Criterion & Eclipse Cover Art & Packaging Babble-on Vol. 7

[hearthesilence]

Not counting the WKW box, this is the first month in a long time I have seen none of the announced releases. How are the other films? What is essential?

And specifically, how is that Mike Leigh film? I just watched Life is Sweet this morning which I mostly enjoyed. The only Leigh I have been absolutely enamoured by so far is Vera Drake, but I am new to his filmography.

I'd say Secrets and Lies is pretty essential. I'm a big fan of Vera Drake as well, if that's of any help.

Defending Your Life is just an extraordinarily funny high concept comedy from the 1990s. Rip Torn's amazing in it.

Albert Brooks is remarkably consistent (though it may help that he's not that prolific as a filmmaker). All of his films are worth seeing, but those first four features from Real Life to Defending Your Life are probably his best. (Real Life is my favorite, and it's now the last of those four still waiting for a BD release.)

Re: Mike Leigh, Secrets and Lies is essential for being a huge commercial breakthrough, relatively speaking. I don't think mainstream audiences were very familiar with him until possibly Naked but he didn't have a sizable arthouse hit in the U.S. until Secrets and Lies which showered him with Oscar nominations (including Best Picture). It's very good, the performances are impeccable, and there are certainly powerful moments, but there are skeptics who consider it a notch below his best work, and I can see where they're coming from - for example, the resolution is a bit too tidy to me, and a cynical take would be to accuse it of commercial calculation.

FWIW, Grown-Ups, Meantime, High Hopes, Naked and Topsy-Turvy are probably my favorite Leigh films (the first two or three of these are BBC TV productions), and Secrets and Lies, Vera Drake, Happy-Go-Lucky and a few others would round out a "top ten."

[justeleblanc]

justeleblanc is this book you're referring too?

https://www.press.uillinois.edu/books/c ... 36651.html

if so, you just gave me some new reading!

Yep. It's excellent. Enjoy!

[TMDaines]

The Essential Fellini boxset looks fantastic by the way. It’s only when you get home after Christmas and try to shelve it with everything else that you realise how impractical it is. If you have shelving for vinyl records, you’ll be fine. Anyway whose media consists solely of DVDs/Blu-rays is shit out of luck. Can’t even lay it on top of boxsets on top of my Billies as the ceiling coving gets in the way.

[hearthesilence]

The Essential Fellini boxset looks fantastic by the way. It’s only when you get home after Christmas and try to shelve it with everything else that you realise how impractical it is. If you have shelving for vinyl records, you’ll be fine. Anyway whose media consists solely of DVDs/Blu-rays is shit out of luck. Can’t even lay it on top of boxsets on top of my Billies as the ceiling coving gets in the way.

I wondered about this. When Talking Heads put out that disappointing box set, Once in a Lifetime, in 2003, the packaging was universally panned precisely because it wouldn't fit in any conventional shelving. None of Criterion's sizable auteur box sets have anything close to matching dimensions - they have exactly the same problem but this is actually the first complaint I've heard about it.

[TheKieslowskiHaze]

Additionally, with this kind of disc housing, the discs can slide into the glue when the box stands upright. I know some people had that problem with the Godzilla set. So it's probably best to find a place to lay this thing flat.

I put mine on the top shelf in my clothes closet, along with my other oddly shaped auteur boxset (Shout's Herzog). So they're not on display, but they do seem, by virtue of being "put away", special.

[swo17]

How big is your Shout Herzog set? Because I was under the impression it was LP-sized but I just ordered a copy from Deep Discount and was surprised to find it a little under 8" x 8". Is this a new pressing or how it always was?

[domino harvey]

My Bergman set lives on my bookshelf, as will the Varda set whenever I feel moved to pick it up. The Ford at Fox and Murnau/Borzage boxes are too big to fit anywhere, including record holder shelves, and I'm almost 100% going to just throw them away when I move. The non-standard size DVD/Blu-ray gift set trend needs to effing die already

[TheKieslowskiHaze]

How big is your Shout Herzog set? Because I was under the impression it was LP-sized but I just ordered a copy from Deep Discount and was surprised to find it a little under 8" x 8". Is this a new pressing or how it always was?

8" x 8" seems about right; it's not LP sized. And I bought it when it was released, so I imagine it's always been this size.

It's a little taller than blu-rays on my shelf, but the spine sticks out quite a bit. That always bugged me until the Fellini boxset prompted me to find the aforementioned closet space that is now for awkwardly shaped auteur boxsets.

[knives]

My Bergman set lives on my bookshelf, as will the Varda set whenever I feel moved to pick it up. The Ford at Fox and Murnau/Borzage boxes are too big to fit anywhere, including record holder shelves, and I'm almost 100% going to just throw them away when I move. The non-standard size DVD/Blu-ray gift set trend needs to effing die already

They are a real mess. I've been trying to figure out what to do with them (well I have the Kazan set instead of the Murnau/ Borzage) as they just don't fit anywhere. Might finally just break down and start moving my discs to those holders and tossing the packaging out.

[therewillbeblus]

I keep the bigger box sets on top of my shelves in a row, though these newer "creative design" sets are really mucking things up. My Godzilla set is open like a book with the Bergman fitting part of its mass inside of it, and the Fellini is balanced sideways so it only takes up an inch but looks awful sticking out like half a foot. That's a shame to hear about the sleeve glue problem, but I don't really have any other option.

[Cash Flagg]

I use the Ford at Fox set to block my cat's access to one side of the entry-way behind my TV set-up, and the Bergman and Fellini sets work in conjunction on the other side. So cumbersome, oversized packaging does have its advantages!

[swo17]

I'm currently using my Ford at Fox set to flatten some digipak spines. Very handy

[domino harvey]

I keep the bigger box sets on top of my shelves in a row, though these newer "creative design" sets are really mucking things up.

I used to keep the Ford and Murnau boxes on top of my armoire. Then I moved the armoire a skotch and they toppled over forwards, sending my giant French Rohmer Blu-Ray box, which miraculously had arrived in the states without damage, flying and it got torn the eff up. So in conclusion, these big boxes will even mess up your non stupidly designed boxes

[TMDaines]

The annoying thing about the Fellini set is that the only interior item that fills the whole width and height of the box is the Blu-ray disc book. Both the actual books are less than half the width of the box.

I thought the Bergman set was a pain, but this sticks out a couple of inches when placed next to that set, and probably sticks out a couple of inches from your shelf too.

I’m struggling to get my head around who thought this was the preferred design. If it came with a vinyl record or two, I’d get it.

[therewillbeblus]

I used to keep the Ford and Murnau boxes on top of my armoire. Then I moved the armoire a skotch and they toppled over forwards, sending my giant French Rohmer Blu-Ray box, which miraculously had arrived in the states without damage, flying and it got torn the eff up. So in conclusion, these big boxes will even mess up your non stupidly designed boxes

For a while I had them on a low level book shelf and layered in an annoying way where the Bergman set was horizonal under others (my complete DVD set of The Shield only fits that way, which is pretty similar to the Fellini set, plus so damn heavy- those that have it will know) but not only was this impractical for retrieving the set, it just felt like hiding the set from myself. Plus my cats could get at it, which I have enough problem with the crazy one scratching the regular blu-rays in the bottom rows of shelves. But yeah, I can see this backfiring.

I’m struggling to get my head around who thought this was the preferred design. If it came with a vinyl record or two, I’d get it.

I mean, I 'get' it insofar as Fellini's carnivalesque brand feels suited to this kind of creative design. The process of getting at the contents is like opening a present and the insides are packaged in a way where when you take them out it's like picking through various game pieces or treasures. It just isn't practical for storage.

[dustybooks]

My boxed set solution is this homemade wooden shelf my stepdad made years ago that I reappropriated and lives above my small TV; the dimensions are deep enough that it works well for most of the aforementioned megasets thus far. (Speaking of dimensions, I really hope this photo isn’t enormous, it’s hard to tell on mobile... mods kill me if needed!)

[tenia]

My dad always taught me to fill my shelves by taking the weight into account so these boxsets are in the lowest shelves I have but put in a Tetris kind of way because their huge design is a real pain and indeed need to die, but at least they're not life-threatening dead weights on top of armoires.

[FrauBlucher]

Perhaps picture stands or small easel stands if you have room. This is what I'll use for the Fellini box and place it on top of make display case.




Dustybrooks, is that a NYC subway map framed in your pic?

[aox]

[dustybooks]

Dustybrooks, is that a NYC subway map framed in your pic?

Yes! My wife bought it at the NYPL on our lovely trip there back in 2013.

[Rupert Pupkin]

is "Rolling Thunder Revue" a digipack ?

[cdnchris]

Three Films by Luis Buñuel
Minding the Gap

[barbarella satyricon]

Three Films by Luis Buñuel

The Buñuel is just this side of boring, but I like it. The typeface and white background call to mind old Saatchi & Saatchi ad designs, and the tinted b/w photos inside remind me of the old Grove Press film book covers. Throwback, a little conservative, but it comes together well, I think.

[Pavel]

Minding the Gap

I love the spine!

[The Narrator Returns]

is "Rolling Thunder Revue" a digipack ?

I got a copy of it from a second-hand shop today, and yes, it is a digipak, about the same thickness as The Irishman. The booklet's 56 pages.