The Criterion Collection

[retablo]

Originally Posted by iScottie

Besides the Oscar hype, it's pretty underrated.

It's an average movie at best, pushed by a typical Weinstein campaign. It's not an Oscar-worthy film IMO... some good performances but the script is lightweight and it never tackles any issues seriously and head-on. Instead, it doesn't know what kind of film it wants to be, part mental illness film, part rom-com, with a big showy (and lazily written) finale.

[Scottie]

Originally Posted by blkhrt

Just out of curiosity, what makes you say it is underrated? It has a 92% on Rotten Tomatoes, an 81 on Metacritic, and it was number three at the box office last weekend. It was also nominated for Best Picture and Best Director, and the director was nominated for Best Director for his last film too. If anything from David O'Russell makes it into the collection I would bet it would be something like Spanking the Monkey.

Well the film is only playing in limited theaters, around here especially. It's clearly not getting the box office success that it deserves.

[octagon]

Originally Posted by The Great Owl

Panic Room... The biggest plot twist of this movie was when I realized that Kristen Stewart's character was Jodie Foster's daughter and not Jodie Foster's son.
[B]

Originally Posted by *PREACHER*

You too...that's hillarious!!!

I found out in a thread here a year or two ago.

[octagon]

Originally Posted by The Great Owl

This also begs to question what "strange and forgotten cinema" will be adopted as Criterion titles in the future.

[Show spoiler]

[brandon_260]

Originally Posted by iScottie

Well the film is only playing in limited theaters, around here especially. It's clearly not getting the box office success that it deserves.

Its in 2500+ theaters as of last weekend and has passed $50 million domestic.

[SammyJankis]

Originally Posted by Snicket

While I completely see where you're coming from, I would like to see more CCOBB like releases from Criterion. They help sell the label and make people aware of the brand, not to mention they bring a nice chunk of change for Criterion. If you look at sales rankings CCOBB is more often than not number 1. So I would accept 1 mainstream new release a year if it meant Criterion getting a piece of the sales.

I think films like Following and The Game fit that bill nicely. Something that is produced by the Weinsteins, garnered a slew of Oscar nods, and going up in the box office isn't going to get the Criterion treatment.

On a similar note, I can't help but cringe whenever I see Benjamin Button at Barnes and Nobles. That thing just sticks out like a sore thumb.

[Judex]

Originally Posted by Darkcritic

While the Criterion edition looks better (Not that the MoC looks bad by any kind of measure) I still think the MoC is a truly worthy release. Mizoguchi fans should get both. The Criterion has PQ and extras for it while the MoC has the booklet plus Gion Bayashi as well which should be a HUGE selling point for those who love Mizoguchi.

I'll be double dipping, the Criterion has extras which are not on the MoC edition.

I wish either MoC or Criterion would hurry up and release Life of Oharu.

We need more Mizoguchi on Blu.

[Otto_Parts75]

VERY happy to see the Amazon.com preorders for Repo Man and Naked lunch criterion blu rays, about time!

[paul000]

Originally Posted by The Great Owl

A question for the masses...

Is The Curious Case of Benjamin Button a good movie?

In my opinion, no, it's not. It's dreadful. I could never possibly sit through it again. The effects, set design, some of the acting etc is good but as a film it is shit.

I'm really looking forward to some Bergman on blu-ray this year. I hope criterion comes through with something. Persona, Hour of the Wolf, Wild Strawberries. They need to happen soon! I feel like they've had Wild Strawberries ready for years and are just amused by teasing us.

[MacEachaidh]

Originally Posted by paul000

In my opinion, no, it's not. It's dreadful. I could never possibly sit through it again. The effects, set design, some of the acting etc is good but as a film it is shit.

I'd second that. It's a long time since I've seen it, so I can't remember my specific issues with it, but as I remember it, it's very cleverly made from a technical perspective, but the script fell way short — it seemed to be one of those post-modern dabble sort of movies (like Private Ryan), raising what it posed as "Big Questions" but never actually addressing them. I remember that, technical curiosity aside, it felt like a huge waste of time.

[drbikeshorts]

Originally Posted by The Great Owl

A question for the masses...

Is The Curious Case of Benjamin Button a good movie?

I've never seen it before, but I see used copies of the Criterion edition in every single used store. Just as I always see used copies of the Chasing Amy Criterion DVD in every used store. Now, I'm aware that Criterion probably unleashed more copies of these particular movies on the public due to their popularity at the time, but the ubiquitous sight of The Curious Case of Benjamin Button on used racks is a red flag to me.

Even without the used-rack preconception, there's really nothing about this movie that quickens my pulse on first glance. It's worth asking about, though, just in case I'm missing out on a marvelous work of cinema.

I like it.
I don't think it's great and I often think that David Fincher is overrated, but I did find Benjamin Button very moving.
YMMV
Try before you buy or buy cheap.

[pro-bassoonist]

Hello guys,

If you could play Region-B discs, please consider adding Tabu to your collections. It is an astonishingly good film directed by Miguel Gomes.

We don't get too many Portuguese films on Blu-ray, and this one is a real treasure. Incredibly poetic film



Pro-B

[deepbreathsanddeath]

I'm sure this has been discussed many times but I wouldn't even know which page to start looking on to find the answer (as if I'm going through 3035 pages... haha!), but I remember reading that Criterion will send a replacement plastic case with cover for titles that are in the terrible thin cardboard digipak packaging. Is this true? and how would I go about approaching them to get this done?
I've got the 400 blows and it bugs the hell out of me. One might say it... blows.

[A Sith Lord?]

Hopefully in my lifetime a Life Aquatic Criterion release on blu-ray will come out...

[Snicket]

Originally Posted by MasturB

Hopefully in my lifetime a Life Aquatic Criterion release on blu-ray will come out...

It was hinted that this would come out Jul-yish. I don't doubt it will release sometime this year.

[Spire]

Originally Posted by Snicket

It was hinted that this would come out Jul-yish. I don't doubt it will release sometime this year.

Nice! Hopefully it was a good hint.

[andsoitgoes]

Originally Posted by deepbreathsanddeath

I'm sure this has been discussed many times but I wouldn't even know which page to start looking on to find the answer (as if I'm going through 3035 pages... haha!), but I remember reading that Criterion will send a replacement plastic case with cover for titles that are in the terrible thin cardboard digipak packaging. Is this true? and how would I go about approaching them to get this done?
I've got the 400 blows and it bugs the hell out of me. One might say it... blows.

Yep, go to the criterion site, then just search for 400 blows replacement.

Then, boom, you're done

[deepbreathsanddeath]

Originally Posted by andsoitgoes

Yep, go to the criterion site, then just search for 400 blows replacement.

Then, boom, you're done

I live in Australia. They don't seem to ship outside the US and Canada
I needed a replacement disc for Walkabout because the one I have is faulty and barnes and noble wouldn't deal with it, so I contacted them about that and got no response. Granted I did give them my post details in the email so they may have just sent the replacement disc without replying. I guess I'll find out eventually if that happened but I doubt it.
The 400 blows paper digipak is so ugly

[KJH6926]

Originally Posted by MasturB

Hopefully in my lifetime a Life Aquatic Criterion release on blu-ray will come out...

Same here....would really like to pick this up along with Häxan

[nametag]

Originally Posted by iScottie

Besides the Oscar hype, it's pretty underrated.

Eh, I don't think so. If anything, it's given way too much credit for being essentially a pretty formulaic romantic comedy which touches on 'issues' to make it seem like it has more depth than it really has but, like someone just said about Benjamin Button, doesn't really have anything to say and resolves itself way too easily. Plus it has these really annoying scenes of characters all shouting over each other in a faux-realistic overlapping-dialogue way that just sounds incredibly staged and unnatural. The Fighter was the same... needless to say, I don't really rate O'Russell as a director at all, he punches way above his weight.

On a separate note, I've been meaning to watch Yi Yi for absolutely ages. Is it really as good as everyone makes out? Its length is slightly off-putting, but I usually really like character/family dramas is they're done well...