Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

Thanks! Tonight we're watching My Own Private Idaho, because he only knows Joaquin Phoenix. River died four year before he was even born.

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

I've completed M and Brief Encounter in the last few days. I had seen both of them once apiece, several years ago, and they resonated with me enough that I snagged them during some of the Barnes & Noble sales since those viewings. I kept meaning to watch them for this challenge but never got around to either. I was again spellbound by each, though obviously for different reasons. It's easy to understand why they're still acclaimed. They're the kinds of movies that I think most of us find out about once we start exploring film beyond whatever movies that came out during our own lives to that point. Those kinds of movies can be easy to put on a watchlist but easily put off for another day. M is for the "ripped from the headlines" crime story fans, and Brief Encounter for those into doomed romances. If you're either of those types of viewers and haven't seen them, I would strongly encourage you to take advantage of the remainder of this month's challenge as an impetus for sitting down with them.

As for their respective Criterion releases, I think their commentary tracks are the best microcosm for contrast. M's features two German film scholars. They talk a lot about the symbols in the story and placing the film in its historical context. It's particularly fun because they periodically debate one another in an almost passive-aggressive way. For instance, one argued that M reflected the trauma of post-WWI Germany; the other emphasized how close it was to WWII. I wish they'd elaborated on their respective arguments more than they did, but it was thought provoking all the same. I could write an entire essay about the subject but, for the purposes of this thread, I'll just recommend listening to the track itself.

Brief Encounter, however, was an outright disappointment. Though it was recorded several years before Wikipedia came along, it has the feel of someone simply reciting various pages from it about the cast. Frustratingly little of Bruce Eder's remarks have anything to do with what's on the screen. I would have been more accepting if he had at least synthesized those bios somehow, but instead, he basically just goes from one actor's career to the next.

It's inaccurate to say every supplement is of the same quality as those commentaries, but fair to say they're mostly close. The English language version of M is horrid. The dubbing is comically bad, but it's more the editing that frustrated me. It feels intended for an impatient audience than an attentive one. Scenes still deliver most of the same information, but they're trimmed enough that they jump from one to the next rather than segue. It costs the film its tension, which seems impossible to do. Conversely, Brief Encounter does include an (almost) hour-long "Self Portrait" retrospective of David Lean's filmography through Ryan's Daughter. Lean's remarks about the films themselves are rote, but when he gets to talking about the actual work that goes into filmmaking, he's highly engaging. He doesn't just talk about directing and editing, the two things he did. He also surveys what each department does on a film, and what their actual work is. Because of the runtime, it's more of a Behind-the-Scenes 101 course, but Lean's enthusiasm and expertise compensate for the brevity.

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

I put in my Twilight Time copy of 1984, but my Blu-Ray player couldn't read it, so I watched my old MGM DVD instead. Really frustrated that I paid $15 for a dud disc. I guess I'll have to get the Criterion in November. The movie itself is a brilliant adaptation of a difficult novel , since so much of it is long political lecture from Emmanuel Goldstein's book. Director and writer Michael Radford only included technologies that existed in 1948 when Orwell's novel was published, so we see the nightmare world of Oceania just as Orwell imagined it. The performances are all excellent, Richard Burton is terrific as Inner Party member O'Brien is a sad reminder of the roles he could have performed if Liz Taylor and the bottle hadn't wrecked him.

The Devils is coming to The Criterion Channel next month!!!

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

Only one week left! I can still reach my goal, but it requires me to watch a disc in its entirety every day between now and then. I won't cover all of the checklist even if I do make it through. It'd be easy to just watch the movies and come back to the commentaries and supplements, but I like doing the deep dive. It feels like attending a symposium that starts with a screening of the movie followed by a series of panels. I dig that.

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

Fail-Safe is being added to the collection.

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

Salo, because I can't imagine any other outfit releasing it.

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

The Seventh Seal is my pick. The Criterion Collection introduced me to Ingmar Bergman, and they are the primary distributors of his movies in the U.S.

Unfortunately, I'm pretty much done with the challenge unless I can fit in one more movie tonight or on Monday evening. I'm going out-of-town this weekend to visit friends and see a production of Macbeth. I've had a very satisfying month and managed to get through a lot of things!

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

I first heard of Criterion when my friend bought their release of The Royal Tenenbaums, still one of his favorites today. I didn't ask anything about what Criterion was at the time, though, and I don't know that he would have known then, anyway. Then The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou came out. It looked fun and I wanted to see it, but didn't get out to catch it during its brief theatrical run. By this point, I was splurging on movies regularly, including blind buys. I found a used Criterion DVD of Life Aquatic for sale at Gamestop and snagged it. That was when I started to find out what Criterion was.

For me, Criterion is first and foremost those essential foreign/art house films. Belle de Jour, M, Rashomon, The Seventh Seal, 8½ are the ones that first come to my mind. They're emblematic of the kinds of movies I'd heard of, but had no idea how to actually see in those pre-Netflix days. Finding out there was a disc distributor that had brought together those and so many other films of their ilk made them immediately accessible to me. Of course, I was also greatly intimidated by the Criterion brand and didn't actually begin exploring it until I gave in and dabbled with this DVD Talk challenge in 2010. I worried I wasn't bright enough to understand the movies, and the supplements would make me feel even worse. Most commentary tracks I had seen listed on discs featured the director, maybe joined by an actor or two; Criterion's featured "film historian"s and "film scholar"s! I'm forever grateful to DVD Talk for getting me to finally explore such films.

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

In the last few days, I've completed The Spy Who Came In From the Cold and Wild Strawberries. Not exactly the most upbeat duo I could have gone with, but I picked them in part because they seemed to be kind of light on bonus content. Spy has a few listed supplements and only a scene-select commentary. The joke was on me, though, 'cause most of those supplements were long enough that I ended up spending three hours on them! They were thankfully, overall, of high quality. What stood out to me most about Spy was just how absolutely gorgeous it is on Blu-ray. I was mesmerized by the textures of clothes and even the wood paneling of a doorway in one shot.

The Wild Strawberries presentation isn't quite as revelatory on a visual level, but it's certainly as rich as I'd hoped. The behind-the-scenes footage was well worth watching if only because some of it is in color!

Both movies are still just as engaging as I remembered them being, and I was glad to revisit them.

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

Best viewing of the month for me has been the Wim Wenders documentary Pina. I probably wrote whenever I first watched it (last year?) but it’s amazing. I’ve never been at all interested in dance, and didn’t expect much from this film. To be honest, I only bought it to have a 3D film in my Criterion collection and let me check that box on my monthly checklist each September. But this film is powerfully moving, and I enjoyed even more this year.

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

I found a used copy of Chasing Amy for a buck recently and took a chance on it, really just figuring it might plug a hole in my checklist somewhere. I'd never seen it, and have only seen a little of the View Askewniverse. I don't know how I might have responded to it at the time of its release, but it's certainly an interesting one to see for the first time in 2019, as someone who was in his late teens at the time the movie was originally made and released. It's a mixed bag. Kevin Smith's narrative point is probably just as relevant now as then, but the execution of making that point is... frequently hard to watch in large part because the whole thing is supposed to be a teaching lesson for the Ben Affleck character that the Jason Lee character doesn't learn and is taught at the expense of the Joey Lauren Adams character. It feels like a laudable storytelling objective but in the hands of the entirely wrong storyteller. It's frustrating.

And yet, I have to also acknowledge that whether anyone cares to admit it or not, Smith's depiction of how young adult Gen X'ers viewed the world and talked about it at that time is highly accurate. The most perfect illustration of this is when Affleck tells Lee he should knock off the casual homophobic slurs. Rather than agree, Lee turns it around: Affleck is the bad guy, for being Adams's PC police enforcer. I'm not wrong for doing something wrong; you're wrong for holding me accountable for doing something wrong. It would be going too far to suggest that Chasing Amy is some kind of historically significant work of cinema capturing the zeitgeist of a social era, but it is relevant at least insofar as it shows that those Gen X'ers today who insist on continuing to act as the Jason Lee character did were told 20+ years ago to knock it off.

On an unrelated note: Smith points out that Affleck had taken the time to come in to record the commentary track while filming Armageddon. I almost want to stop my challenge here, just because I started with the Criterion Armageddon DVD and this would be a fun bookend. However, I have enough time left that I think I can get through at least one more disc in its entirety, maybe two.

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

It seemed appropriate, during this last weekend of the regular baseball season, to revisit Bull Durham. There aren't many baseball movies that are actually good movies, so it's understandable that Criterion should enshrine one. I think I've seen it half a dozen times over the years, not including with commentary tracks. I've never been in love with the final act, after Nuke's call-up. I can't quite put my finger on why, but I feel a drop off in energy. Regardless, I still love the movie itself.

The Criterion presentation is, I'm afraid, disappointing. The only thing new is an 18 minute one-on-one with Ron Shelton in which he largely repeats things he said in the previously recorded materials. This sense of Criterion phoning it in extends to the packaging. The booklet features a reprint of a 1989 New Yorker essay by Roger Angell rather than anything newly commissioned. Even the insert under the clear plastic of the case is just a solid generic red. This is not to say that those preexisting materials aren't worthwhile; the commentary tracks and the essay all are. But it's hard to point to any part of this release and say that Bull Durham truly got the Criterion treatment.

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

This is the first year that I've completed the checklist even though I didn't see everything I wanted to watch this month.

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

Have five Criterions lined up for an all-nighter of double Challenge credit and personal checklist mania tonight.

Videodrome
Godzilla
Carnival of Souls - Rifftrax
The Lure
Cat People

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

I started with good intentions at the beginning of the month including subscribing to the Criterion Channel but real life took over and starting a new role in my job, kept me from watching a lot of movies.

However, I was able to watch a few and it was better than my first Challenge but still not satisfied about my total.

I'm hoping to watch at least one tonight before the challenge is over.

Thanks to Travis for running this challenge again!

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

I actually like Swing Time better than Top Hat. I felt the whole plot of mistaken identity in Top Hat a bit tiresome.

The only thing that I hated about Swing Time was the whole blackface by Astaire and it's the same problem I find with Breakfast at Tiffany's with Rooney's Asian stereotype. I find it hard to overlook now...

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

This year's challenge wasn't about completing the checklist. Instead, I got to turn my 22 year old son onto some great movies.I asked him his top five that we watched together. In order, he said...

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

Very cool! I've only completed the checklist once, and I have never seen everything I wanted to watch in the course of a challenge month.

This challenge is explicitly not competitive between participants, but if it was, I think I'd have to declare you the winner, popcorn! I've recently gotten a friend into Criterion. She even did this challenge and completed the checklist on her own, though without joining the forum or following along with us here. I'm always keen to talk about them online, like with my fellow DVD Talkers, but it's really nice to have someone offline who has actually seen these things and can discuss them with me in person. I think sharing and comparing has also helped us learn about one another in certain ways, too. I imagine you and your son had a similar experience. I'm genuinely envious of that and I'm thrilled for both of you that you've had it.

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

I hope everyone who participated got something out of it, and I hope everyone who had things come up and keep them from participating has a calmer time next year. Speaking of next year, does anyone have any suggestions for revising the checklist? Losing the Themes page on the website hurt. I've been able to manually reconstruct an index to most of the themes that were linked to in previous challenge list threads, but I didn't think to do that until a few days ago. I'd like to add that section back to the checklist. Maybe we could consider restoring the 5 Genres section, either with or instead of Themes?

Also: Keep an eye on Criterion's social media feeds or the website itself, because the October flash sale could run at any time. The last two years, it was on 10/16 and the year before that was 10/17, but they've run them as early as 10/1 (2013).

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

I have to admit, I totally failed. I was much busier at work than I anticipated and had some family events that took more of my time. Next year, I hope to delve into Criterion again, though!

popcorn Harold and Maude was my treasure find two years ago. I went in thinking I wouldn't like it at all but it really clicked with me and I loved it!

Travis, thanks for running the challenge! I don't have any ideas for the checklist, sorry!

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

Doh!

Personal Pet Peeve Aside: Our Travis is the one person I don’t mind getting confused with. Normally, people calling me Trev or Travis is like nails on a chalkboard. All my life, I’m routinely called Travis by new acquaintances. I’ve discussed it with them and other people with our names, and have a theory. Both are fairly rare names, so it depends on which one you’re more used to. Say you grow up knowing a Travis. You meet me and instantly hear my name as Travis and call me that, even after just hearing me say Trevor. I’ve heard other Travises say they get called Trevor all the time, but forget if I’ve discussed it with our Travis.

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

Re: 2019 Criterion Challenge Discussion Thread
 

Thanks! He said he really enjoyed watching the movies and now understands my affinity for Criterion releases, especially around B&N/flash sales. Thanks for hosting!