534 L'enfance nue

[colinr0380]

There's a new film to add to the canon of troubled French youth!

Don't forget Les enfants terribles and La Haine (plus Forbidden Games at a stretch)! Maybe we can start lobbying for Assayas's L'eau froide next!

[tenia]

MoC vs. CC:
BUT the film and all bonus on 1 disc?!?!?
I can imagine that the image suffers of a low bit rate.

Well, in fact, on the MoC set, the movie only takes 4400 MB so... But there are indeed about 6GB of extras to fit everything on a single disc...

Still, the ITW with Tarrazon and the trailers won't be back in the CC set.

[zedz]

Why does Criterion sometimes use the title of the film in its original language, and other times translates it to English? Why no consistency?

As Jun-Dai notes, they tend to go with whichever title has the most currency in their market, and if it's a tough call, they usually opt for English.

In the case of this film, however, it was such a flop at the time that it got hardly any exposure - even in France. I think its original American release title was Me - which for only two letters is a whole shitload of awful - and neither of the available translations (Naked Childhood and Naked Youth), quite apart from being -ah- problematic, have ever really caught on (plus one of those is an alternative title for one of their forthcoming Oshima films, so there's another headache they need to avoid). If people are familiar with the film, it's most likely from Pialat retrospectives where the film has retained its original title. Pialat gave several of his films titles that didn't translate well (e.g. the bland "To Our Loves", the blunt "Graduate First!", the brutal "Mouth Agape"). Given the alternatives, I think we should be thankful Criterion have opted for the French original in this instance.

[Der Spieler]

Beaver

Hmm... Is it me or the CC image looks pretty bad in comparison?

[doc mccoy]

No, it's not just you - it looks atrocious compared to the MoC disc

[domino harvey]

Those colors look disgusting, like something out of those PD educational filmstrip compilations

[knives]

The criterion is hideous, the worst I've seen from them in a while. It looks like the stretching is mostly on Crits plate. God, that couldn't be worse. The MOC is basically the same package right? If so I'll be canceling my order on the Crit.

[Der Spieler]

It looks like a reverse situation of 'Vengeance is Mine' on DVD.

[zedz]

Rather disappointing. The stretching / squashing is so slight I honestly can't recall which is more accurate (I've seen the film twice in 35mm), but the golden filter on the Criterion definitely doesn't ring true for me. I recall the colours (which are very important to the film - selected primaries against neutral backgrounds) being stark, clear and plain.

It's also a great shame to lose half of the Champs / Contre Champs interview, since it offers Pialat at his most bullishly obstreperous, pissing contempt all over the set and splashing a lot of it on himself.

EDIT: Don't know if MoC have settled on their August sale titles yet, but it might be a good time to offer up that Pialat package again!

[FerdinandGriffon]

If you look at the boy's face in the second to last comparison (of him holding onto a bookshelf) then I think it's fairly clear that the criterion is the version with stretching. Why is it that the big C seems to have had consistent problems getting color balance right of late (rather than just on Ozu releases)?

[artfilmfan]

The Criterion looks terrible. I'm glad I have the MoC.

[Svevan]

You know this worries me even more in relation to their Deserto Rosso, although I don't own their disc (being perfectly happy with the BFI.) There seems to be a compulsion to overly warm these titles up, as though they were using blue biased monitors.

Hate to beat a dead horse, but on a similar note, Crit has been "standardizing" b&w films for years. I just recently watched Trouble in Paradise, and there were moments where the grain was far too heavy and the corners of the screen far too dark (not unlike their M Blu-ray). Major portions of that film are in darkness anyways, and I watch on a very bright monitor. Compared to a nice, grain-filled, and well-balanced Design for Living from Universal, I was surprised how far Crit was willing to go for their own tastes. In the case of B&W, sometimes it works wonders. Other times, definitely not. The color-meddling, too, seems to have bled out from their Melville and Ozu releases into, uh, everything else. I enjoy doing the "eyeball" test at home, setting my display wherever I think is best; for Criterion to do the same apparently research-less finangling on the "definitive" R1 digital editions is just sad.

[Doctor Sunshine]

The Criterion has significantly more information on either side, they're the exact same aspect ratio, yet the Criterion must be stretched. That logic doesn't follow.

[FerdinandGriffon]

The Criterion has significantly more information on either side, they're the exact same aspect ratio, yet the Criterion must be stretched. That logic doesn't follow.

As I see it, the amount of information on either side is irrelevant to the issue of stretching, or at the very least far from conclusive. Far more persuasive to me is that fact that the boy's face looks distorted in the Criterion caps, and doesn't in the MoC ones.

[Doctor Sunshine]

And that's one fat 1960s French toddler in the MOC. Logically, with the MOC missing information on either side, it may have been stretched horizontally to fill out the correct aspect ratio. Just saying.

[knives]

I think the baby looks more normal in the MOC, that's actually the cap the convinced me of the stretching in the Crit. Here the baby looks like all down syndrome.

[Doctor Sunshine]

Logic v. opinion. (And the Down syndrome reference is a little out there.) All I can offer is this: presumably the Criterion cover art is from a publicity shot rather than a frame capture. Compare the width of his profile there to the screenshots. Or if you don't want to go by the cover, google around.

[knives]

I was mostly just teasing on the fat baby comment. The more space in the crit does suggest problems in the MOC, but they're pretty minor compared to the colour issues and there's no denying that.

[skuhn8]

Looks like somebody puked on the Crit print in the lab.

MOC won this one hands down.

[Arn777]

I don't have the MOC one, but have the Gaumont, and nobody suffers from jaundice in that one unlike the awful Criterion.

[perkizitore]

Unlike M, this has less interesting supplements than MoC, therefore making the Criterion completely unnecessary on all fronts.

[gyorgys]

Tinkering the color scheme is not unusual for Criterion. Their In the Mood for Love and Le Cercle Rouge have similar issues.

[Finch]

Tinkering the color scheme is not unusual for Criterion. Their In the Mood for Love and Le Cercle Rouge have similar issues.

Which makes me anxious about the (hopefully) eventual BD of In The Mood...

Gary needs to have his head examined for not calling this clearly in favour of MoC - the Criterion is Anne Widdecombe to MoC's Angelina Jolie.

[domino harvey]

It is perplexing-- why is he so quick to diss other MoCs for perceived problems but doesn't call out Criterion's golden shower transfer here?

[Dr. Geek]

Atrocious. Looks so...unnatural.

But I'll end up buying it anyway.