Criterion Research Project

[Dr. Geek]

A Woman Is A Woman - A
Ikiru - B
Dillinger Is Dead - C
Oshima's Outlaw Sixties - C
Vivre Sa Vie - B

[movielocke]

broke mine up into bluray eclipse and dvd because it's telling

Researcher's Note to Self: Criterion Forum sample can sometimes be unreliable because of inability or unwillingness to follow instructions.

oddly, I made the post first following directions then edited it immediately to break it up because I thought it was more interesting. after seeing your comment I went back and edited in the original list.

[ShowsOn]

Bigger Than Life (Blu-ray) - A
Oshima's Outlaw Sixties - B
Chungking Express (Blu-ray) - A
Last Year At Marienbad (Blu-ray) - A
Pierrot Le Fou (Blu-ray) - B

[dlevine]

M [Blu] - B
Stagecoach [Blu] - A
Roberto Rosselini's War Trilogy - A
Do The Right Thing - B
L'Avventurra - A

Of the above films, the only ones I had any familiarity with was Stagecoach and L'Avventurra. My uncle is a huge Westerns buff, so when I found out Criterion was releasing Stagecoach, I dug out his copy of the first Warner DVD and loved it. I caught L'Avventurra for free on TheAuteurs (now Mubi), so when I saw a used copy at a video store for $15 I had to grab it.
Do The Right Thing might seem a little random in that list, but if you see a 2 disc Criterion for $5 at a video store that's going out of business, you don't pass that opportunity up.

[jbaart]

I find your B/C criteria pretty flawed. There are almost no movies that Criterion might cover that I've never even heard of before. Yes, it happens, but it is a very rare occurence. So 95%+ fall into B or A. I'd guess it's the same for most other fans of quality films as they have a good grasp of film history in general. If I had conducted this survey I'd have added another category between B and C for "Had heard its title before Criterion picked it up but didn't know anything about it besides that".

Anyways, using your criteria:

Boudu Saved From Drowning - B
The Fallen Idol - B
Pierrot le fou - B
Chungking Express - B
The Third Man - B

As I'm still quite young I haven't seen a lot of the movies I pick up.

[Feego]

The Man Who Fell to Earth - C
Stagecoach - A
M - A
Oshima's Outlaw Sixties - C
Grand Illusion - A

[aox]

Days of Heaven (Blu) B
8 1/2 (Blu) A
M (Blu) A
Stagecoach (Blu) B
The Human Condition B

[rockysds]

Earrings of Madame de... - B
By Brakhage An Anthology Vol. 1 & 2 (blu) - B
Stagecoach (blu) - A
Walkabout (blu) - A
Vivre sa vie (blu) - B

[nick]

Stagecoach - B
By Brakhage Vol 1 & 2 - B
Mystery Train - A
Walkabout - A
Fugitive Kind - C

[colinr0380]

Researcher's Note to Self: Criterion Forum sample can sometimes be unreliable because of inability or unwillingness to follow instructions.

I don't see the problem with, while answering the basic question asked, expanding the topic some more for our own ends and seeing what kind of extra discussion that this request for information might provoke!

I'm finding more recent Criterion releases have polarised me into either the A or C category. If I'm not buying a very familiar film that I've seen before, either because it is something like The Exterminating Angel getting a Criterion release with associated extras or because I'm upgrading a previous edition to Blu-Ray, I'm picking up Eclipse sets of films that I've really no idea about (the Allan King documentaries are going to be another good example of that).

The 'B' movies seem to be coming out more rarely for me, yet they are often the types of films that I get the most excited about finally getting hold of (though films bought in the other categories have their own pleasures too!)

This could seen as an example of a certain 'conservatism' in Criterion's choice of releases with the more difficult home entertainment market (though many of the more recent 80s and 90s American films added into the collection have been new territory to me, plus late John Huston has been one of my overlooked areas - unless Annie counts!), or just that many of the major 'canonical arthouse' releases of which a lot has been written have already been released.

But then this is a discussion that we have had many times before in lots of different ways, from the 'Why won't they release what I want' thread, to the threads about the Blu-Ray releases and the way that Criterion appears to be moving into more mainstream film releases through their deals with major studios, and how these factors could affect how many 'surprising', 'rare' or 'most wanted' titles get released. This could be something to factor into the original poster's research project, along with the different individual tastes and prior knowledge of such material that each of us brings to our purchases.

[eljacko]

A Woman is a Woman - A
Oshima's Outlaw Sixties - B
Ugetsu - A
Playtime - A
Le Corbeau - C

[Awesome Welles]

I find your B/C criteria pretty flawed. There are almost no movies that Criterion might cover that I've never even heard of before. Yes, it happens, but it is a very rare occurence. So 95%+ fall into B or A. I'd guess it's the same for most other fans of quality films as they have a good grasp of film history in general. If I had conducted this survey I'd have added another category between B and C for "Had heard its title before Criterion picked it up but didn't know anything about it besides that".

I thought this too but then compared it with my recent non-Criterion purchases and it does seem to work. Criterion either do a good job (or is it the forum) of keeping us informed or are releasing less well known films by known directors, like The Fugitive Kind (in my case at least) and so on.

Here's my last 5 non-Criterion purchases (includes pre-orders as my memory is bad):

Three Ozu Films (BFI) - A
Morgiana (Second Run) - C
Cuban Boxset (Network) - B/C
Profound Desires of the Gods (MoC) - A
Institute Benjamenta (BFI) - C

Whereas in comparison all my Criterions were A or B and I don't remember the last Criterion 'C' I bought.

[matrixschmatrix]

^^^ Interestingly nearly all of my MoCs are As or Bs, whereas my Criterions are Cs as often as not.

I find your B/C criteria pretty flawed. There are almost no movies that Criterion might cover that I've never even heard of before. Yes, it happens, but it is a very rare occurence. So 95%+ fall into B or A. I'd guess it's the same for most other fans of quality films as they have a good grasp of film history in general. If I had conducted this survey I'd have added another category between B and C for "Had heard its title before Criterion picked it up but didn't know anything about it besides that".

In my case, I haven't heard of a lot of the movies Criterion put out until they announced them because I wasn't seriously interested in movies until say 2003 or 2004, and Criterion was a major source of new areas of film to look into. That's gotten less true, but it still means that anything I buy with a spine number under about 350 is pretty likely to be something I heard of first through Criterion.

Then too, I tend to be attracted to the ones I know nothing about, which is why at one point I bought Quai des Orfevres without even knowing what the title meant, much less what the movie was like. There's something exciting about a movie that's a total surprise.

Then too, I buy Criterions used and in ebay lots quite often- something I wouldn't do for a film I didn't know if it weren't a Criterion. (Or an MoC.) Apart from the B&N sale, I rarely get to pick exactly what I want and buy that.

[rossen]

My last five Criterions:

The Fugitive Kind - A
Bigger Than Life -B
Lola Montes - B
Oshima Outlaw Sixties - B
The Flowers of St Francis - A

[charliekohller]

Thank you to everyone who has responded. It has been very interesting to see everyone's answers. In some ways I too think my criteria was a little flawed. What I really want to figure out is to what extent does Criterion legitimize certain films, or make audiences take a second look at a film they might otherwise have ignored. For example I personally had never put much thought into seeing The Fugitive Kind. I had always assumed that it was not that strong of a Williams adaptation. I don't remember where I got that idea, but when Criterion released it I suddenly began to look at it differently. The very fact that Criterion released the title created my desire. This sort of gets into this idea of how Criterion has a knack of making people feel like their getting what they want, even when they didn't know they wanted it in the first place. It sort of fits it into what Barbara Klinger calls the 'thrill of acquisition'.

Anyway, I also had this idea that Criterion was creating new audiences for classic films. I feel in some cases they conferring legitimacy and creating desire in the home cinephile. So to test that out I wanted to get a sense of how often a cinephile's first contact with a film was through Criterion.

I hope there are still more contributions to come. The more responses I get, the more I can learn.

Thanks again

[zedz]

Flawed or not, this project does at least provide some interesting data. Like several other posters, my purchases are often determined by completely different factors, such as OOP announcements or one-off prices. If you asked me the same question after a B&N sale, you'd get a completely different, probably 'purer' answer.

Also, as noted above, the number of Criterion films I'd literally 'never heard of' before their announcement is vanishingly small (Border Radio, anyone?), but there are some which I'd never given a second thought to or which had barely registered, which is more in the spirit of your 'C' category - i.e. I probably would never have purchased them without the Criterion connection.

So, anyway:

The Man Who Fell to Earth BluRay - A (because of OOP announcement)
By Brakhage BluRay - B (I suppose, though obviously I've already seen the films on the upgraded first volume)
Stagecoach - A (because of price deal)
Oshima's Outlaw Sixties - A (because of price deal - had previously seen 3 out of 5 films, so it's really A / B)
The Golden Age of Television - C (see above - had heard of some of the films - Marty, Requiem for a Heavyweight - but the majority I hadn't, and I wouldn't have sought them out if they hadn't come in this package)

[Tom Hagen]

Rossellini's War Trilogy - B
Paris, Texas - A
Revanche - A
Vivre sa Vie - A
Oshima's Outlaw 60s - C

[domino harvey]

Gervaise C
Bigger Than Life A
George Bernard Shaw Eclipse B
Oshima Outlaw Sixties B
Stagecoach A

[JAP]

Mystery Train - A
Stagecoach - A
Walkabout - B
Vivre sa Vie - B
Letters From Fontainhas - A/A/B (the B is for "Colossal Youth")

[denti alligator]

Oshima - A and B
Close-Up blu - A
Stagecoach blu - A
Brakhage - A and B
Days of Heaven Blu - A

[Matt]

Stagecoach - A
Vivre sa vie - A
M - A
Pierrot le fou - A
Billy Liar - B

[mteller]

Close-Up (Blu) - A
Red Desert (Blu) - A
By Brakhage (Blu) - A/B (had seen volume 1 and about 5 of the films from vol 2)
Le Doulos - A
Bigger Than Life - A

I rarely blind-buy anything. However, I usually rent/borrow the ones I haven't seen before. For instance, Le Doulos is one I had borrowed from the library and then decided to buy. Regarding your post above, Criterion introduced me to Brakhage and Le Doulos, but the others I had seen long before the Criterion releases were announced.

I Fidanzati and An Angel at My Table are good examples of films I absolutely adore and might have never seen if not for the Criterion "brand". There are several others.

[Arrow]

The Phantom of Liberty - C
The Milky Way - C
The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeouisie - C
Red Desert - B
Close Up - B

[cdnchris]

A Woman is a Woman - A
Milky Way - A
Paul Robeson - A/B/C
Fire Within - B
Man Who Fell to Earth (Blu) - A

[Dadapass]

Oshima Eclipse - B
Variety Lights - B
Pierrot le fou - A
Gervaise - C
Forbidden Games - B