The Criterion Collection

[retablo]

Originally Posted by Simple Lines

Hooray for no links or explanation!

It's been covered in the past. The artist used a reference shot from Cameron's Titanic for his painting of the cover. It's a minor thing. but pretty blatant.

[jcs913]

Originally Posted by Joe Dalek

If you were given the following choices:

• 1980s black comedy from Fox
  
• contemporary indie drama by a female director

...which would you expect from Criterion? The latter seems more obvious to me, or at least more deserving because you can slap Eating Raoul on a $15 Fox disc and nobody would really mind.

That said, you're right about what the polls will say.

You can also say the same about TF, no?

[SpiderBaby]

Originally Posted by Darkcritic

Best:
- Trilogy of Life
- Week End (Godard)
- World on a Wire

The best films with the best covers.

[joie]

That's quite a sale Amazon is having. Many titles are priced 10% less than the B&N sale price. If you set your price watcher on Criterion titles for $18, you may find that some become available at Amazon for $17.99 at other times during the year.

Considering sales tax, the final price can depend on where you live. But what I liked about going into the store was that I could select which of each title I wanted. Some are obviously shrink-wrapped, with the obvious seam; others look as though they're in a plastic sleeve with the top and bottom neatly folded down, like movie packaging usually looks. The store's copies of "In the Mood for Love" were all shrink wrapped, so that's what I got with that one, but "Rashomon" and "Rosemary's Baby" weren't shrink-wrapped. I have seen the same sort of shrink-wrap packaging when I ordered something direct from Criterion -- it is a mystery to me. Going into the store let's you see whether the thing has been used as a writing surface or something, too.

add: And "Weekend" wasn't shrink-wrapped.

[retablo]

Originally Posted by Joe Dalek

If you were given the following choices:

• 1980s black comedy from Fox
  
• contemporary indie drama by a female director

...which would you expect from Criterion? The latter seems more obvious to me, or at least more deserving because you can slap Eating Raoul on a $15 Fox disc and nobody would really mind.

That said, you're right about what the polls will say.

I'd honestly expect the 1980s black comedy. Remember, until the somewhat recent IFC deal, Criterion rarely issued many contemporary films. When they did, they were more along the lines of Ghostbusters, Se7en, The Silence Of The Lambs, Robocop, Armageddon, etc... a few others, like Chasing Amy, Dead Ringers, George Washington, etc, snuck in there, but even most of those had medium-to-wide theatrical releases. Criterion was never a champion of little-seen indie dramas until more recently, unless they were foreign.

[Snicket]

Originally Posted by retablo

Criterion was never a champion of little-seen indie dramas until more recently, unless they were foreign.

That is a more than welcome policy change IMO.

[IronWaffle]

Originally Posted by Joe Dalek

Man, these sales...I'm down to less than 10 titles on my Criterion "must have" wishlist.

Of course there are about 60 "maybe someday" titles I could add to it...but between the Hulu specials and the 50% off sales my wishlist has dwindled to almost nothing since July.

If you need help buying stuff just shoot me a PM and I'll give you my wish list and mailing address

Being fiscally responsible-ish means instead of buying instead I'm pawing at Amazon like my cat at a window when a bird is perched nearby.

[octagon]

Originally Posted by Joe Dalek

It's strange because I really thought a lot of people would find

[Show spoiler]Eating Raoul

"unworthy" of Criterion but it's been very well-received.

Has it really been very well-received or just largely ignored by those indifferent to it. My impression is more toward the latter.

It certainly hasn't generated much backlash but that's not really surprising. It's kind of in that mushy Something Wild 'eh, whatever' zone.

[Darkcritic]

Originally Posted by CoopFilm

Yeah, I think it does the best job at representing the themes of the film over any of the other covers. It may not look appealing but it's brilliant. I feel like the people that vote for it as worst most likely haven't seen it.

+1 The cover is brilliant but ugly. Life isn't easy .

Originally Posted by SpiderBaby

The best films with the best covers.

Yeah, those covers are truly amazing (The spine of World on a Wire is beautiful, great and uncommon color combination). I was thinking about adding A Hollis Frampton Odyssey and/or Les Enfants du Paradis too. The first one is also a top-release (And probably the best surprise of the year) while the second is a great film with a crappy release. I wish Criterion would start doing at least one experimental release per-year as those are awesome. My most wishful and impossible release is a set with the complete experimental shorts from Mexican-filmmaker Ximena Cuevas.

[NoirFan]

Originally Posted by Joe Dalek

I was patiently waiting for a swell of WTFs when Eating Raoul came out

Why? It's a well-reviewed film with a solid cult following, and the Blu-ray includes two early Bartel shorts in HD as well as other extras, including a commentary. The Sony DVD had a horrible transfer and zero extras, so I doubt if they had any plans for a Blu-ray, and it certainly wouldn't have received anything approaching the Criterion treatment.

[octagon]

Originally Posted by Joe Dalek

Because I didn't think it was anything terribly special, and being right all the time I assumed everyone would be of the same mind as me.

Cut us some slack, after all it was announced the same day as The Game

[jcs913]

Originally Posted by Joe Dalek

I was patiently waiting for a swell of WTFs when Eating Raoul came out but the few mentions I've noticed here have been positive. Not that there have been a lot of mentions.

Joe, I just think that Raoul fits Criterions' mold more consistently than TF does. I see your point about the 'here and now' with Dunham, but the same can be said for White Material and The Forgiveness of Blood. Frankly, in the motto of Criterion, those are more of an 'important piece of cinema' than Dunhams ever will be. IMO, TF seemed like an attempt at trying to bring in the 18-30 viewer to Criterion and what it has to offer. I wonder if Criterion knew about the HBO deal before they picked up the film. That's not a bad thing for them financially, but as to whether it 'fits' in their catalog, is anyone's guess and my reason for making it the #1 pick in the WTF is this category list. But as with any film, it's all subjective anyway....

[octagon]

Originally Posted by jcs913

IMO, TF seemed like an attempt at trying to bring in the 18-30 viewer to Criterion and what it has to offer.

I suspect their motives weren't quite that cynical. If I had to guess I'd say somebody there was sincerely caught up in whatever (primarily New York based, I would think) buzz there was around her.

I don't exactly agree but whoever made the decision probably genuinely felt he/she/they were getting in on the ground floor of something with real legs.

[jcs913]

Originally Posted by octagon

I suspect their motives weren't quite that cynical. If I had to guess I'd say somebody there was sincerely caught up in whatever (primarily New York based, I would think) buzz there was around her.

I don't exactly agree but whoever made the decision probably genuinely felt he/she/they were getting in on the ground floor of something with real legs.

I do believe that they were targeting an audience. This selection was completely out of the mold of what Criterion releases. It may seem cynical, but consistency is what I do not see with this release. I think someone (an executive, junior executive, etc) was trying to bring that demographic into a company that frankly, doesn't have it. Whether it works or not, I do not know, as we do not have access to the sales numbers since its release. As I mentioned before, I wonder if Criterion knew about the HBO series before they signed off on releasing the film. Would certainly add to sales and interest in Criterion from that demographic, no?

[greekak229]

Welp, my copy of Godard's Weekend said Order Delivered but, um, it's not here of course. Too bad. I was looking forward to watching that tonight.

[octagon]

Originally Posted by jcs913

I do believe that they were targeting an audience. This selection was completely out of the mold of what Criterion releases. It may seem cynical, but consistency is what I do not see with this release. I think someone (an executive, junior executive, etc) was trying to bring that demographic into a company that frankly, doesn't have it. Whether it works or not, I do not know, as we do not have access to the sales numbers since its release. As I mentioned before, I wonder if Criterion knew about the HBO series before they signed off on releasing the film. Would certainly add to sales and interest in Criterion from that demographic, no?

If they had gone with Bellflower would you have the same WTF reaction? Would that have seemed as far outside their mold? Or would we have lauded them for distributing this generation's Two Lane Blacktop?

Don't get me wrong, I'm not defending this choice. I haven't seen TF but if it's anything like Girls it's probably pretty shallow, trite and uninteresting.

But it doesn't really seem all that odd or strange a choice for them.

Aside from not being very good and even that's not *cough*Traffic*cough* virgin territory for them.

[NoirFan]

Originally Posted by octagon

Aside from not being very good and even that's not *cough*Traffic*cough* virgin territory for them.

Huh? Traffic won 4 Oscars.

[octagon]

Originally Posted by NoirFan

Huh? Traffic won 4 Oscars.

Dances With Wolves won seven.

What's our point?

[NoirFan]

Originally Posted by octagon

Dances With Wolves won seven.

What's our point?

Just because you personally don't like Traffic doesn't make it a bad film - it has an 86 score at Metacritic, 92 at Rotten Tomatoes, and, if memory serves, was on or at the top of pretty much every critic's top 10 that year, in addition to winning or being nominated for categories in every single award ceremony in 2000. There are plenty of questionable inclusions in the Criterion Collection, but this is the first time I've ever heard Traffic listed as one of them.

[rkish]

Originally Posted by Joe Dalek

Man, these sales...I'm down to less than 10 titles on my Criterion "must have" wishlist.

Of course there are about 60 "maybe someday" titles I could add to it...but between the Hulu specials and the 50% off sales my wishlist has dwindled to almost nothing since July.

Hey Joe...sorry to sound like a noobie, but how do the Hulu specials work? Is there a link on Criterion's website or do you order through Hulu?