The Criterion Collection

[StarDestroyer52]

Originally Posted by MifuneFan

They gave us Le Samourai the previous month, I am allowing them to have a couple of off months in lieu of that

This and The Philadelphia Story has given Criterion the right to a few off months. Anyway, I will be busy with the sale next month to care about the December titles plus I have to get the Lang Silents set in December anyway.

[ThisKid]

Originally Posted by cakefactory

Yeah, I think a lot of people are just uninterested in anything documentary (I am including myself in this - I think Hoop Dreams, Buena Vista Social Club and Night and Fog are the only three I've bought from them), so we're left ONLY with something with Reese Witherspoon. Ah well. I REALLY don't mind tangential discussions, I don't know why some people do. I guess you should be glad it's not like the Code Red thread.

Buy Crumb. You won't regret it.

[bwdowiak]

Originally Posted by cakefactory

Have you actually SEEN it, or are you just talking out of your ass cause you heard it was for dummies?

Why would you say that? I actually saw it in the theater.. as I did RW's Just Like Heaven, Cruel Intentions, and Election.

Why do some people get so butt hurt when someone doesn't like a movie that they do?

[bwdowiak]

I picked up a copy of The Straight Story from the library. I've never seen it and am very much looking forward to it. The copy is very scratched, so I hope it works.

[bwdowiak]

Originally Posted by DaBargainHunta

This thread is the first I've ever heard of any backlash for My Big Fat Greek Wedding. I swear, some Criterion fans are way too snooty for their own good. As I said in an earlier post:

Another one...

Please spare me the stereo-typing. It isn't really fair.

I'm a lover of cinema. My tastes aren't defined by anything or anyone.

[DaBargainHunta]

Originally Posted by bwdowiak

Another one...

Please spare me the stereo-typing. It isn't really fair.

I'm a lover of cinema. My tastes aren't defined by anything or anyone.

I honestly have no idea how you came to the conclusion that any of my posts were attacking or stereotyping you personally. That certainly was not my intention.

[MeMynonsense]

Revisited Le Trou after many years on the new Studiocanal BD and it remains every bit as enthralling as it was the first time around. It appears so understated and unpretentious, yet so poignant and dynamic that the underlying scrupulousness hardly ever comes to the fore. A prison-escape film that both mocks and eschews common genre cliches. There aren’t any nasty guards or sadistic wardens, no sucking up to Mr. Big for protection against hulking sexual predators, no time for unnecessary shower or mess hall politics. In fact there are no mess halls. Period. And most of the action is confined to the claustrophobic prison cells. Becker resists the deep plunges into character backgrounds or enlisting stars instead casts non-actors to boost their believability.

Le Trou houses an embarrassment of exhilarating, tenterhooking sequences. My favourite is the deafening demolition of a solid concrete floor using only a metal bed-supplement, in real time, while the cell-door is guarded through the peephole via a crude spy-glass - ingeniously fashioned out of a toothbrush and broken mirror. Becker heightens the suspense by forensically highlighting such salient details, grounding most of the action in the immediate present. Everything is so right here. He brilliantly succeeds in conveying with fidelity the realities of the prison world (loyalty, betrayal, isolation, inspections and inedible meals). There’s a reason why Le Trou feels like a distant cousin of Rififi. Both meticulously document the painstaking preparation that goes into pulling off a plan while utilising silence as the primary tension builder. Both deceptively transform the titillated viewer into an apprehensive accomplice. Only this time, instead of breaking into a place the protagonists are breaking out.

Equally noteworthy are the performances from its principals, in particular Philippe Leroy, Michel Constantin and Jean Keraudy, who’d never been in a film before. But it is ‘Roland’ played by the uber-industrious Jean Keraudy who lends credibility to this gritty caper. A co-conspirator of screenwriter José Giovanni in the notorious 1947 Santé Prison jailbreak attempt that inspired the film - Keraudy draws from his experience as an escape-artist and his rightly described as a “manual magician” in one of the disc supplements. His remarkable resourcefulness is why Le Trou lives and breathes in its processes: whether it’s his ingenuity with a makeshift sand-clock or the precision of his periscope device.
Jean-Pierre Melville famously hailed Le Trou as “The Greatest French Film Of All Time!” - a lofty claim but one not without merit. From its slow-burn start to its astounding, disquieting conclusion - Becker’s swan song is a veritable knockout.

[Ned Brainard]

Originally Posted by dwk

According to this Reddit post, Suzanne Lloyd said that Kid's Brother is coming in 2018 and a box set of all of his shorts is in the works.

Thanks for the news. I hope to see The Kid Brother among the Criterion April announcements in several months.

[Poya]

Originally Posted by Cremildo

Hilary Swank has 2 Oscars.
Liv Ullmann and Glenn Close have none.
Who's the better actress?

(I'm not arguing Reese is better than Nicole, just illustrating how ridiculous the amount-of-awards argument is)

It's not just awards, I personally don't see much value in them. My post didn't mention this but it was more of a companion to the picture posted above than me worshiping awards. That said, I still feel Witherspoon is inferior to Kidman. I said "that's a fact" because I like to make overstatements.

[MifuneFan]

Seriously move on, and take this shit to its own thread.

[hoytereden]

Originally Posted by llj

Popped in the BD of Seconds this weekend. It is, of course, Rock Hudson's most lauded performance, but I never thought he was ever a bad actor. And the guy has more appearances in the Criterion collection than many more historically acclaimed actors! Hudson looked genuinely terrified in the last scene.

Anyway, the movie holds up. In terms of its themes of personal freedom and the ways in which more powerful entities try to exploit these desires in people to in fact enforce even MORE control over them seems particularly topical in today's world where people are signing over their names and background info to companies even more often than ever before. And it doesn't absolve the individual either--if anything it condemns the Hudson character's weaknesses as much if not more than the "company" exploiting him. Very dark, cynical film about 4 years before Hollywood went full on in that direction.

Alec Baldwin's segment on the disc is surprisingly not fluff. He namedrops some actual good comparisons (Fincher's The Game and Westworld--even before the recent TV show started) and shows himself to be a decent movie buff.

Baldwin is quite knowledgeable about film. He and Robert Osborne used to be co-hosts of TCM's The Essentials and I was surprised at just how much he knew. He left after a three year stint and some others they brought in were not nearly as knowledgeable. After Osborne's death he returned and took over the hosting duties.

[Knaldskalle]

Originally Posted by thatguamguy

The company which put out the Keystone DVDs is supposedly working on HD versions, so I wouldn't expect those to go to Criterion.

Flicker Alley? Is this confirmed? I've been tempted by the DVD set at times, but will definitely hold out for a BD set instead if it's in the works.

[thatguamguy]

Originally Posted by Knaldskalle

Flicker Alley? Is this confirmed? I've been tempted by the DVD set at times, but will definitely hold out for a BD set instead if it's in the works.

From what I understand, the Keystone films are being restored to full HD (the previous restoration was 720p), the project has been underway for several years and is expected to take several more, and Flicker Alley won't comment on it publicly (beyond "no current plans", which makes sense because the restoration isn't finished) because they are still trying to sell the DVD set. I have no direct inside source (though the guy that runs the Chaplin DVD/Blu guide seems to), so definitely feel free to take that with a big grain of salt, but I would bet that we'll see a Chaplin Keystone blu-ray (in the UK if not the US) before Criterion finishes releasing the Chaplin titles it owns.

[llj]

Originally Posted by hoytereden

Baldwin is quite knowledgeable about film. He and Robert Osborne used to be co-hosts of TCM's The Essentials and I was surprised at just how much he knew. He left after a three year stint and some others they brought in were not nearly as knowledgeable. After Osborne's death he returned and took over the hosting duties.

Nice! I live in Canada and don't get TCM, but I wish I did.

I found his Criterion Closet video on youtube too:

Alec Baldwin's DVD Picks - YouTube

[bwdowiak]

Originally Posted by llj

Nice! I live in Canada and don't get TCM, but I wish I did.

I found his Criterion Closet video on youtube too:

Alec Baldwin's DVD Picks - YouTube

I've had 3:10 to Yuma and Jubal on my wish list for a long time. I saw like 5 and 30 minutes of the 2 films, respectively, on cable TV. I've enjoyed Glenn Ford in the films I've seen him in.

[Poya]

Originally Posted by MifuneFan

Seriously move on, and take this shit to its own thread.

You are absolutely right. I'm sorry for bringing this up on this thread. I was being childish and I just hope we can move on from this.

[JupiterMission]

A decent percentage of the Man in the Moon thread is Poya railing against Reese. It's a weird obsession.

[DaysofSlevin]

Originally Posted by Poya

Does anyone see Andrei Rublev coming to the Blu Collection? I won't accept anything less than the original 205-min cut.

It should coming eventually. Mosfilm gave Criterion the rights to all of Tarkovsky's Soviet films and their restoration of the shorter cut of the film that's on Filmstruck now looks very good. Criterion has been rumored to have been working on restoring the full cut for many years now, so we may be getting an edition with both cuts of the film.

[Poya]

Originally Posted by DaysofSlevin

It should coming eventually. Mosfilm gave Criterion the rights to all of Tarkovsky's Soviet films and their restoration of the shorter cut of the film that's on Filmstruck now looks very good. Criterion has been rumored to have been working on restoring the full cut for many years now, so we may be getting an edition with both cuts of the film.

Excellent to hear. This is one of my favorites. I know Tarkovsky endorses the shorter cut but the original cut really makes it complete. It was how I first saw the film and that's the way I'll always see it. You wouldn't want to cut off a perfect poem's verse.

[pedromvu]

I've been watching the Tati set, previously I had only seen Playtime which left me underwhelmed years ago.

I have enjoyed his films prior to Playtime but mostly for their music, characters charm and visuals, there is something in the atmosphere his films create that I can't quite pinpoint but I always end up feeling satisfied even if some of the jokes aren't that funny.

Well today I rewatched Playtime on the projector which is as close as I assume I will get to watch it as it was intended and it was glorious, all the things from his previous films I liked still apply but the quality of the image looks so pristine it gives it another dimension to the visuals and better audio which only intensified the things I liked on previous ones, also I think it's gags are funnier.

It's quite clear the evolution of Tati watching the films in order, so I am afraid that is why there is much less love for Trafic since I assume at his pace it might be too abstract for my taste, Playtime has just the right balance for me but I think big part is it's for it's audio and visual qualities.