
• Gallery tracing the history of David Low’s original Colonel Blimp cartoons
• PLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by critic Molly Haskell

TITLE: The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (BLU-RAY EDITION)
CAT. NO: CC2238BD
UPC: 7-15515-10361-9
ISBN: 978-1-60465-702-9
SRP: $39.95
PREBOOK: 2/19/13
STREET: 3/19/13

A MAN ESCAPED – Blu-ray
With the simplest of concepts and sparest of techniques, Robert Bresson (Au hasard Balthazar) made one of the most suspenseful jailbreak films of all time in A Man Escaped. Based on the memoirs of an imprisoned French resistance leader, this unbelievably taut and methodical marvel follows the fictional Fontaine’s single-minded pursuit of freedom, detailing the planning and carrying out of his escape with gripping precision. But Bresson’s film is not merely process-minded—it’s a work of intense spirituality and humanity.

1956 • 101 minutes • Black & White • Monaural • In French with English subtitles • 1.33:1 aspect ratio

SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES
• New high-definition digital restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray edition
• Bresson: Without a Trace, a 1965 episode of the television program Cinéastes de notre temps in which the director gives his first on-camera interview
• The Essence of Forms, a forty-five-minute documentary from 2010 in which some of Bresson’s collaborators and admirers, including actor François Leterrier and director Bruno Dumont, share their thoughts about the director and his work
• New visual essay with text by film scholars David Bordwell and Kristin Thompson
• Trailer
• New English subtitle translation
• PLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by film scholar Tony Pipolo

TITLE: A Man Escaped (BLU-RAY EDITION)
CAT. NO: CC2242BD
UPC: 7-15515-10401-2
ISBN: 978-1-60465-706-7
SRP: $39.95
STREET: 3/26/13

MONSIEUR VERDOUX – Blu-ray
Charlie Chaplin plays shockingly against type in his most controversial film, a brilliant and bleak black comedy about money, marriage, and murder. Chaplin is a twentieth-century Bluebeard, an enigmatic family man who goes to extreme lengths to support his wife and child, attempting to bump off a series of wealthy widows (including one played by the indefatigable Martha Raye, in a hilarious performance). This deeply philosophical and wildly entertaining film is a work of true sophistication, both for the moral questions it dares to ask and the way it deconstructs its megastar’s loveable on-screen persona.

1947 • 124 minutes • Black & White • Monaural • 1.33:1 aspect ratio

SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES
• New 2K digital restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the
Blu-ray edition
• Chaplin Today: “Monsieur Verdoux,” a 2003 program on the film’s production and release, featuring filmmaker Claude Chabrol and actor Norman Lloyd
• Charlie Chaplin and the American Press, a new documentary featuring Chaplin specialist Kate Guyonvarch and author Charles Maland
• New video essay featuring an audio interview with actress Marilyn Nash
• Radio advertisements and trailers
• PLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by critic Ignatiy Vishnevetsky and reprinted pieces by Chaplin and critic André Bazin

TITLE: Monsieur Verdoux (BLU-RAY EDITION)
CAT. NO: CC2240BD
UPC: 7-15515-10381-7
ISBN: 978-1-60465-704-3
SRP: $39.95
STREET: 3/26/13

Attention Canada: A MAN ESCAPED is available in English-speaking Canada only. All other March titles are avaiilable in all of Canada.

Pro-B

[tonylopez]

I so love the pulp novel looking cover for Badlands. I'll be buying that and The Blob in March. The other titles are nice but not that rewatchable in my opinion. Unless I win the lottery then I'll buy every Criterion title , but until then.

[Page14]

Originally Posted by IronWaffle

I love Days of Heaven and have a love/like relationship with Tree of Life. I own Thin Red Line and therefore NEED to give it a second chance. It just didn't stick to my memory, probably since I'm also not a huge combat film person. Saw it the same weekend as Paths of Glory, which I preferred but largely for the parts not in the trenches.

<snip>

Days of Heaven ended up being the last Criterion I purchased last week ... before the latest Criterion sale at Amazon.com ended. It's a blind buy for me. Now I'm interested in Badlands too, in large part because I'm a Sissy Spacek fan. I'm not even sure if I've seen a Terrence Malick film before, so I'm anxious to finally see what I've been missing.

I also recently had somebody highly recommend The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp to me, so that title has me interested too.