A nice anthology of experimental pop art films will do. They should release Flaming Creatures.

good point. I'd like to see them tack on a decent print of Beauty #2 to any future Warhol release. the amount of bonus material available is staggering really

Maybe this post should go in the Lion's Gate thread but I think more people read this one. Anyway, an oft-requested title on this board, Terence Davies' Distant Voices, Still Lives is a Lion's Gate title, which may make it a Criterion contender.

Also, could someone clear this up for me? On the "More Random Speculation" thread, someone mentioned that Criterion was trying to court Hal Hartley, Trust specifically. IMDB has Republic Pictures as the video distributors for the film, although a runthrough of the company's credits makes me think this is a different Republic Pictures than the one Lion's Gate acquired from Paramount recently. This seems like some cheapie straight-to-video label, BUT in the aforementioned Hal-Hartley-on-Criterion post, an email from the production company said that Paramount was the current holder of rights to Trust, which makes me think this IS the old school Republic, briefly brought back from the dead in the early '90s. I dunno, can someone clear that up for me? Someone with the Trust VHS should check the logo on the box.

well... didn't the republic rights get sort of mixed up... Paramount thought they owned them, but it turns out they just own the Republic TV rights and Lions-Gate owns the film rights (as to why the Öphuls, Lang, Polonsky films were scrapped at the last moment)

It's been done to death, but who cares...

Guys, what's the latest on the possibility of "The Game: Criterion Collection"?

Don't think so, it's one of the few earlier Criterions that actually still look quite convincing. But it would be great to have this with a few nice extras (like separate audio tracks for the songs alone or something).

But talking about "Orpheus" (the other one): I would dearly have them release some of the missing Cocteau after their "Trilogy" collection and Bressons "Dames". I have "L'aigle a deux tetes", "Les parents terribles" and especially "L'eternel retour" in mind. The last one is by Delannoy, of course, but Cocteau had such a hand in the production that it actually looks more Cocteauish than some of his own work. This one and "L'aigle" are currently available in Japan and in Korea, but they don't have English subs and both come from some badly damaged prints (still worth having in absence of any other edition). And the claustrophobic and intense "Parents" seems to be available nowhere. These are relavitely minor films all, but they still carry enough of Cocteau's pure visual and textual poetry to warrant the royal treatment. Oh yes... and a re-make of "Blood of a poet" with the original French titles, please!

and what about the Cocteau/Melville "Les Enfants Terribles"

I wonder why hasn't anyone (Expecially if Criterion has the rights) released Les parents terribles? It is such a essential Cocteau film not released.

More Cocteau would certainly be welcome. L'aigle may be minor, but surely a package coupling it with Antonioni's version would be eminently marketable. Oberwald is hardly my favourite Antonioni, but it's an intriguing experiment.

As for L'Eternel retour, there'd be good mileage in a 'Cocteau as directed by' set which could deliver the big hits of that film, the Melville and Franju's Thomas l'Imposteur, plus the curiosity value of the Antonioni and Rossellini's Voix humaine. If you're going to randomly speculate, you might as well be grandiose about it!

I didn't mention the Melville/Cocteau "Enfants" because it's already out in France (2 DVD edition, with extras all available in CC's "Trilogy" set) and in the UK on BFI (not perfect, but very well rendered nevertheless, with optional English subs and, if I remember correctly, even an audio commentary).


Ah, I never even heard that there was an Antonioni version, being not all too familiar with that director's work. Is this the original Cocteau text, or something completely new? In any case, this would certainly be a fantastic coupling!


Quite true, give it to us now, Criterion! That said, I always found the Franju rather slow-going and unintriguing. Apparently, there's no new French restoration of "Retour"either. I heard somewhere that the French did have some problems with the film when it came out because they thought Cocteau was espousing 'German/Aryan' aesthetics with it.. you know, the "Tristan and Isolde" theme and that very BLONDE and short-cropped Jean Marais. And perhaps they still feel uneasy about it, but then: it's a masterpiece, really, and deserves to be seen.
I remember that Cocteau also wrote the dialogue for a film called "Ruy Blas", but know nothing about it...

Kon Ichikawa's The Makioka Sisters has been added to the Janus Films retrospective @ NYFF.

The bad news: no more Crime of M. Lange, Le Jour Se Leve oddly enough, or Miracle in Milan.

now I know this is completely random, but I'm hoping that Criterion gets the rights to David Blair's "Wax: or The Discovery of Television Among Bees." It is not only the first independant film to be editied on a digital non-linear editing system (AVID) but was also the first film to be streamed over the internet... and yet it is, astoundingly, unavailable on DVD.

Now that's a weird film. Would have been a sitter for the presumably defunct Eclipse.

Zedz, isn't the Antonioni/Cocteau adaptation from l'Aigle a Deux Tetes (as The Oberwald Mystery?)

Yes. Even though Cocteau's version is considered 'minor' (I've never seen it), beefing it up with the Antonioni (also minor, but so unusual amongst his other work that it's fascinating viewing) as a Killers / Lower Depths-style double feature would surely make for a strong release.

Consider this speculation until it's confirmed, but I've been advised by someone who (possibly) is in the know, that we should expect a Criterion edition of "La Haine" sometime in '07.

-BJ

It probably sounds odd, but this would be my "dream DVD." I saw La Haine about five years ago on a crappy VHS and just fell in love with it. I've always wanted to own a region 1 copy, and I'd always quietly hoped that Criterion would put it out. It would really make my year to see this announced.

I was just watching the extras on my Harakiri dvd and theu show clips from one of Kobayashis earlier films, The Human Condition. Any chance we will see a CC version of this soon?

It's owned by Janus and Image's discs were from Janus, but your guess is as good as ours. The Seventh Seal DVD has clips from Janus-owned The Magician, but now almost 8 years after that DVD - and still no Magician from Criterion.

It's been rumoured for a while now, and I've asked JM about it in the past. It seems there is interest, and a box set would be perfect for a Criterion release, but nothing seems to be eventuating.

What, if anything, can we expect in December? (If memory serves me right, in the last year or so we have come to expect a reissue or two, but since we've had some biggies lately. . .)

December i'm guessing:

Border Radio
Sanjuro
Yojimbo

gah, don't get me started on that topic!

I don't know if this matters, but TCM just played La Jetee, with Janus logo beforehand.