The Criterion Collection

[The Great Owl]

Originally Posted by lemonski

Ever since reading the site review for Chandu the Magician, I have been smitten by June Lang...so much so that I feel the need to buy the Blu-ray. Is this wrong?

[Show spoiler]

Not at all. I love how those 1930s films showed just enough to be sexy while also leaving plenty to the imagination.

I'm intrigued by Chandu the Magician, but I can no longer keep up with all of the Blu-rays that I want to own these days, and am having to focus most of my funds on limited edition releases that may not be around in the future. It'll probably be mine at some point when a sale goes on.


All of this Meiko Kaji talk has cemented my decision to watch my Lady Snowblood movies at long last tomorrow on my flex day off from work.

[jayembee]

Originally Posted by theater dreamer

Thank you. I would agree that Veronica should be included in the discussion. She popped into my head while I was looking through pictures, but I forgot to include her. She wasn't my only omission; I'd also include Audrey Hepburn, Juliette Binoche, Anne Baxter and several others if I took more time to think about it.

I might've missed one, but not one person mentioned Maureen O'Sullivan? Or the other Maureen O'? Or if you want to go back a little farther, the Gish sisters?

[Ray Jackson]

This article on the relationship between Frank Sinatra and Ava Gardner is fascinating.

Any woman who can P-whip the Chairman of the Board to the point where he actually attempts to commit suicide over the prospect of her leaving him, must've been one hell of a dame.

And yes...they generated some explosive heat in the bedroom.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/ar...atra-tame.html

[cakefactory]

Originally Posted by The Great Owl

All of this Meiko Kaji talk has cemented my decision to watch my Lady Snowblood movies at long last tomorrow on my flex day off from work.

I just watched them yesterday. I'd watched the first one on the Arrow disc a while back, but didn't remember much of anything. It's quite a genre classic, has brilliant use of color (especially the surreal spurting blood), filmmaking style to spare, and has a few whole sequences that are up there with the greats. Kill Bill 1's structure is quite similar, down to a weird stylized flashback (manga instead of anime here). Her master even looks like an Asian David Carradine! The second isn't much good, but hey, it's basically a bonus feature and the transfer is just as nice I think you'll like the first one at least quite a bit.

[diskspinner]

Originally Posted by cakefactory

I just watched them yesterday. I'd watched the first one on the Arrow disc a while back, but didn't remember much of anything. It's quite a genre classic, has brilliant use of color (especially the surreal spurting blood), filmmaking style to spare, and has a few whole sequences that are up there with the greats. Kill Bill 1's structure is quite similar, down to a weird stylized flashback (manga instead of anime here). Her master even looks like an Asian David Carradine! The second isn't much good, but hey, it's basically a bonus feature and the transfer is just as nice I think you'll like the first one at least quite a bit.

I watched the 1st one few days back (borrowed from library) due to comparison with Kill Bill (which I love)...I did not like Lady Snowblood at all...Sure, there is similarity in structure but Tarantino is a much better filmmaker...There is simply no comparison...I am not fan of Samurai type of movies...but it would rank in the bottom part of what I have seen. Anyway I am sure Great Owl, you will love it...because you love all the movies you watch (I wish I could be like that)

[jayembee]

Originally Posted by cakefactory

I just watched them yesterday. I'd watched the first one on the Arrow disc a while back, but didn't remember much of anything. It's quite a genre classic, has brilliant use of color (especially the surreal spurting blood), filmmaking style to spare, and has a few whole sequences that are up there with the greats. Kill Bill 1's structure is quite similar, down to a weird stylized flashback (manga instead of anime here). Her master even looks like an Asian David Carradine! The second isn't much good, but hey, it's basically a bonus feature and the transfer is just as nice I think you'll like the first one at least quite a bit.

You mean Kwai Chang Caine?

[cakefactory]

Originally Posted by jayembee

You mean Kwai Chang Caine?

X_X Naw, when he has the aged makeup later in the movie when he's talking about the writer to her, he looks like David Carradine circa Kill Bill/Dexter. Too bad Kung Fu didn't last long enough for him to be the old wizened master.

[theater dreamer]

I don't know if it will be released on Blu-ray or not. The documentary was produced by the USC Shoah Foundation, so I wouldn't be surprised to see it get some kind of domestic distribution. Kitty Hart-Moxon returns to the grounds of the Concentration Camp at Auscheitz-Birkenau with two teenage girls who were the same age she was when the camp was liberated. While any documentary taking place there is going to have a real underlying sense of horror, she goes about relating to these girls, and the audience, what the day to day life was like, and how pretty much everybody she met in the camp, all the friends she made, were systematically killed. The only person I recall surviving that she knew was her mother. It was her mother, an academic, if I recall, that somehow engineered their release just prior to the camp's liberation. To listen to her speak, it's amazing, to me, that anybody survived. The documentary is also a testament to the human spirit, how one can endure even the most cruel and inhumane hardships. It's also an incredibly important piece. We're drawing closer to a time when there will be no more living survivors of these camps, and the story needs to be told to the younger generation, so that they know what really happened. No Hollywood film, no matter how well done, will ever bring the experience home like actually visiting the grounds where so many innocent people lost their lives. There's one scene towards the end where they visit a lake on the grounds, and she relates how it's a mass graveyard.

Our family is very fortunate that nobody (that I know of) was relocated to the camps, or the ghetto, during the war. My great grandfather moved the Grzegorzewski family from Warsaw to Chicago in 1928. But I still feel a real connection to what happened because, had a few things changed, there's a very real possibility that I might not be here. I've always had a bit of a difficult time reconciling my Polish and German ancestry.

Thank you for the heads up on The Last Days. I'll have to see if I can find it streaming; Netflix usually has a diverse set of documentaries, so I'll keep my eyes peeled.

Originally Posted by jmclick

No, I have not seen One Day in Auschwitz, but I thank you for pointing it out to me. I am definitely interested in seeing it; perhaps it will eventually be released on blu-ray?

Another worthwhile documentary pertaining to the Holocaust is the 1998 film that won the Best Documentary Feature Oscar: The Last Days, which was directed by James Moll and executive produced by Steven Spielberg. Released on DVD, it hasn't been released on blu-ray yet, although it deserves to be. It's a harrowing record of the Nazi's campaign against Hungarian Jews during the final months of World War II.

By the way, I was touched by your mention of your family's personal connection to the Holocaust and the war. Thank you for sharing that with us.

Well, it seems my heritage is a big talking point tonight. In addition to being 1/4 Polish (and 1/4 German), I'm also half Irish. I've always most closely identified with my Irish heritage; my parents visited Ireland in early 2000, and, before I hurt my back, Ireland was the place I was next going to visit after taking a trip to England. There's something about the island that has always called to me. Understandably, I have a real affinity for Irish women, and Misses O'Sullivan and O'Hara would also be on my list (God, I forgot quite a few, didn't I?) There have been beauties from every era, going back to Lillian Gish, Mary Pickford and Norma Shearer. Nicole Kidman, besides being drop dead gorgeous, has a real elegance to her, much like the actresses back in the 30s, 40s and 50,s had.

I happen to really love beautiful women. What can I say? I don't think there's anything wrong with openly admiring the beauties of the screen. In the Golden era of Hollywood, especially, beauty and glamour were big parts of what made watching the silver screen memorable.

Originally Posted by jayembee

I might've missed one, but not one person mentioned Maureen O'Sullivan? Or the other Maureen O'? Or if you want to go back a little farther, the Gish sisters?

[Nuck Horris]

Originally Posted by diskspinner

I am not fan of Samurai type of movies

[The Great Owl]

I just finished watching my Criterion Blu-ray of Carnival of Souls.

I think that this Blu-ray is a day-versus-night upgrade from my old DVD, and I'm really blown away by how much detail I see on this high definition release. I've been clamoring for a Blu-ray upgrade of Carnival of Souls for years now, and this release is everything that I was hoping to see.

The original theatrical version of Carnival of Souls works for me, and I do not believe that the story or the aesthetics of the film are compromised in any way for lack of the scenes that were added for the extended DVD cut. In fact, I like how the theatrical version keeps the story more centered on Mary's point of view after her car accident, and this aspect of that version is appreciated for reasons that become apparent later in the film.

I'm too tired tonight to write the long-winded sort of review that Carnival of Souls deserves, but I'll just say that I have loved this movie for many years now. It's a textbook example of how to make an effective film on the cheap, and I'm always in awe of how horror cinema, time and time again, shows that money and state-of-the-art effects are not necessary as long as a script has the ability to captivate.

[Show spoiler]Since I am a lifelong fan of The Twilight Zone, and episodes like "The Hitch-Hiker" and "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge (based on the Ambrose Bierce short story), I was preconditioned to enjoy this particular story when I first saw Carnival of Souls years ago. The phenomenon that the late Roger Ebert called the "Keyzer Soze ending", where the conclusion of a movie redefines the reality of the previous scenes, may seem worn out these days, but it's still a welcome storytelling style when it is effectively done, as it clearly is here.

I did chuckle a few times during tonight's viewing, because Mary's across-the-hall neighbor, John Linden, looks like a hillbilly version of James McAvoy.

[hoytereden]

I'll just add one to the gorgeous female stars conversation and then be gone:

Frances Gifford*

I first saw her when I was a yout in Tarzan Triumphs and thought she was so darn pretty and, of course, the costume didn't hurt. That opinion was reinforced when our local station ran the serial Jungle Girl. Her career started to get an uptick when MGM signed her but then a car accident profoundly affected her health and her career was, for all intents and purposes, done. So sad.

One otherwise forgettable film she made was She Went to the Races that featured her and Ava Gardner competing for James Craig (lucky bas#*%d!)

*I apologize for not posting a photo but I do a pretty miserable job at it when I try.

[Blu-Velvet]

I just rewatched the original 1932 THE MUMMY, and must say that Zita Johann belongs high on the list of hypnotically attractive female stars. I wish she had made more films, but she preferred the stage over the hassle of 1930s Hollywood. And to keep this somewhat on topic, the underrated and all but forgotten THE SIN OF NORA MORAN sorely needs a Blu-ray release with Criterion treatment. More people know it from its Vargas poster design than from seeing the movie.

[ThisKid]

All this talk of the most beautiful women in movies and not once has this beast ever been mentioned?

[Show spoiler]

I'm sorry, here's the best one-

[Show spoiler]

[hoytereden]

Originally Posted by Blu-Velvet

I just rewatched the original 1932 THE MUMMY, and must say that Zita Johann belongs high on the list of hypnotically attractive female stars. I wish she had made more films, but she preferred the stage over the hassle of 1930s Hollywood. And to keep this somewhat on topic, the underrated and all but forgotten THE SIN OF NORA MORAN sorely needs a Blu-ray release with Criterion treatment. More people know it from its Vargas poster design than from seeing the movie.

Pretty amazing poster from a poverty row studio. I saw one of Zita's other films on TCM recently: Howard Hawks' Tiger Shark. Excellent film; gorgeous woman.

[malakaheso]

Originally Posted by The Great Owl

I'm always in awe of how horror cinema, time and time again, shows that money and state-of-the-art effects are not necessary as long as the director has the ability to captivate.

Fixed that for you. Horror is a director's medium, not a writer's medium. I'd argue the reason the genre went downhill is because the emphasis shifted from the director to the writer around the time of Scream, which was that film's unfortunate legacy.

Carnival of Souls is so effective because of the mood and atmosphere, which is partially influenced by European art films of the time, especially in its use of space. That's what makes it rather unusual for a genre film, especially one of that period.

[The Great Owl]

Originally Posted by malakaheso

Fixed that for you. Horror is a director's medium, not a writer's medium. I'd argue the reason the genre went downhill is because the emphasis shifted from the director to the writer around the time of Scream, which was that film's unfortunate legacy.

Carnival of Souls is so effective because of the mood and atmosphere, which is partially influenced by European art films of the time, especially in its use of space. That's what makes it rather unusual for a genre film, especially one of that period.

That's a good observation. Carnival of Souls is certainly served better by atmosphere and direction than it is by script, although it is a well-written simple tale.


Right now, on my flex day off from work, I'm watching the special features on the Carnival of Souls disc. It's sad that people allowed the Saltair to fall into such disrepair and decay, because it was such a cool-looking and beautiful building. Most architecture today is featureless and blandly uniform, so I always mourn the heyday of building designs that had distinct character.

[ShellOilJunior]

Anyone get a chance to take the New World (Extended cut) for a spin?

The PQ is immaculate and the interviews with Farrell and Kilcher are quite good. I also had a chance to read the entire booklet. Excellent release.

[llj]

Originally Posted by The Great Owl

Actually, I'm perfectly happy with my existing Blu-ray of Michael Mann's Heat, and I've never understood the disdain for that disc in this forum.

I love the film so much that I'll gladly pull the trigger on the upcoming 4K transfer if the virtues of that release prove to be worthy of a purchase, but I'd never have thought to question the current Blu-ray had I not read the reviews on this forum. (I tend to feel this way about 99% of the Blu-rays in my collection, actually.)

I'm delighted that there are people in this forum who call out Blu-ray releases for technical flaws, but I'm personally content whenever I see something that looks better than my old DVDs or VHS tapes. (This is also why I'm not cut out to be a real reviewer on this site, but that's cool.)

Actually, didn't I hear that the biggest problems of Heat on the current BD is that there were a few edits and alterations?

[barfyman]

Does anyone else really hope that the next Altman film Criterion does is California Split? Been wanting to see a proper version of that for a long time now. The DVD has some cuts due to licensing and is out of print so it's a perfect candidate.

[malakaheso]

Originally Posted by barfyman

Does anyone else really hope that the next Altman film Criterion does is California Split?.

Yes.