2013 Criterion Forum Awards

[Yakushima]

Thief is a 2014 release. Vote for it next year.

Thank you, Swo17, my bad! Let's hope this year brings some strong competition in this department!

[Sandman]

I'm rooting for a certain Czech film to finish at least in the year-end top three!

[Matt]

BEST RELEASE
1. Marketa Lazarová
2. Shoah
3. To Be or Not To Be
4. Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion
5. On the Waterfront

BEST ECLIPSE
Kobayashi

BEST BOXED SET
3 Films by Roberto Rossellini Starring Ingrid Bergman

BEST MODERN FILM
Frances Ha

BEST COMMENTARY
To Be or Not to Be – David Kalat

BEST ESSAY
*abstain*

BEST "BONUS" FILM
Sobibor, October 14, 1943, 4 p.m.

BEST (NON-COMMENTARY, NON-ESSAY, NON-BONUS FILM) SUPPLEMENT
Marketa Lazarova - Interviews with Magda Vášáryová, Ivan Palúch, Vlastimil Harapes and Theodor Pištěk

BEST R1 RESCUE
Shoah

BEST REISSUE
The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp

BEST UPGRADE
*abstain*

BEST DISCOVERY
Marketa Lazarová

BEST COVER
Nashville

BEST PACKAGING
Zatoichi: the Blind Swordsman

SECOND-MOST DISAPPOINTING RELEASE
*abstain* (or Madame de… twice and thrice)

BEST THREAD
Any Film Club thread

MEMBER OF THE YEAR
David M. (Because I bought a Panasonic Viera on his recommendation just before Panasonic announced they will no longer make plasmas, among other public services he has provided)

RICHARD CRANIUM AWARD
InterFilmArt Entertainment

[domino harvey]

Voting closed, results soon-ish

[domino harvey]

BEST RELEASES OF THE YEAR
01 Marketa Lazarova
02 Seconds
02 To Be or Not to Be
04 A Man Escaped
05 On the Waterfront
06 3 Films by Roberto Rossellini Starring Ingrid Bergman
07 Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion
08 Zatoichi: the Blind Swordsman
09 Shoah
10 Badlands
10 Pierre Etaix

BEST ECLIPSE
Eclipse Series 38: Masaki Kobayashi Against the System

BEST BOXED SET
3 Films by Roberto Rossellini Starring Ingrid Bergman

BEST MODERN FILM
Pina

BEST COMMENTARY
David Kalat, To Be or Not to Be (Runner up: also David Kalat)

BEST ESSAY
No prize awarded (Don't expect to see this category next year)

BEST "BONUS" FILM
the Coward and Pinkus' Show Palace (tie)

BEST (NON-COMMENTARY, NON-ESSAY, NON-BONUS FILM) SUPPLEMENT
the Making of Autumn Sonata

BEST R1 RESCUE
Badlands

BEST REISSUE
Autumn Sonata

BEST UPGRADE
John Cassavetes: Five Films

BEST DISCOVERY
The Pierre Etaix box-set

BEST COVER


BEST PACKAGING


MOST DISAPPOINTING RELEASE
the Earrings of Madame de… Blu-ray



SECOND-MOST DISAPPOINTING RELEASE
Eclipse Series 39: Early Fassbinder

BEST THREAD
The Collected Output of the Film Club

MEMBER OF THE YEAR


RICHARD CRANIUM AWARD

[Cold Bishop]

Doorman! Garbageman!

[FrauBlucher]

Here, here! Raise a glass to Domino!

[swo17]

I revise my vote for Best Thread to that post.

Congrats to Sausage, who will now get to curate an upcoming round of film club. Or would now be an awkward time to reveal that he's secretly been curating every single round since the beginning?

[Jean-Luc Garbo]

Ugh, I can't escape that gif anywhere! Christopher Lee takes the sting out at least. Nice to see Marketa Lazarova and Seconds top the list. Thanks for the work, domino.

[domino harvey]

Thanks guys. Fun fact: the tallies for the Top 10 are the lowest for any year I've tabulated-- lots of vote splitting, very little consensus

[swo17]

Thanks to everyone who copied my ballot to ensure that my top 4 were also the forum's top 4.

[Mr Sausage]

Jeez, thanks guys. I take it everyone likes the film club. A good portion of the praise should go to swo17, the unofficial co-runner of the club.

[jindianajonz]

Definitely appreciate all the work you've put into film club, Mr Sausage! But I have to say, Member of the Year was a tough category this year- there were a number of others who also received votes that really helped make the forum an enjoyable place. Great year, guys!

[Props55]

Congrats to Mr. Sausage! I never bother to vote (I'm never directly familiar with enough of the current releases) and rarely follow this thread but it appears you're in some pretty august company. In addition to your great work with the film club I'd like to also commend the way you run a tight ship around here decorum wise. Like Ford's Judge Priest you "save us from ourselves"!

[MichaelB]

I'm genuinely surprised that he hasn't won before.

But then I was equally surprised to find out that I'd won last year - I didn't read the thread, and no-one told me at the time!

[Perkins Cobb]

Rather like the TV director who wins an Emmy for directing the Oscars, I think domino deserves some kind of award just for the Armond graphic.

[Numero Trois]

Maybe next year there should be a "best GIF" award?

Christopher Lee takes the sting out at least

Lee takes the sting out of everything. He certainly improved that one Star Wars film by several notches.

[HerrSchreck]

But then I was equally surprised to find out that I'd won last year - I didn't read the thread, and no-one told me at the time!

That's truly one of The funniest posts I've read here bar none.

Congrats to the winners and losers! This in lieu of our old vintage crowning ceremonies as I'm running around like a madman. By god those were fun to write.

[zedz]

I'm genuinely surprised that he hasn't won before.

But then I was equally surprised to find out that I'd won last year - I didn't read the thread, and no-one told me at the time!

To be fair, somebody did tape a sign on your back telling everybody else, which you discovered some time in February.

[zedz]

I just had a flashforward to 2024. Some meek youth is submitting a doctoral thesis entitled "Dodging the Cockring: The Criterion Forum Awards 2007-2022."

[colinr0380]

david hare, it sounds as if you have been doing a Jim Broadbent in Cloud Atlas! Albeit with a delightful dog companion too!

[colinr0380]

I liked the film very much and wrote about it a bit here. I think the individual storylines are a little bit flawed if viewed completely in isolation, mostly in the way that the neo-Seoul action sequences don't really end up going anywhere and end up feeling a little too much action for action's sake (though that does add to the eventual futility of that particular section, and it is interesting that Jim Sturgess went on to star in the similarly beautiful looking sci-fi world but full of slightly shoehorned-in action scenes Upside Down), but it is a good example of the editing between the storylines and the way they are interrelating conveying most of the meaning of the film and making the entire film feel cumulatively more powerful than its individual storylines.

I'm a big fan of Tom Tykwer in general (watch out for his regular motif of having members of his main cast get knocked down by cars during his films!) and might be one of the few defenders of The International, which peters out into a bit of a shrug over the issues of financial wrongdoings at the end but has a great use of architecture to convey meaning throughout.

EDIT: I forgot to say that I see Cloud Atlas very much as the 21st century update of Intolerance with all of the grandeur, and flaws, of the Griffiths film. That strand of cinema was something that I thought was long gone from modern cinema, so that immediately got me to view the entire film in a more favourable light!

[aox]

Yikes.. what happened in the Best Essay category?

[swo17]

Probably no two people voted for the same one. Not terribly surprising.

[mfunk9786]

Sorry, Ignatiy