Criterion News and Discussion

[Just Withnail]

Edit: Looks like Godardian beat me to it in the Todd Haynes thread, but I still think it should be mentioned here.

Conversation with Gus Vant Sant and Todd Haynes to Appear on My Own Private Idaho

A wide-ranging new audio conversation between director Gus Van Sant and acclaimed filmmaker Todd Haynes (Safe, Velvet Goldmine, Far From Heaven) and will be included on Criterion's upcoming release of My Own Private Idaho. Also included on this special edition two-disc set will be a new documentary on the making of the film, featuring interviews with key crew members, and many additional supplemental features. Look for My Own Private Idaho in early 2005.

[cine]

Kagemusha cover:

[Gamblour.]

I swear to god...these covers are so gorgeous, that shit just made my day

[Stefen]

Does anyone know how Criterion does finacially? As dvd moves more towards soccer moms and less towards peeps like us I can see Criterions profits getting lower and lower. The day Criterion releases full screen will be the day that.

[Weak2ndAct]

Does anyone know how Criterion does finacially? As dvd moves more towards soccer moms and less towards peeps like us I can see Criterions profits getting lower and lower. The day Criterion releases full screen will be the day that.

I think they do okay.  One thing's for sure, they're notoriously cheap about their production costs-- they often demand everything for free (when I was in college, they wanted our school's print of 'The Third Man,' which was said to one of the best in existence-- they were bitches about shipping costs and said they'd *consider* giving a couple of copies of the dvd for the trouble when it was done).  Also, most of their discs are region zero, and since they don't have any deals w/ any other countries, everyone in the world has to import them from here.  I actually see Criterions a lot more than I used to.  In the library, at Best Buy, and the evil corporate video stores... a couple years ago, I had to special order everything, now I can walk into BB and pick up 'Short Cuts' and 'Fanny and Alexander' if it suits me.

[Gold Trumpet]

Recently, The American Museum of the Moving Image in Astoria hosted a panel with Criterion president Peter Becker and Technical Director Lee Kline. From another film forum, here is a brief summary of what was talked about (including some future releases):


"The panel was good and informative. I didn't take any notes so I'll briefly summarize it here as best as I could.

Quick news for readers who don't want to go through this long (and disorganized) post looking for upcoming titles : Renoir's THE RIVER, Antonioni's THE ECLIPSE, and re-release of SEVEN SAMURAI from a new HD transfer. More Powell-Pressberger: 49TH PARALLEL and A CANTERBURY TALE ("not transferred yet"). A hint of possible new HIGH AND LOW as Peter Becker mentions that it would be good that this gets a new improved transfer.

Becker started off the session by going over how it was founded by Bob Stein (a great pioneer in digital media who was covered by Wired in this memorable profile) in similar terms as in this old interview with Todd Doogan at the Digital Bits.

The company has a staff of around 45 people who work hand-in-hand on all the ongoing projects.

Current video restorations are all done on high-def. Currently, this work cannot be printed back to film since this is too expensive (from $100,000 up) to do.

Good negatives of THE LEOPARD that were considered lost for years were located in England due to Lee Kline's persistence for high quality. He even rejected the materials from the earlier Italian restoration (presented on the previous R2 Italian DVD). He evaded from talking too much to Giuseppe Rotunno about not using the old work that the DP supervised; but once Kline told that better materials were located, Rotunno was more than happy to go through the movie once again, giving very detailed notes ("he gave like 15 pages of notes for every shot") from Italy as Kline sent him tests as he worked on the transfer in England. Not only the movie looks better on DVD, it's now better preserved since the quality of the negatives that were found was superior than all the previously available materials.

The missing fine-grained print of THE RULES OF THE GAME listed in lab inventory but lost for years was found after lots of prodding of various labs in France. Before that, available materials of the famous 50's restoration were already much faded and so fragile that splice tapes were coming off.

Each film on the Brakhage set used a different encoding program that gives each one the best picture quality.

Sven Nykist was not available to supervise the transfer for FANNY AND ALEXANDER due to health problems.

Transfer of THE RIVER will be done by digitally re-compositing the original 3-strip Technicolor negative, which has problems lining up together due to shrinkage. This expensive project is co-financed with help from BFI.

Some answers to audience's questions:

Criterion will continue to make laserdisc supplements to titles they've lost rights to available to studios as they make deals on a title-by-title basis. The upcoming MGM Raging Bull SE will have the LD commentary.

They forego doing anamorphic transfers at first because the former technical director (unnamed, could be Sean Wright-Anderson) was not satisfied with the results of the downcoversion done by various player chipsets at the time. The tests were done with an anamorphically encoded image of a circle: no downconversion looked the same as the other.

Earlier non-anamorphic release will gradually be re-released in better transfers. But then Becker notes that most early titles were shot in standard Academy.

KING KONG can be considered as one of the "titles that got away" on DVD. The nitrate negative that was used in the transfer of the 1984 Criterion LD is currently lost and Becker guessed that it's one of the reason why it's still MIA on DVD.

BULLET IN THE HEAD was considered to be the Criterion title at one point. Usual problems with rights made this impossible, especially now since the rights have just changed hands to Fortune Star. But Becker still keeps in constant contact with Woo and producer Terence Chang and continues to "knock on the door" of the rights holder every year for a possible release.

Tower was the first store chain that started a separate section devoted to Criterion LD's in the video department. This was mostly due to knowledgeable store managers than from corporate mandate. Criterion was too happy to obliged to support these efforts with banners, ads, etc."

[Stefen]

A new high and low? The one that I have is lacking, no features hardly, any word on whats on this new one?

[Weak2ndAct]

BULLET IN THE HEAD was considered to be the Criterion title at one point. Usual problems with rights made this impossible, especially now since the rights have just changed hands to Fortune Star. But Becker still keeps in constant contact with Woo and producer Terence Chang and continues to "knock on the door" of the rights holder every year for a possible release.

God, I hope they finally get this title.  I'm watching my Tai Seng video right now, and it's a disgrace: white subtitles (often undreadable and at times just flat-out missing over some scenes), and a hazy image full of scracthes

[Gold Trumpet]

A new high and low? The one that I have is lacking, no features hardly, any word on whats on this new one?

No word. Its just discussion of a potential title to be released. I'd expect a Seven Samuari release well before High and Low so hold tight to the dvd you have now.

[Ernie]

a criterion "my own private idaho" has been announced to be released sometime in february 2005, just in case anybody didn't know and was interested. i couldn't find it posted about anywhere around here, but it is the latest news on their main website so maybe it's too obvious to post about, i don't know. it was very surprising, as a choice tho, i thought anyway, so i figured i'd mention it. can't wait for that.

[MacGuffin]

i couldn't find it posted about anywhere around here

Counting mine, scroll up eleven posts.

[samsong]

February releases just announced... some cover art was posted






Jules Dassin's Thieves Highway is also being released in February (no cover art available).



No cover art available for My Own Private Idaho either, which will also be release in February, but the specs are enticing in themselves...

DIRECTOR APPROVED SPECIAL EDITION DOUBLE-DISC SET FEATURES:

New high-definition digital transfer, enhanced for widescreen televisions and approved by director Gus Van Sant

New Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack

Exclusive new audio conversation between Van Sant and filmmaker Todd Haynes (Safe, Far From Heaven, Velvet Goldmine)

The Making of My Own Private Idaho, a new documentary featuring interviews with key crew members  

New video interview with film critic Paul Arthur on the adaptation of Shakespeare in My Own Private Idaho

Video conversation between producer Laurie Parker and Rain Phoenix  

Outtakes

Original theatrical trailer

English subtitles for the deaf and hearing impaired

More!

Plus: a booklet featuring a new essay by film critic Amy Taubin and reprinted interviews with Van Sant, Phoenix, and Reeves  






mmmm.... I'll be blind buying many come February

[Just Withnail]

I wish I was a good enough of a writer to justify the feelings I have towards Criterion right now, through words.

[Pwaybloe]

"Overrated" comes to mind.

[ono]

BANNED.