Janus Films

[yoloswegmaster]

Here's the touring poster for Daisies:

[diamonds]

According to this article, Olivier Assayas's Late August, Early September is streaming on HBO Max with a Janus logo.

[therewillbeblus]

According to this article, Olivier Assayas's Late August, Early September is streaming on HBO Max with a Janus logo.

Fantastic news, one of his very best films and probably his best non-genre work

[yoloswegmaster]

Pages for The Mother and the Whore and Drylongso are now on the Janus site.

[knives]

That’s exciting.

[spectre]

That's amazing news. Anyone know how long it usually takes between these pages going up and a title being announced by Criterion? Or is it all over the place?

[therewillbeblus]

The Eustache is obviously a dream finally coming true, but Drylongso sounds fascinating. I checked out Smith's short film reportedly used to birth this project into being, Chronicles of a Lying Spirit (by Kelly Gabron). It's a pretty interesting experimental film that overlaps gendered vocals on different volume levels to weave a seething sensation of silenced agency, which is to say nothing about the imagery's resonance in how we write history in racial realms. Well worth checking out online for five minutes- I imagine it'll show up on that disc when it gets announced

[dwk]

That's amazing news. Anyone know how long it usually takes between these pages going up and a title being announced by Criterion? Or is it all over the place?

No time frame. Titles going up are essentially a sign that Janus has both the rights to a film and media/formats (DCPs, prints, Blu-rays, and/or DVDs) they can send out to theaters that want to book said film.

[Ribs]

Janus will be presenting Drylongso, Eight Deadly Shots, The Long Farewell, and the Mother and the Whore at this year's NYFF.

[criterionsnob]

The Antoine Doinel films coming to Film Forum, in all new 4K Restorations courtesy Janus Films.

[hearthesilence]

The Antoine Doinel films coming to Film Forum, in all new 4K Restorations courtesy Janus Films.

If Criterion wanted to take a shot at a UHD box set, this would be perfect. (Though Three Colors would probably come first, potentially at lower risk since it would be fewer films.)

[Roscoe]

I hope there would be a separate single UHD release of 400 BLOWS. I'm nowhere near interested enough in the other Doinels to want to shell out the money for them.

[Ribs]

Janus will be presenting Werckmeister Harmonies at TIFF.

[FrauBlucher]

Hallelujah, Tarr joins the Collection!!!

[criterionsnob]

Incredible news, and maybe my favourite Tarr.

[Finch]

Announcing a UHD of Werckmeister Harmonies would make up for the In The Mood For Love cash-in.

[ryannichols7]

oh my god. this literally shook me to my core, first time in ages - I fully expected Arbelos to do this, never thought I'd see the day Criterion doing Tarr. was my first of his films and still an all timer for me. absolutely can't wait!!!

[Calvin]

I'd wait before celebrating with the exclamation marks as Arbelos' Bela Tarr releases were superb, featuring David Mackenzie encodes.

[therewillbeblus]

Yeah, the Arbelos releases are terrific and I wish they were putting this out as well, but I'm just happy someone is finally doing it

[FrauBlucher]

When Arbelos was asked on another forum about Werckmeister Harmonies, they said they didn't have the rights. I never imagined it was with Janus/Criterion. I know David M is a superstar but Criterion is no slouch with black and white films. Most of their issues are with color and color timing. I would expect the supplements to surpass Arbelos' though

[swo17]

Nah, they have compression issues too, though less so with UHD. Either way though, David M would surely do a better job. (Prove me wrong)

[Finch]

I think Calvin's point is that because David encoded the Arbelos releases and his encoding is demonstrably better than that of the authoring houses Criterion uses, at least for the Blu-Rays; so if Werckmeister Harmonies ends up being a BD release only through Criterion, it's understandable to wish that Arbelos had gotten WH instead as David's encoding more likely than not would have guaranteed a definitive presentation whereas with Criterion's Blu-Rays, compression has rarely been Pixellogic's strong point. Which is not to say that they couldn't knock it out of the park with the forthcoming disc but it does leave a reasonable amount of doubt over whether they'll handle Werckmeister Harmonies with the same efficacy as David would have.

Usually when color issues become apparent with Criterion, it's because they inherited it from the source and/or chose not to redo the color timing (or were contractually obliged to take the source as is). Compression on the other hand has been a self-inflicted issue and even some of their UHDs aren't optimised (Virgin Suicides is one, and I think someone spotted compression issues in Le Cercle Rouge which I understand they chose to have done in-house).

edit: swo beat me to it.

[ryannichols7]

the Arbelos ones for Satantango and presumably Damnation (I was actually going to order it today!) are pretty good but there is the ever so slight chance Criterion does a UHD of this, something I don't see Arbelos having done. plus, Tarr will see the benefits of the Criterion "bump" so to say, something I think a lot of us take for granted...but it really does make a lot of these directors more of known names, ensures their other films get restored/get good treatment/etc. look at A Brighter Summer Day's leap from obscurity (though it did have a reputation, much like Tarr does in general) to the astronomical renown it has now.

plus come on, its plenty to get excited about that one of the best films of the 2000s is getting a 4K restoration and will finally be rescued from the DVD era

[Finch]

I'd also add, personally, I find Arbelos's cover designs more consistently pleasing than Criterion's. However, I'm glad Werckmeister Harmonies is getting a new release in the first place. (I wonder if the UK rights are still with Artificial Eye, or if Criterion has global rights as with Infernal Affairs, or if Fran Simeoni might get to it for a Radiance 2023 line-up?)

[yoloswegmaster]

Yeah, I'm not sure why some people are trying to downplay someone's excitement of a future release of a film that they love over encoding of all things (I'm actually convinced at this point that the term "encode" is just being used as a buzzword).

On a different note, I would be surprised if this were to be released on UHD. Then again, I was also surprised over the The Last Waltz 4K release, so I guess there is always a chance.