re: The Criterion Collection 4K/Blu-ray Discussion and Release Thread
 

Sounds good to me. I don't have OCD, so package/disc issues won't affect me like it does other people.

re: The Criterion Collection 4K/Blu-ray Discussion and Release Thread
 

This makes perfect sense to me and is exactly the reason I assumed they were doing this. It's just not cost effective to have to put out 2 separate versions of the same product. Also, I will appreciate the ability to lend the dvd copy to friends who have been slow to upgrade. One time I even went out and bought a copy of The Red Shoes on dvd despite owning the blu-ray because I wanted a friend to see it.

re: The Criterion Collection 4K/Blu-ray Discussion and Release Thread
 

Awesome. Got my answer for the Zatoichi set.

re: The Criterion Collection 4K/Blu-ray Discussion and Release Thread
 

Great explanation. Let the bitching stop.

I totally sympathize with this beloved company's situation. I had no protest from the beginning (and I had already chosen the first person to lend out the bonus Frances Ha DVD to).

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Haha, I'd buy that in a heartbeat. Had it on DVD, but lent it out and never got it back. Now it's OOP and costs a bundle. :(

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Still seems excessive for the Zatoichi set on the consumer end, but maybe it makes even more sense on their end.

Guess they don't care about the DVD copies being "loaned out", although I have no doubt there will be eBay re-sellers for many titles. I guess as long as it's getting their name out, it's a good publicity.

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If that many "cinephiles" are still buying Criterion DVDs, why the hell can't I sell/trade mine?

re: The Criterion Collection 4K/Blu-ray Discussion and Release Thread
 

Speaking as a Criterion fan of ~25 years tenure, I miss the days when dual-inventory was not a real production concern because films were only released on the one consumer format that was vastly superior to all others on the market. Criterion probably could've made a boatload of money releasing on VHS but, for the most part, they didn't. I appreciate greater audience accessibility, but I think something is lost. Criterion used to mean, 'the best movies, presented as well as can be'; now it seems to mean, 'the best movies and some others, presented as well as can be and some other ways'.

re: The Criterion Collection 4K/Blu-ray Discussion and Release Thread
 

That Zatoichi set isn't excessive... When you do it during the B&N sale.

That bitch is mine.

re: The Criterion Collection 4K/Blu-ray Discussion and Release Thread
 

I definitely understand your point. I just think that in the early days of home video, the 'best possible way' was probably a pretty viable business model, and they've had to adapt that over the years to fit the needs of today's market.

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Not sure if it's you're intention, but you're coming across as one of those "hi-def" snobs that would rather *not* watch a movie, then watch it on DVD, even a really good looking and sounding DVD.

DVD is still a really good format. There is a lot of good stuff available, and much of it still looks pretty darn good, especially with a good upconverting player. And on the business side, the install base is massive. They would be fools to ignore that market, 40% ain't exactly chicken scratch you know.

You can debate their choices of movies, though most of us are well aware of the need to occasionally present the more mainstream titles in order to get more of the B&W silent gay cowboys eating pudding films that film students get all hot and bothered over.


(No homophobia intended, if you don't get that joke, then you obviously need to watch more mainstream media and fewer B&W silent..., well, you get the idea.)

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While I think your reaction to Doctorossi's comments is way overblown, this is basically the crux of it. DVD is the most successful home video product of all-time and it would be crazy of Criterion to turn their back on their market. You could make the argument that they did just that to the VHS market, but the vhs market wasn't what the dvd market is/was, and the format didn't really allow them to do the very things that they became known for (special editions with lots of bonus features).

Doctorossi didn't say anything about mainstream/osbscure, he said Criterion used to release only the best movies. Any list of the best movies would include many mainstream movies. If you look at Criterion's laserdisc catalog you'll see that a huge percentage were so-called mainstream movies. Back then they were a big fish in a small pond and had the pick of just about anything they wanted. That's not the case anymore and after 25+ years the catalog has become a little diluted. I'm sure that's all Doctorossi meant. I think you can lower your defenses.

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Well, I do think that as the big studios move away from physical formats we're probably going to see more of those mainstream titles coming from Criterion, and a movement back towards what they were in the laserdisc days. I'm not sure how much I'll like that change, though - not because "mainstream is bad" or "it harms the purity of the collection" or whatever other nonsense, but just because a lot of those films (like It's a Mad... World) have already gotten good releases from other companies.

Casablanca is an absolute masterpiece of cinema, but I wouldn't be too happy about it re-entering the collection just because it has already been released so many times in great editions with copious extras.

Back in the laserdisc days, I’m sure I would have treasured their discs of 2001 and Blade Runner, since Criterion seemed to be just about the only company who cared enough to release those titles in widescreen and with extras. Now, though, a Criterion release of those films would just seem kind of redundant - the only real “value” being the logo on the box and the spine number.

-

I will say that, at this point in time, I think they do a pretty good job of balancing the mainstream titles and the more obscure ones. A lot of people complain about the IFC deal, but that only seems to lead to three or four titles a year. And most of those titles, so far, have been pretty good (with some *coughtinyfurniturecough* exceptions.)

As the collection gets bigger, it's inevitable that there will be more titles that you don't like - and that can make it seem diluted. But I think they still do an excellent job of picking mostly good-to-great titles to add to the collection.
But that’s the thing - Criterion never released "only the best movies." No matter what kinds of movies you prefer, there has always been some crap in the collection. And when you look back at their laserdisc catalog, I don't think the quality of the average title in the collection has really fallen over the past 25 years. I mean, yeah - they released Citizen Kane. But they also released Evita. And in the laserdisc day they almost certainly never would have released a genuinely obscure masterpiece like Marketa Lazarova or Lonesome (or The Music Room, or Letter Never Sent, or...)

If their inability to release all those great films from the major studios meant being forced to release films that were more obscure and inferior, that would have been unfortunate. But I think once it got harder for them to get rights to some of the "obvious" classics they used the opportunity to look further into their own catalog, resulting in DVD releases of forgotten gems like Il Posto and I Fidanzati. Maybe those aren't quite as great as Citizen Kane - but then again, very, very few films are.

It's not a big deal, but I also think the collection has gotten a little more diverse in the intervening years – they still focus almost exclusively on a few areas of cinema (the US, Western Europe, Russia, and Japan), but at least now they’re releasing a few things from masters like Satyajit Ray, as well as things like that Czech New Wave set. (If they start releasing those World Cinema Foundation titles, that will help matters even more.)

re: The Criterion Collection 4K/Blu-ray Discussion and Release Thread
 

While I do think that Criterion's choice of "great films" have become diluted over the years. They don't seem to be as picky as they used to be (ie. just because you can release a Wes Anderson film, doesn't mean you should).... plus other examples.

However, with the disc market dying and the studios making very little money now on catalog titles, isn't it possible that Criterion will soon have access to a lot more high quality films mainly due to the studios having less issues with licensing the titles out - as there's not as much profit in it anymore? It seems like we're starting to see that now with more studios licensing out more major catalog tiltes to Criterion.

I suspect down the road Criterion can afford to be more picky about what they release because they'll have a lot more options.

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Since CC has a contract with IFC now I really hope they get to do something special with "House of Pleasures." That's such a great film but I hate the Americanized title. It's in French and House of Pleasures isn't even the actual title.

/rant

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Are people still bitching about Tiny Furniture even though Lena Dunham is kind of a big deal now? Or is it because she's such a big deal now that people are bitching about it?

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I've yet to see it. I did want to though. Looked interesting.

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Tiny Furniture is pretty awful but the CC Blu-ray treatment they gave it was stellar. I was surprised to see that there was an interview with Paul Schrader in there. He liked it a lot, obviously. Lena Dunham is one awkward looking chick and she should be the last person walking around in her big chones. Put some pants on!

/rant

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I'll give Lena Dunham this much: She can act. She can act her ass off. She is beyond fantastic in her Girls HBO show, and I don't know if this is a positive for her or a negative against the rest of the cast, but I think she's the best looking of the four. The others look like high maintenance twats, pardon mine, and act that very same way, but Dunham's character is 3 dimensional, accessible, realistic, and far less of a horrible person than the rest of the cast. She looks like a NORMAL PERSON, and that's much more likable in my eyes than the traditional bullshit found in every fucking film.

Considering the standards for beauty in Hollywood and the studman69's of the world, that she's willing to throw off her kit and get ridiculed (albeit paid to be ridiculed) because of it, she also has more guts than anyone on this forum.

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Compared to the DVD market, the LD market was absolutely miniscule. I don't know how they could've pulled it off in the LD market but not managed the same feat with DVD and Blu-ray volumes.

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Today, BD players are $50 and fully compatible with non-HD TVs. You don't have to be an "hi-def snob" to be able to enjoy all the great Criterion Blu-ray releases you want.

I guess you could argue that they were fools to have ignored the VHS market, but I know plenty of people who were awoken to the value of quality presentation by Criterion laserdiscs. They would ask, "Why do you need a special player for this?" Then, they would watch and immediately understand. Criterion stood for more than great movies; it stood for exceptional presentation, as well.

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As someone who has never seen a laserdisc before, how did the picture quality compare to DVDs? The same, or not quite as good?

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It would have depended on the viewing source. Heavy ass picture tube televisions were still popular at the tail end of laserdisc and into the beginning of DVD. Depending on the software, it was pretty evenly split. There were some laserdiscs that looked great and there were plenty of shitty looking dvds, too. Criterions early DVDs were excellent, but not always anamorphic.

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Yes, blu-ray players work just fine on SD tvs, but trying to watch Academy ratio blu-rays on a 4:3 tv would hardly be enjoyable given that they'd be heavily picture boxed. Considering that a large chunk of Criterion blu-rays are in that ratio, I don't think your statement rings very true. That said, owning an HD tv and a blu-ray player hardly makes one an HD snob.

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Neither, it is because the movie is terrible. Sort of like why people will still bring up Armageddon as a "black eye" for the collection.

Tiny Furniture (or more Lena Dunham's Girls now) is a representative and well deserved poster child for a lot that is wrong with "hip" indie cinema (think the average mumblecore movie) today. It is just a bunch of overgrown adult-children of means whining about how tough their not tough life is b/c they lack any coping skills whatsoever apparently.

As for Lena Dunham personally, I don't mind her anymore than I mind someone else who seizes on the zeitgeist to make a career/money, good for her. She must have taken a day trip to Williamsburg from the Upper East/West Side or whatever part of Manhattan she is from and had the smart idea and industry/celebrity connections to say, "I'm going to make a show about all these twentysomethings talking loudly about last night's drunken sex in great detail at brunch right now" and then actually do it.

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I'm not a huge fan of Dunham's, but you do realize that her work is very critical of these "adult-children" thing, right? What she does is basically paint them in an even worse light than they do to themselves, and sorta' makes fun of them, while also humanizing them.

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At its best, a reference quality LD could look pretty close in quality to a non-anamorphic letterbox DVD. Most Laserdiscs were not quite that good.

Because the format was analog, Laserdisc picture quality was also highly dependent on the LD player used to watch it. There was a pretty wide disparity between entry-level and high-end models.

If that sounds like damning the format with faint praise, keep in mind that the competition at the time was with VHS, and we were all watching movies on much smaller televisions. In its day, Laserdisc was a pretty awesome product that introduced the concepts of letterboxing for OAR, audio commentaries and supplemental bonus content, chapter coding, and many more features that we take for granted today.

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The Criterion Laserdisc CAV releases started at $100 list price and went up from there. Also, because the home video market was so small back then, it probably cost them a lot less to license the films too.

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Don't forget that Criterion has their stuff on Hulu Plus, which can be viewed on objects as small as a smartphone. The fact that this library is available online is great but if their mission statement is about the best presentation (for their main line, not Eclipse), a small screen is not the way to go. Still a fan, but that is kind of weird. And yeah I understand that it's in keeping with the small nature of the company and streaming is part of the climate now.

re: The Criterion Collection 4K/Blu-ray Discussion and Release Thread
 

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/wKiIroiCvZ0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

re: The Criterion Collection 4K/Blu-ray Discussion and Release Thread
 

Exactly my point. Classic vid.

re: The Criterion Collection 4K/Blu-ray Discussion and Release Thread
 

You can't watch a film on your f*cking telephone, Junior. Get real.

http://images4.wikia.nocookie.net/__...Case_081BF.jpg

re: The Criterion Collection 4K/Blu-ray Discussion and Release Thread
 

Most BD players have a 'zoom' function that should handle this issue just fine.

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It's not that critical of these people or at least it is as critical of them as they tend to be of themselves. Maybe it is simply, "I'm too close to it" thing, but from conversing with/overhearing conversations between "these people" (aka hipsters/trust fund white twenty-somethings in Bklyn), the stuff Lena Dunham does is so accurate b/c it is so shallow.

For as bad as she may make them seem, there is no real criticism b/c criticism implies judgment/shame, neither of which her characters or these people ever really get. Everything is fair game to be shared from an ironic distance. These people's lives have no gravity, dramatic or otherwise whatsoever, it's just an extension of living in a dorm in college, only the bars/house parties are a hell of a lot better/expensive.

I appreciate her ability to so perfectly capture the subjects of her work and she is definitely amazingly self-aware b/c she is one of these people, but the few that even gets that she is one of these people and can articulate it. But, in terms of being interesting or entertaining, authentically rendered movies/shows about such inauthentic and vapid people does nothing for me.

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You probably don't watch her stuff (which is fine), because it's HUGELY critical of them.
One example is how her character gets a big break for a writing job, something she's wanted for ever, but she neglects the work, blows her advance and might be getting sued as a result - all the characters do some stupid selfish shit, most which have huge repercussion, some of which they learn from, though mostly, they don't - and the show is very critical of her, and paints her in a more than unsympathetic light. And I'm not saying "you should like it", I'm not too big a fan myself, but there is more going on beneath it's surface that you're not seeing, for one reason or another.

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^I don't watch much of her stuff. Bits and pieces of Girls here and there and Tiny Furniture until I had to turn it off b/c it was so bad.

I think a lot of it comes down to attitude about the things you mentioned. I think a lot of what you described is exactly what a non-hipster would criticize a "hipster" about. Poor work ethic, self destructive behavior, selfishness, etc. But, from knowing "hipsters" I realize that that is sort of what makes a hipster (not fashion or musical taste), but this complete detachment from/awareness of such things. Situations that could be easily avoided or should be avoided are gotten into and the takeaway is "awww a learning experience," when it should be, "you're 26! What the hell were doing in that situation to begin with? You're not 17 anymore!"

If Dunham has ever written about this, I'd be interested in reading her take b/c I tend to feel that she knows/is/loves the type of people she writes for the screen, which is what makes her stuff so authentic. But, at the same time, it's just a lifestyle I don't really need to watch on screen.

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https://i1.createsend1.com/ei/r/4E/B...ackypeople.jpg

Seems a little on the nose for their typically vague clues, but it might be hinting at Boy A.

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Or, perhaps more likely, Bergman's Persona.

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:thumbsup:

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bolded - sounds like 99% of sitcoms, even the "acclaimed" ones like Seinfeld.