Post-Bergman Boxing Speculation

[Luke M]

I remember having zero interest in the Kurosawa set. Criterion had already starting releasing Blu-rays so a dvd-only set felt like a regression.

[jedgeco]

Based on the results of the Facebook group brackets poll they just did, I'd argue the Criterion fanboy canon's Mount Rushmore is:

Kurosawa
Bergman
Tarkovsky
Kubrick

What the world needs more than anything is another Stanley Kubrick collection box set!

[dda1996a]

I don't know, I never even considered getting the AK box because it was DVD only, but I would buy a blu-ray box of Kurosawa (or Angelopoulos, or Kiarostami, or Hsiao-Hsien, Tarkovsky, Panahi, Tarr and Tsai) in a heartbeat.
I wanted to get this, but not yet being a big fan of Bergman and Amazon taking $50 for shipping it to me made me wait for now.

[movielocke]

Given the dearth of both Chaplin and of Kurosawa releases the past couple of years, they are definitely the most likely candidates for "__ ___'s Cinema" box sets. Also, both Chaplin and Kurosawa are big enough to have continual or very high end work done on their films. So there's good harvests available to use for these super sets across the entire filmography. Given the time frame since the bluray release there is probably some 4k or 6k or !!!!!k restoration of Seven Samurai now or soon available.

Harold Lloyd was mentioned upthread, he definitely had the big box set released on DVD, but I think I remember reading it wasn't terribly popular, and Susan Lloyd wanted more individual attention for the catalog. That might be a prospect for some years down the road though, if "___ ___'s Cinema" becomes an annual thing.

Ozu would be a good candidate for five plus years down the road, just guessing that timeline wise he's further down the queue based on restoration and HD master pipeline more likely to have more HD or 2k or 4k harvests and restorations from his latter films.

[DeprongMori]

Considering his legacy and that his 100th anniversary has just passed, Orson Welles would have been an obvious choice for a box. The problem is that the licensing would be incredibly complex — which is probably why such a comprehensive box has never been issued.

[domino harvey]

Well, and also the majority of features that would go in a Welles box are already out on Blu-ray (same with Chaplin). This isn't just a collection of Bergman movies, it's also a mass upgrade event

[DeprongMori]

If we want to focus on world-class directors who are well-known enough to be able to sell a bunch of career retrospective sets, and who still has a lot of feature films that have never had a Blu-ray release, I’ve got the perfect candidate: Robert Altman.

Though we might want to wait until 2025 for his 100th birthday.

[HitchcockLang]

If we really want to get serious about speculating who will get the next ____ _____'s Cinema box, we should look for names that can be easily broken into three character lines, otherwise what self-respecting OCD collector would ever buy the complete line?

AKI
RAK
URO
SAW
A ' S
CIN
EMA

Chaplin doesn't work unless you don't count the apostrophe as its own character and since the precedent has already been set... I'd say Kurosawa set confirmed

[tenia]

AKI, URO, SAW, you might get lots of very different customers with that one.

[movielocke]

YAS
UJI
RO
OZU
‘S
CIN
EMA

HMm guess we can strike Ozu off the list.

Maybe just maybe they wouldn’t be married to three characters for every directo?

AKIRA
KURO
SAWA’S
CINEMA

That might look right

CHAR
LES
CHAP
LIN’S
CIN
EMA

YASU
JIRO
OZU’S
CIN
EMA

Assuming they can be flexible it just might be possible to make other filmmakers work

[justeleblanc]

MIC
HAEL
BAY
CIN
EMA

[Fiery Angel]

ARM
OND
WHI
TE'S
FAV
ES

[fiddlesticks]

JAY
AND
SIL
ENT
BOB
MOV
IES

[domino harvey]

T H I
S I S
T H E
N E W
P E O
P L E
P O S
T I N
G D V
D B E
A V E
R L I
N K S
W I T
H T H
E W O
R D "
B E A
V E R
" I N
S E R
T E D

[mfunk9786]

T H E
W O R
D B O
X I N
G I N
T H I
S T H
R E A
D T I
T L E
I S F
O O L
I N G
M E I
N T O
T H I
N K I
N G I
T S A
B O U
T T H
E S P
O R T
E V E
R Y T
I M E
I S E
E I T

[goblinfootballs]

Boxing was never the same after Bergman.

[Noiradelic]

If we want to focus on world-class directors who are well-known enough to be able to sell a bunch of career retrospective sets, and who still has a lot of feature films that have never had a Blu-ray release, I’ve got the perfect candidate: Robert Altman.

They've never done a career retrospective for an American director -- because of the licensing issues, it won't happen for a long time if ever.

[MichaelB]

If we want to focus on world-class directors who are well-known enough to be able to sell a bunch of career retrospective sets, and who still has a lot of feature films that have never had a Blu-ray release, I’ve got the perfect candidate: Robert Altman.

Though we might want to wait until 2025 for his 100th birthday.

Again, a rights nightmare, involving just about every major Hollywood studio (including Disney) plus a ton of indies. Good luck wangling a deal that will please all of them!

Bergman is feasible because he conveniently worked for the same company for most of his career. Ditto Rohmer, Kaurismäki and Fassbinder. And indeed ditto Kurosawa, for a large chunk. But Altman flitted from company to company like a butterfly, so the rights to his films are scattered all over the place.

And of course another big advantage of being linked to a single organisation is that they're more likely to have instituted a comprehensive restoration programme already - Bergman and Fassbinder being cases in point.

[soundchaser]

The Artificial Eye Kaurismäki set is brilliant, while we're on the subject. It wouldn't be too hard for Criterion to replicate it - and they might even be able to get the rights to I Hired A Contract Killer. It certainly wouldn't be as big a seller (or include as many films), but it could absolutely be closer to comprehensive than the Bergman set.

EDIT: Not StudioCanal. Whoops.

[miless]

they're already quite close to a full Cassavetes set, but his estate might be a hinderance

[justeleblanc]

A Fassbinder box is also a possibility, especially if you add together all the Wellspring titles, the five Fantomas titles that have now reverted back to the Fassbinder foundation, plus the many new restorations reportedly forthcoming. I suspect it would just be a matter of Criterion renegotiating the rights to the BRD trilogy -- which could happen. Even if it weren't complete, a 25-film boxset seems doable. That is, unless another distributor, like Arrow, already has plans to release films like CHINESE ROULETTE on Blu in North America. Still, Arrow's stand-alone release of THE SERPENT'S EGG suggests that they might be willing to work out a deal with Criterion in some way.

Or maybe this is just wishful thinking on my part.

[MichaelB]

The Serpent's Egg, of course, is in the minority of Bergman films not made by Svensk Filmindustri (for rather notorious tax-related reasons!).

[justeleblanc]

The Serpent's Egg, of course, is in the minority of Bergman films not made by Svensk Filmindustri (for rather notorious tax-related reasons!).

So then, perhaps the better analog to SERPENT'S EGG is DESPAIR.

[OldBobbyPeru]

A Buñuel box would be great, mostly because of the sorry state of a great deal of his Mexican films, some of which are missing in action.

I also vote for a Fellini box--long overdue for some upgrades there. The non-anamorphic And The Ship Sails On is sub-Criterion quality. I think a new 4K of La Strada has been floating around. Il Bidone has a blu-ray release in the UK, and many other Fellini films are worth upgrading.

[artfilmfan]

While the interest in boxing is high, Criterion needs to bring Naruse into the rink!