Oh, That Viridiana Cover!

[viridiana]

Am I the only one who doesn't really have a problem with the Viridiana cover? I definitely don't like it, but I don't hate it either.

Hell, I'm just glad to have the flick on DVD at this point.

[Subbuteo]

Rest assured the film is coming out whatever. As for the cover well it would be nice if they came up with another, if not I'm still buying.

[luxetnox]

I don't hate it. I just think that it is empty and, for a film as provocative as Viridiana is about patriarchy and religion, the cover art should be better than pop art. I'm not even sure what I would replace it with - maybe a scene of the last supper or an image of the dog tied to the undercarriage of the cart.

[justeleblanc]

I didn't mind Pinal's picture, but the purple sash, pink background, and horrible typeface was pretty bad.

[bufordsharkley]

I think the Viridiana cover is pretty nice-looking, but it doesn't match the film at all. It's not the pink-ness. I think the light pink is sort of fitting. The thin, white, radiating lines are pretty nice. The problem's the jagged purple title-thing.

For another film, it would work. Sort of a violent, edgy sort of thing. It would work for a violent, edgy sort of film. But not Viridiana.

I say keep everything but the purple-title-overlay-thing. Lose that, and put in a tasteful, perhaps old-fashioned-looking title, in black. Perhaps in the same place as the title is now. But not diagonal. The diagonality is what's driving this current sucker down.

[godardslave]

what they have tried to do is apply modernity to a truly classical film.

The problem is Viridiana is just too classical, the weight of the film resists such intrepretation, and the resulting cover hence looks both tasteless and just plain silly.

My suggestion is to simply go with a restrained, classical cover. Black and white only, with a beautiful b/w still from the film as the main front picture.

[rwaits]

I agree with Buford's post. Its definitely not the still (which I like a lot) or even the pink that wrecks this cover art---its that horrid, off center, diagonal, purple thing at the bottom. Its sub-photoshop, and disgusting. Out of all the great titles Criterion have been releasing of late, Viridiana, to me, is the most essential--I've been waiting on its arrivals since Criterion's inception, and such a beautiful film packaged in such an ugly cover is very disappointing indeed. It will be interesting to see if, as suggested in Mulvaney's response to Matt, the deluge of complaints will actually affect Criterion's choice of cover. Here's hoping.

[Matt]

The problem any designer faces in coming up with cover art for a DVD is creating or selecting a single image that summarizes or encompasses the total film - not just its story but its impact and its tone. I can sympathize with the poor artist attempting to do such with Viridiana, and I can see how someone might see how the current design would do that. You've got the very traditional image of the bride, but you've also got the very modern, almost radically stylized background suggesting the iconography of the Madonna (rays of light emanating from the head) and the violent slash of the title banner suggesting a political poster or something like that.

The problem here is that it all adds up to something rather ugly, which Viridiana is not.

I have a hard time criticizing something that I cannot suggest a better alternative for, but I find myself doing that with this cover. I've combed Google Images for a good still, but haven't found anything really fitting.

What might really work is if Criterion did something rather radical and did a horizontal design using the "last supper" image. Instead of being locked into a vertical design, simply turn the package 90 degrees. It would certainly be novel and startling (like Viridiana), and would be classically inspired yet viciously blasphemous (like Viridiana). If reinterpreted as an illustration, one could take even more liberties with it such as adding some color or removing distracting background clutter, etc.

[kappoka]

Everyone seems to want some sort of last supper inclusion. That's too obvious boys!
I actually believe Buñuel would have liked this cover.

[stroszeck]

I have an interesting theory on this particular cover that would possibly make sense to some haters. If you think about it, Viridiana is a CAMPY movie, and as such the shock of the bright purple contrasts very beautifully with the ominous, stoic B&W of the actress in the wedding dress. Unlike King of Kings or even Kind Hearts (with that AWFUL cut out of the actor's body shooting an arrow) this is a very relevant piece of art.

[stroszeck]

Sorry, I actually meant that Viridiana has ELEMENTS OF campy movies, including obscene and nearly pitch black comedy and over-exaggerated moments. But then again, doesn't most/all of Bunuel's work contain that element?

[kappoka]

Although I did not know him personally, Buñuel had a passion for life. He had a great sense of humor. He was constantly amused by the absurd, the grotesque, the vulgarity of society and man. Personal freedom and anarchy were his pursuits. That, and women and bars and cigarettes and daily newspapers.
I think if we could have emailed him the CC Viridiana cover he would have laughed out loudly as he was holding his martini and said 'I Like It! It has comedy. It must have been designed by a Spaniard!'
I will email Mulvaney and ask him if the designer was a Spaniard.

I think the cover is very unattractive, but it is hilarious. I find alot of Buñuelian comedy in it. It would easily win 'Funniest Criterion Cover of All-Time"

[bunuelian]

Bunuel hated the giant lips and butt that were used to sell Discreet Charm and Phantom of Liberty. While he had a certain sense of humor he also had taste. And this cover is in bad taste.

He was also far from a woman chaser. If anything, he was terribly inhibited with women, by his own admission.

At any rate, it's somewhat pointless to speculate about how Bunuel would have responded. He's not even important - what's important is whether we as purchasers of this disc like the art. I have no problem saying that I don't.

[Gigi M.]

I actually believe Buñuel would have hated this cover. Who wins?

Hey Matt, what about this for a cover?

[godardslave]

What might really work is if Criterion did something rather radical and did a horizontal design using the "last supper" image. Instead of being locked into a vertical design, simply turn the package 90 degrees. It would certainly be novel and startling (like Viridiana), and would be classically inspired yet viciously blasphemous (like Viridiana). If reinterpreted as an illustration, one could take even more liberties with it such as adding some color or removing distracting background clutter, etc.

I like this idea. However, aside from the 90 degree rotate i think the still should be left untouched.

[Mr Pixies]

Unearthed Films' release of the Nanking Massacre has cover art like that,

[thewind]

This thread is hilarious -- that anyone can see this cover as being worse than, say, Burden of Dreams or Tanner '88 is completely beyond me.

[mmiesner]

at least the Burden of Dreams cover has some creativity put into it, as well as that whole package design being pretty sweet. Tanner 88 fits the film pretty well, as boring as the cover is. This looks like they hired it out to somebody who's credits included one semester with a 2.8 GPA at the local community college in graphic design. i am not a designer myself, but christ almighty is that the best they can do? it doesn't fit the film, it doesn't have anything interesting or creative to catch the eye *other than the color* and there were so many better things they could have done with it. it just looks totally lazy.

[stroszeck]

I'm just dying to hear the response Mulvaney gave to people who e-mailed him to complain about it:

Dear XXX,

We have no current plans to alter the Viridiana box design.

Jon.

[thewind]

at least the Burden of Dreams cover has some creativity put into it, as well as that whole package design being pretty sweet. Tanner 88 fits the film pretty well, as boring as the cover is. This looks like they hired it out to somebody who's credits included one semester with a 2.8 GPA at the local community college in graphic design. i am not a designer myself, but christ almighty is that the best they can do? it doesn't fit the film, it doesn't have anything interesting or creative to catch the eye *other than the color* and there were so many better things they could have done with it. it just looks totally lazy.

I'm just tickled pink at how the color is what everyone focuses on with this. Other than the color, it's been established that this is basically the same image as early promotional graphics for the film. Which, other than the color, puts it in the same realm as most DVD covers. Nothing horrible, just pretty bland.

I find Tanner '88 to be the worst, simply because it's a cheap copout -- compare it to, say, Hoop Dreams. Both are trying to serve as imitations of real-life displays, in Tanner's case a political poster, in Hoop Dreams, a framed high school basketball jersey. Where Tanner fails is that there's nothing to it ... it's three gaudy colors and a little tear in the corner. If I knew nothing about Altman or Tanner '88, I'd immediately pass the disc by. And have many times, actually.

Also, Burden of Dreams may have taken more skill to put together, but it's still butt ugly.

[kinjitsu]

More interesting still, would be the Criterion art department's reaction to these comments/complaints.

[Matt]

More interesting still, would be the Criterion art department's reaction to these comments/complaints.

I keep imagining scenarios: It's a new hire's first cover. She's very excited and tells all her friends and relatives over Thanksgiving dinner to look it up on the Criterion website. After a nice, relaxing holiday weekend, she returns to her new job to find an inbox full of e-mails in which people describe in detail exactly how much they hate the cover and why. She runs away from her desk in tears, into the comforting arms of Johanna Schiller. Johanna wipes away our heroines tears and tells her, in soft, lilting tones, about how evil, spiteful, and ungrateful the people on "those internet websites" can be and regales her with stories of outrages past: the addition of Hopscotch to the collection, Peter Cowie's Diary of a Country Priest commentary, etc. Our heroine, now reassured and comforted, is given the rest of the day off. She goes to get a massage and then some chai tea, finally heading home to watch some Law and Order re-runs on A&E.

[scotty]

No reason why the cover has to encapsulate the film--why tie the hands of the designer? The piece is very 50s in its graphic look--check out old album covers. It's fine. Expansion of the color palette beyond dorm room colors works too. Much ado . . .

[kinjitsu]

This still would have made a much more provocative cover!

[godardslave]

I keep imagining scenarios: It's a new hire's first cover. She's very excited and tells all her friends and relatives over Thanksgiving dinner to look it up on the Criterion website. After a nice, relaxing holiday weekend, she returns to her new job to find an inbox full of e-mails in which people describe in detail exactly how much they hate the cover and why. She runs away from her desk in tears, into the comforting arms of Johanna Schiller. Johanna wipes away our heroines tears and tells her, in soft, lilting tones, about how evil, spiteful, and ungrateful the people on "those internet websites" can be and regales her with stories of outrages past: the addition of Hopscotch to the collection, Peter Cowie's Diary of a Country Priest commentary, etc. Our heroine, now reassured and comforted, is given the rest of the day off. She goes to get a massage and then some chai tea, finally heading home to watch some Law and Order re-runs on A&E.

Im sure this poetic (!) post is circulatig the Criterion offices by email even as we speak. It stands to reason at least a few criterion employees (if not more) read this forum. Even if its just a secret, guilty pleasure when they get home after a day at the office.