The Criterion Collection

[rkish]

Originally Posted by ElliesDad

Since we're sharing, see if this doesn't do something for you. Happy Monday!

http://http://www.youtube.com/watch?...7AE044&index=5

Thanks for sharing! Can't have enough Audrey...

OK Pat...I hope you've gotten enough to get you through the rest of this week, at least.

[P@t_Mtl]

Originally Posted by rkish

Thanks for sharing! Can't have enough Audrey...

OK Pat...I hope you've gotten enough to get you through the rest of this week, at least.

Maybe not the rest of the week but at least till Thursday

[Abdrewes]

Pierre Etaix review is up!
https://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Pierr.../64061/#Review

[P@t_Mtl]

Originally Posted by Abdrewes

Pierre Etaix review is up!
https://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Pierr.../64061/#Review

Was just reading it, will have to hope for a July sale from B&N, price is very high here right now unless I just get that one release with nothing else

[The Great Owl]

Originally Posted by Abdrewes

Pierre Etaix review is up!
https://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Pierr.../64061/#Review

Great write-up! I am definitely intrigued.

[SammyJankis]

Another release to add to my B&N July list. Yikes.

[bluesilo]

Watched Babette's Feast yesterday. That was one charming movie. I wouldn't expect the dinner to be such a trial, but it ended up being at least half of the film. The payoff at the end was surprising and beautiful. I would recommend it to anyone on the fence come this July.

[Fellini912]

Originally Posted by jrsl76

I've never seen those, maybe as a child I don' remember, and I didn't even know they were out, but those look fascinating. I might have to pick them up some time.

Blu ray format is definitely the best format for nature documentaries. Cousteau's storytelling is what makes his documentaries special.

[Fellini912]

Originally Posted by James78

Great Expectations: https://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Great...-Blu-ray/1099/

Oliver Twist: https://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Olive...Blu-ray/55975/

Summertime: https://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Summe...Blu-ray/40413/

Thank you for the news. I did not know there was a Region free Great Expectations.

[Abdrewes]

Okay, my write-up isn't exactly finished, but heres what I got:

Chris Marker's La Jetée ("The Pier") opens with a sole Black and White image of the Orly Airport in Paris, France on a serene Sunday morning. Four Airplanes are in view as chants ominously foreshadow a burgeoning cataclysmic event. We cut to what the measured narration describes as the childhood memories of a man from the future: the face of a freckled woman whose hair is kissed by the currents of wind, the shock of realization that a man has died on the pier, and lastly a brief glimpse of the annihilation of the city of Paris. A brief series of superpositions detail the doomsday aftermath with more potency than the entirety Roland Emmerich's filmography and provide a word of warning to a world saturated in Cold War panic (the Bay of Pigs incident had been dispelled concurrently to the photography). Among these images, that of the half standing Arc de Triomphe (recalling the Bastille Day Parades and the various matches that took place during World War II) provided an ironic counterpoint: the world, through nuclear proliferation, no longer has population enough to wage war against itself.

To shelter themselves from radiation, the survivors settle underground, beneath the art galleries of the Palais de Chaillot, a "Kingdom of Rats." The man with the childhood memory of the pier is selected to be a time traveling emissary. His strong attachment to the memories at the Pier makes him a perfect candidate. There's a heartbreaking simplicity to the way Marker applies the man's humanity as he goes about his mission: on the tenth day, for moments at a time, he witnesses a small, morning-lit bedroom, open fields, children, birds in flight, and graves; on the sixteenth day, he returns to the Pier; and finally, on the thirtieth day they meet, he gets glimpses of the statues at the museum. occupies the same space as the woman.

In one of the most formally perplexing moments in cinema, a montage of impressionistic stills of the woman's head feather-lightly resting on a pillow give way to the sole instance of movement: her eyes slowly open. It comes as such a shock to our hero that it sends him back to the future. On one level, the brief relapse from the film's established mode of diegesis infuses the romance with a sense of urgency while also reaffirming the poetic existential notions of the film: to coexist with one's surroundings and absorb its infinite array of sensations. But on the other hand, it suggests something more sinister: the world's industrial mechanizations are too forceful to slow down, but momentarily we will receive a pointed reminder of what we have lost (or neglected) in the process. The second reading aligns almost perfectly with the fatalism of the final scene at the pier: eventually the underground society has acquired the keys to restarting industry, and as our hero travels back to the pier the narrator informs : "He ran toward her. And when he recognized the man who'd trailed him from the camp, he realized there was no escape out of time, and that that moment he'd been granted to see as a child, and that had obsessed him forever after... was the moment of his own death."

[mrjohnnyb]

I know that there are many Melville fans on this site, so I thought that I would ask this: Has anybody here seen the Masters of Cinema blu-ray version of Le Silence de la Mer?

I have noticed that the disc plays in Region A and have been thinking about a blind buy purchase.

[The Great Owl]

Originally Posted by Abdrewes

Okay, my write-up isn't exactly finished, but heres what I got:

[Show spoiler]

Chris Marker's La Jetée ("The Pier") opens with a sole Black and White image of the Orly Airport in Paris, France on a serene Sunday morning. Four Airplanes are in view as chants ominously foreshadow a burgeoning cataclysmic event. We cut to what the measured narration describes as the childhood memories of a man from the future: the face of a freckled woman whose hair is kissed by the currents of wind, the shock of realization that a man has died on the pier, and lastly a brief glimpse of the annihilation of the city of Paris. A brief series of superpositions detail the doomsday aftermath with more potency than the entirety Roland Emmerich's filmography and provide a word of warning to a world saturated in Cold War panic (the Bay of Pigs incident had been dispelled concurrently to the photography). Among these images, that of the half standing Arc de Triomphe (recalling the Bastille Day Parades and the various matches that took place during World War II) provided an ironic counterpoint: the world, through nuclear proliferation, no longer has population enough to wage war against itself.

To shelter themselves from radiation, the survivors settle underground, beneath the art galleries of the Palais de Chaillot, a "Kingdom of Rats." The man with the childhood memory of the pier is selected to be a time traveling emissary. His strong attachment to the memories at the Pier makes him a perfect candidate. There's a heartbreaking simplicity to the way Marker applies the man's humanity as he goes about his mission: on the tenth day, for moments at a time, he witnesses a small, morning-lit bedroom, open fields, children, birds in flight, and graves; on the sixteenth day, he returns to the Pier; and finally, on the thirtieth day they meet, he gets glimpses of the statues at the museum. occupies the same space as the woman.

In one of the most formally perplexing moments in cinema, a montage of impressionistic stills of the woman's head feather-lightly resting on a pillow give way to the sole instance of movement: her eyes slowly open. It comes as such a shock to our hero that it sends him back to the future. On one level, the brief relapse from the film's established mode of diegesis infuses the romance with a sense of urgency while also reaffirming the poetic existential notions of the film: to coexist with one's surroundings and absorb its infinite array of sensations. But on the other hand, it suggests something more sinister: the world's industrial mechanizations are too forceful to slow down, but momentarily we will receive a pointed reminder of what we have lost (or neglected) in the process. The second reading aligns almost perfectly with the fatalism of the final scene at the pier: eventually the underground society has acquired the keys to restarting industry, and as our hero travels back to the pier the narrator informs : "He ran toward her. And when he recognized the man who'd trailed him from the camp, he realized there was no escape out of time, and that that moment he'd been granted to see as a child, and that had obsessed him forever after... was the moment of his own death."

Nice!

Like most present-day peeps, I saw 12 Monkeys in the mid-to-late 1990s, and thought that it was a brilliantly innovative film. It was only later that I discovered La Jetée, and realized that it's a vastly superior movie that squeezes in so much during the short running time.

[Scottie]

Looks like Charade is getting a general, non-Criterion release

http://www.amazon.com/Charade-Blu-ra...37110&sr=1-126

[Abdrewes]

Originally Posted by The Great Owl

Nice!

Like most present-day peeps, I saw 12 Monkeys in the mid-to-late 1990s, and thought that it was a brilliantly innovative film. It was only later that I discovered La Jetée, and realized that it's a vastly superior movie that squeezes in so much during the short running time.

I've seen the film probably 4 or 5 times now, but I still don't want to interpret THE bottom line of the film (note: I didn't write much of a conclusion). It covers so much within a dense 27 minutes

By the way, the only other short films that come close to La Jetee for me are Buster Keaton's One Week and Forough Farrokhzad's The House is Black. Both are about 22 minutes long and well worth seeing out.

[shortmartin]

Originally Posted by Abdrewes

I've seen the film probably 4 or 5 times now, but I still don't want to interpret THE bottom line of the film (note: I didn't write much of a conclusion). It covers so much within a dense 27 minutes

By the way, the only other short films that come close to La Jetee for me are Buster Keaton's One Week and Forough Farrokhzad's The House is Black. Both are about 22 minutes long and well worth seeing out.

Night and Fog - stunning, wrenching, one of the greatest movies ever - clocks in at 32 mins. Whenever I watch it, which, however morbid, is pretty often, I'm always torn because I want more, and yet I'm also of the opinion that the brevity is part of what lends the film its greatness, much like Jetee.

[The Great Owl]

Originally Posted by mrjohnnyb

I know that there are many Melville fans on this site, so I thought that I would ask this: Has anybody here seen the Masters of Cinema blu-ray version of Le Silence de la Mer?

I have noticed that the disc plays in Region A and have been thinking about a blind buy purchase.

Great Blu-ray edition of a great film!

I cannot recommend this one enough. The film itself is subtle, but majestic. The MoC booklet is really something else. It's almost like taking a college semester dedicated solely to this movie.

[Abdrewes]

Originally Posted by shortmartin

Night and Fog - stunning, wrenching, one of the greatest movies ever - clocks in at 32 mins. Whenever I watch it, which, however morbid, is pretty often, I'm always torn because I want more, and yet I'm also of the opinion that the brevity is part of what lends the film its greatness, much like Jetee.

That's another great one.

Please try to see The House is Black (available on YouTube). It is very similar in tone and just as powerful.

The House Is Black - خانه سیاه است - YouTube

[shortmartin]

Originally Posted by The Great Owl

Like most present-day peeps, I saw 12 Monkeys in the mid-to-late 1990s, and thought that it was a brilliantly innovative film. It was only later that I discovered La Jetée, and realized that it's a vastly superior movie that squeezes in so much during the short running time.

Belonging to the grunge generation, I have a great fondness for the films of the nineties, including 12 Monkeys. While I absolutely love and respect Jetee, it's that nostalgic aspect, taking me back to my school and college days, that defines my special admiration for 12 Monkeys and - along with other films of the era, especially crime-related flicks, like Usual Suspects, Shawshank Redemption, Heat, Lock Stock, Pulp Fiction, La Confidential - encourages frequent revisits.

My nineties nostalgia is also very much about music - my favorite album being August and Everything After . . . and I love to crank me up some Cranberries. In fact, I recently revisited Chungking Express (what an awesome looking Criterion blu!), and although the incorporation of California Dreaming into the movie is what usually gets the most attention, I actually found the Cantonese version of (the Cranberries song) Dreams to be just as definitive to the soundtrack.

[shortmartin]

Originally Posted by Abdrewes

That's another great one.

Please try to see The House is Black (available on YouTube). It is very similar in tone and just as powerful.

Thanks for the recommendation, never seen it, but definitely going to check it out now.

[Abdrewes]

Originally Posted by shortmartin

Thanks for the recommendation, never seen it, but definitely going to check it out now.

I edited my previous post to include the YouTube link.