The Criterion Collection

[Scottie]

Does anyone know how Criterion sends the $10 gift certificates when getting a disc replaced? I misplaced mine and I don't remember how it was sent.

[The Great Owl]

Originally Posted by Abdrewes

Duly noted. I can imagine Kubrick stealing much thunder from all the novels he adapts. I'm so thankful I read A Clockwork Orange before watching the movie.

Stephen King's The Shining was a rather personal take on alcoholism and parental responsibility that reflected many of the author's own struggles during that time period. Kubrick's interpretations touches on these things in a roundabout way that was quite effective for the screen.

A recovering alcoholic father with a wife and child who are still dealing with the trauma of abuse... The idea of these three characters staying in an isolated hotel away from community resources is the Worst Idea in the History of Bad Ideas, and Kubrick's film does a superb job outlining the predicament in a story where everyone is screwed up inside and there are no reliable narrators. He downplays Stephen King's supernatural aspects of the story to create a more claustrophobic film.

The trouble is that it's near impossible to read the Stephen King novel these days without picturing Jack Nicholson. I fared okay, because I read The Shining over 25 years ago, but the Kubrick images still sneaked in.

I need to re-read The Shining before King publishes Doctor Sleep, which features an adult Danny Torrance fighting against vampires. (I'm not making this up.)

The Shining has always been my favorite Kubrick film by far, though. I love how he uses brightly lit settings to create terror, because it's so unlike most other horror films.

[BohemianGraham]

Originally Posted by NoirFan

And Peppard makes Paul more, uh, existent? Obviously, homosexuality and ambiguity were tougher sells in 1961. Despite the film's flaws, watching Hepburn sing "Moon River" always moves me, despite the hokey trappings of the sequence.

Agreed. Notice how they completely removed Holly's pregnancy (from her relationship with Jose) too?

I really enjoy the film, but Capote's novella was just some much more snarly, and there isn't the "happy ending" like in the film. I enjoy Blake Edwards, and the film.

Originally Posted by jayputter

I'm not sure it would make much difference. You had to remind people you're a girl once a month even when you had the Josie and the Pussycats avatar!

You mean this one?

I can see why people might have thought I was a guy there too, it having Josey Wales, rather than Josie McCoy.

Originally Posted by Snicket

Thaaaaannnnnkkkkk yyyyoooouuuu!!!

Finally someone who feels the same way a out some of the dudes here. But don't call them out on it...they don't like that.

Anyways...back to whatever...

I have called them out on it, and will continue to do so. I won't rehash that argument again now though.

Originally Posted by drbikeshorts

You know you don't need to see it, right
Films should never be an obligation.
I've either been underwhelmed or unimpressed with Baz Luhrmann, so Gatsby is not even on a list for me at the moment. Perhaps if Mrs Drbikeshorts wants to...

I didn't mind Australia, but that's it for Luhrmann for me. I know I don't have to watch the film, but all the hype and the fact you have so many people who think watching a film makes up for not reading the novel, everyone is going to say that this is the bestest version of Gatsby evah! It's the hype and the overrating of it I'm going to be dreading, as right now, it sounds like a total trainwreck.

I hate Romeo and Juliet (try studying it 3 years in a row in high school, and then in first year Intro English during undergrad, ugh. thank god my Shakespseare class studied the "history" plays like Henry V), but Luhrmann's film makes me hate it more.

Remember how I said a few post ago that The Departed made me take Leonardo DiCaprio seriously as an actor? Well Luhrmann's Romeo + Juliet made me think of him as a joke. Yeah, I was that 12 year old girl. The only 12 year old girl who hated Leonardo DiCaprio, and had the audacity to say Ewan McGregor (all before Ewan became majorly popular) and Micky Dolenz (Micky was my favourite at the teenybopper age!) were better actors and better looking .

Originally Posted by CoopFilm

I don't know much about it...what was it? I looked it up just now and didn't see much written about that.

[Show spoiler]Paul's gay, and doesn't end up with Holly, she ups and leaves for Brazil, lets go of Cat and doesn't find him, after feeling guilty. Eventually she ends up in Argentina and Africa, or so it is to be believed. The novel is told from a flashback perspective.

Originally Posted by andsoitgoes

Oh how sadly true. It's a sausage fest here, sadly. And as stereotypical as it may be assuming the majority of us are male, we are equally prejudiced in assuming we look like this:

[Show spoiler]

As for the confusion, I think your name is the starting point for why people are a bit confused, I'm guessing 90% of the people just assume you're a dude named Graham.

As to the metadata, that drives me insane. I've devoted entire days fixing missing art. I despised nothing more than having incorrect or missing artwork. If I couldn't get the art corrected, there was a 70% chance I'd just delete the music, no matter how good it was. It was THAT annoying. Same with eBooks. Sloppiness and inconsistencies drive me insane.



Hey, I've been tempted to cart around that avatar. That movie rocked my world. I never got into the series, but that movie. Rachael Leigh Cook is the most amazing thing in the world.

To quote most of the films in the 50s: "That girl's got spunk!"

I don't hold that stereotype of guys on here.

Different version of Josie and the Pussycats. I can't stand the live action film, but love the crap out of the cartoon series.

My name is an online alias I've been using for 10 years now. It's kinda stupid as to how I got it: 13 Tales from Urban Bohemia by the Dandy Warhols had just come out, and I was listening to the album non-stop. I was also a huge, huge, huge fan of Graham Chapman and Monty Python. That's how Bohemian Graham came about. Lame, I know, and it was ambiguous.

Originally Posted by drbikeshorts

No you shouldn't. Because the regulars here would miss out on these amusing mistaken gender posts followed by your explanation

Glad to know I can be entertaining!

[wcrouse]

Originally Posted by iScottie

Does anyone know how Criterion sends the $10 gift certificates when getting a disc replaced? I misplaced mine and I don't remember how it was sent.

I received notice of my $10 certificate in an email ten days or so after getting the replacement disk. It is also supposed to appear somewhere under your account info on Criterion's own web site.

[tonylopez]

Yeah, I wished I read more but by my count I still own over 100+ blus that I have not watched yet. For that matter I do own about 100+ books I have not read yet too. Someday i'll catch up.

[octagon]

Originally Posted by MacEachaidh

Noel Coward can be surprising. I think a lot of his stuff gets dismissed a bit unfairly as camp flummery, but films like "In Which We Serve" show that he could get to the heart of the matter and stir pride and emotions with the best of them, without resorting to overt rah-rah or sentimentality.

I already had the BFI release of Brief Encounter on Blu, but I'm still happy I splurged on the Criterion Lean/Coward set. Every disc in the box is satisfying.

I almost responded to this yesterday but after watching Brief Encounter I feel even more strongly about the In Which We Serve comments I had in mind.

It's not just that he can stir emotions without resorting to sentimentality, he can also resort to sentimentality without it being cheap or maudlin.

Some of the early segments of IWWS had me half-dreading the sappy tear-jerking that never materialized. There was no shortage of sentiment but I never felt like they cheated or I was being manipulated.

Apply all of that x1000 to Brief Encounter. I'm still in the afterglow so I'm going to try to reign in my enthusiasm but it was incredible to me that such a simple, straight-forward almost Peyton Place situation could be so layered and subtle without adding cheap complications and that it could all be handled with such deftness.

And I cringe at the prospect of almost any modern director even trying to show as much restraint that Lean did from open to close. There was scene after scene and shot after shot that just begger for (and would have been destroyed by) cheesy swelling strings or a dramatic sniffle or overly active lighting or a close-up of doe eyes brimming with tears but he let the story and the leads do most of the heavy lifting and it just plain worked.

It was absolutely brilliant.

And as an aside, it was also a textbook example of the benefits of both blind buying and of letting stuff sit around - often for months - without watching it. Tonight is a pefect example of what can happen if you roll the dice on good films and let them sit until the right night. Well tonight was definitely the right night and it was a deeeeeeeelight.

Originally Posted by drbikeshorts

Actually, I also watched my copy of Phantom Carriage a few days ago.
Fantastic story!
I was really just expecting a quite simple and straight forward story, so was very surprised that it was such a cleverly layered and non-linear narrative.
I watched it with the Matti Bye score, so I'll have to go back and re-watch it soon with the KTL score.

I'll second all of that and add one of the flat-out coolest visuals I've ever seen in any film from any era. I was completely floored

[Show spoiler]when Death reached down and lifted the 'unconscious spirit out of the recently deceased and had to carry him around for a bit. I can't recall ever seeing anything quite like that. It was so natural and believable. It seemed absolutely right artistically but it also seemed like a completely natural, normal thing for The Grim Reaper to do.

It's also a really good example of why 'outdated effects' can still be effective generations later. You know how you keep people from noticing the wires or the mirrors? Give them something really freaking cool to look at instead.

George Pal knew that

[Abdrewes]

Originally Posted by retablo

I just re-watched the Jeremy Irons-Adrian Lyne version that caused such a stir in the 90s... and in many ways it bests the Kubrick version IMO. I still prefer Kubrick's film overall, but Lyne included a lot of nice little touches from the book (and also was able to make it more gratuitous, which caused it's Showtime release).

Blasphemy!...Ive heard pretty negative things about Lyne's version. However, I've always been slighty curious to see both 90's Lolita and 90's Psycho.

Correct me if I'm wrong but wasn't he one of the posterboys for amped-up MTV filmmaking style? Considering the Olivier Megatons and Neveldine & Taylors of this world, Adrian Lyne seems rather tame by comparison.

[octagon]

Originally Posted by BohemianGraham

I'm dreading Gatsby to be honest. I probably will reread it though.

I'm half-looking forward to the film and half-dreading another reread of the novel. I read it in high school and thought 'yeah, okay, whatever'. In response to the film buzz I read it again last summer and was surprised when my reaction wasn't a whole lot different.

I can chalk part of that up to the fact that it had been 90+ for some sick number of days that month (and I'm vehemently opposed to AC) but not all of it.

Maybe three times will be the charm.

[Abdrewes]

Originally Posted by octagon

I'm half-looking forward to the film and half-dreading another reread of the novel. I read it in high school and thought 'yeah, okay, whatever'. In response to the film buzz I read it again last summer and was surprised when my reaction wasn't a whole lot different.

I can chalk part of that up to the fact that it had been 90+ for some sick number of days that month (and I'm vehemently opposed to AC) but not all of it.

Maybe three times will be the charm.

I just think we all need a great big dose of Luhrmann every couple of years. I think he'll totally Get the story wrong, but we won't be able to look away. The man is relentless and goes all out to bring his vision to the screen. It may be too campy, frenetic & overbearing for some, but a fully realized vision nonetheless.

[NoirFan]

I assume he means Blu-ray?

Originally Posted by Kent Willams tweet

Been hunkered down this whole week doing drawings for the new Criterion Lord of the Flies DVD.

Link

[The Great Owl]

Originally Posted by NoirFan

I assume he means Blu-ray?
Link

I assume the same. I traded in my Essential Art House edition DVD of Lord of the Flies a couple weeks ago in anticipation of the upcoming Criterion. Tough to do, because I got a lot of mileage out of that DVD, but I'm sure that the new Criterion will be ace.

[jrsl76]

Originally Posted by NoirFan

I assume he means Blu-ray?



Link

I'm sure he means both as this will certainly be a complete new edition of the title not just an upgrade to blu.

[The Great Owl]

Originally Posted by tonylopez

Yeah, I wished I read more but by my count I still own over 100+ blus that I have not watched yet. For that matter I do own about 100+ books I have not read yet too. Someday i'll catch up.

I go through a phase a couple times a year where I'll plow through two or three novels a week for several weeks. This past fall, I had a blast re-reading my collection of every Ian Fleming James Bond 007 novel before the release of Skyfall, but I also read quite a few books in between.

I am at a standstill now. I'll read about 100 pages of Les Miserables a week, but I am in movie-watching mode right now so soon after buying my first Blu-ray player and HDTV at the beginning of December. When the novelty of this wears off (and it will), I'll go back to reading a lot.

This morning, I read Stephen King's newly-written Kindle-only essay on Guns, so I haven't completely abandoned the written word. (For those interested, King brings up some good points for both sides of the debate, but an editor would have come in handy.)

[Scottie]

Originally Posted by wcrouse

I received notice of my $10 certificate in an email ten days or so after getting the replacement disk. It is also supposed to appear somewhere under your account info on Criterion's own web site.

Thank you!

[Page14]

Originally Posted by octagon

I'll second all of that and add one of the flat-out coolest visuals I've ever seen in any film from any era. I was completely floored

[Show spoiler]when Death reached down and lifted the 'unconscious spirit out of the recently deceased and had to carry him around for a bit. I can't recall ever seeing anything quite like that. It was so natural and believable. It seemed absolutely right artistically but it also seemed like a completely natural, normal thing for The Grim Reaper to do.

It's also a really good example of why 'outdated effects' can still be effective generations later. You know how you keep people from noticing the wires or the mirrors? Give them something really freaking cool to look at instead.

George Pal knew that

+1 on the George Pal comment. I love his films. Nice to see him get some respect!

[greekak229]

Didn't even know til today Barnes was having a Buy 2 get 1 Free sale. Either way, I picked up Ivan's Childhood, The Organizer and Tarkovskiy's Stalker on DVD.

[rkish]

Originally Posted by BohemianGraham

I'm a girl. You're new here, so therefore you're excused. I'm sure some of my OMG Peter Tork is teh pretteh would have popped up eventually, but you could have just presumed I was a gay man or something.



Not really, I'm so used to people thinking I'm a man on this bloody forum, because apparently "girls are stupid and have cooties! they don't appreciate film or HDTV!" Thus, 98% of this forum is male and there are a multitude of unintentional and intentional sexist comments/avatars.

I should just put in my signature I'm a girl or something.



I'm 27, I'm not old. My hair is still a nice auburn. Could use a trim though.

I don't want to go on the cart. I feel happy, I feel happy!

Originally Posted by Snicket

Thaaaaannnnnkkkkk yyyyoooouuuu!!!

Finally someone who feels the same way a out some of the dudes here. But don't call them out on it...they don't like that.

Anyways...back to whatever...

People conveniently forget that this is a forum and it "should" be a way for people to get into each others brains and share/learn/entertain/be entertained by the others posting. Sex/age/politics/etc./etc. have no place in this or any forum. BH could be one of the best posters on this particular thread, as she reads a LOT of books and has a deeper insight into a number of the films that she has seen that corresponds to either a screenplay and/or book that she has read. My wife is the same way...her nickname is "bookhound" and she has seen a number of the same films years ago that I embrace today. I've learned a lot from her and from the others on this forum.

I'm a 54 year old balding bearded male network specialist that just happens to have an interest in film. I'm a film novice at best, but have made an effort to expand my horizons as much as I can.

[rkish]

Originally Posted by BohemianGraham

Wow...now that your old avatar pic has been blown up to better dimensions, I can appreciate the art work even more. Very nicely done. I'm old enough to remember watching it on TV when it was brand spanky new.

[BohemianGraham]

Originally Posted by rkish

Wow...now that your old avatar pic has been blown up to better dimensions, I can appreciate the art work even more. Very nicely done. I'm old enough to remember watching it on TV when it was brand spanky new.

I admit I didn't draw it, I found it online and thought it was pretty damn awesome.

I agree with you that gender shouldn't matter in this forum, but sometimes I think people assume this is an old boys club, and often make comments or have avatars that are slightly insulting and inappropriate towards females. I'm not a fan of Dunham, but during the original blow up, a lot of the comments dI'd cross the line. It also gets annoying to read other threadswwhere posters are so derogatory towards their significant others. It does work the opposite way too, as I've worked with women who think their husbands are morons.

[rkish]

Originally Posted by BohemianGraham

I admit I didn't draw it, I found it online and thought it was pretty damn awesome.

I agree with you that gender shouldn't matter in this forum, but sometimes I think people assume this is an old boys club, and often make comments or have avatars that are slightly insulting and inappropriate towards females. I'm not a fan of Dunham, but during the original blow up, a lot of the comments dI'd cross the line. It also gets annoying to read other threadswwhere posters are so derogatory towards their significant others. It does work the opposite way too, as I've worked with women who think their husbands are morons.

LOL...yeah...there are some real a-holes out there, all right! My wife and I don't always "like" each other, but we try to respect each other and those that we encounter. She's Chinese, so she's all too familiar with the "glass ceiling", having worked for a publisher in NYC, when we first met.