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Terry Gilliam Views 'Fisher King' Scenes in New Light After Robin Williams' Suicide

The Hollywood Reporter wrote:Gilliam, 73, was still struggling with what happened when he was required to revisit Fisher King for an upcoming home video re-release.

"Criterion are putting out a Blu-ray [edition of The Fisher King], and last week I had to watch it, just for technical reasons," Gilliam tells The Hollywood Reporter. "I'd been pretty depressed since Robin died and watching it was exhilarating because there was Robin — alive and well."

Don't know where else to post this: Neil McGlone mentions in his tribute to Peter von Bagh that Criterion have licensed nearly 200 unpublished interviews from von Bagh's archives for possible use as extras on future releases. I assume a good part of these are videos of the two-hour morning interviews from the Midnight Sun Film Festival, the first one of which is on the new Time Bandits disc. CC have their mitts on a veritable film-cultural treasure trove here!

There's a short Q & A from the Midnight Sun Film Festival already available on The Essential Jacques Demy.

As does Love Streams, featuring an interview with Seymour Cassel.

Oh cool, I didn't realize that. I hope they'll be able to fit the full Makavejev and Chabrol ones somewhere in the future! (Not to mention Fuller, Tavernier, Léaud, Fleischer, Oliveira... and the list goes on)

Valin Kenobi wrote:Fisher King pretty much confirmed: http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/t ... ing-735663" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Yeah, he had spoken briefly about the upcoming Criterion release at the DragonCon Q&A in Atlanta.

Criterion posted this visual "essay" on Facebook. Possibly a hint at one or some of the Hitchcock Nine coming soon? I know the possibility has been discussed previously.

EDIT: Whoops, it looks like the embed doesn't work. Here's the FB link.

Hitchcock 9 isn't going to happen unless there's something in the works with Studio Canal; which is highly speculative at this point.

Shout! buys Westchester Films. http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/s ... lms-736617" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I really hope Criterion does have something cooking with Studio Canal because this is going to add a lot of new OOP titles whenever Criterion's current rights with Westcherster expire. Shout's been pretty agressive lately. I think they bought ITC Entertainment last year? Yikes. Becker might want to whip out the cheque book and go acquisition hunting.

Welp, here's hoping my copies of Stagecoach, To Be or Not To Be, Insomnia, and Foreign Correspondent don't brown-out in the next few years....

The Hollywood Reporter says that they now own the rights to Welles' Othello. Is it known which version(s), exactly?

albucat wrote:The Hollywood Reporter says that they now own the rights to Welles' Othello. Is it known which version(s), exactly?

That would be the 1992 restored version of Welles' 1955 U.S. edit (currently making the rounds again this year in a digitally spruced-up release). Westchester founder Julian Schlossberg was credited as "presenter" of the restoration.

Westchester also owned the rights to The Shooting and Ride in the Whirlwind. I certainly hope whatever deal they have extends beyond November, so that we don't end up in a Ran-type situation.

...and The Ruling Class; Hopscotch amongst a few others. Becker seems like a nice guy but if he's got a passive agressive streak; I'd recommend licensing The Thing; Army of Darkness; Dawn of the Dead and putting them out next year.

Hopefully Breaker Morant is out soon. They have it up on the Hulu channel and it was a laserdisc release. Not sure who has licensed the Morrissey stuff but blu's of Blood/Flesh would be nice for legacy purposes.

The last paragraph suggests that all may not be lost on the physical media/Criterion front:

"Foos said that Balsam will help Shout! with broadcast sales of library content and further acquisitions, and he noted that Schlossberg has sturdy relationships with many of the rightsholders with whom Westchester has made deals in the past."

Personally, I'm hoping for The Long Voyage Home sooner than later.

Your reading that wrong. Criterion would be the licensor. The rightsholder would be Beatrice Wells (Othello); Classic Media (Godzilla) ; etc. Shout! will almost cetainly release these when Criterion's deal expires.

Jesus, it's like all the shit is hitting the fan at once for Criterion. First, the brown Blu-Rays, then the Erasehead error, now this... What next?

criterion10 wrote:Jesus, it's like all the shit is hitting the fan at once for Criterion. First, the brown Blu-Rays, then the Erasehead error, now this... What next?

It'll turn out that the binding for "Red River" and "Picnic at Hanging Rock"'s included novels will not only fall apart within a matter of months, but will release toxic greenhouse gases into the atmosphere that futzes with chemicals in avian species that cause them to attack non-avians, including human beings, cars and trucks, plate-glass windows, the few remaining telephone booths in existence, and spruce-bark beetles.

Finally, a plausible explanation for the cause of the Violent Unknown Event.

Bah, I was hoping it would be, say, a version of Othello that Welles actually finished rather than the "restoration." I'm always hoping for that...

Alright, looking at their website, these seem to be the affected titles that are in danger of going OOP:
Foreign Correspondent
John Cassavetes Box
Hoop Dreams
To Be or Not To Be
Godzilla
I Married a Witch


Assuming they're not willing to maintain their relationship with Criterion, these will probably go OOP as soon as three years pass from release (I think that's the usual time for license/exclusivity).

Hypothetically, Hoop Dreams should go out of print very quickly whilst the others still have 1-2 years to remain in print.

EDIT: Ignore the previous part of my post, they could all just disappear immediately, given that is what happened with StudioCanal.

Doesn't this sort of thing happen all the time without swaths of DVDs necessarily going OOP?

Hopefully Shout will play ball with Criterion on some of these, as there isn't a snowballs chance in hell that Shout could produce something even 1/2 as decent as the above blurays (particularly with A/V). I'm guessing Shout was mostly interested in the Godzilla titles (either that, or this is payback over Brood/Scanners).

I'd imagine that Criterion still has several titles forthcoming with Westchester (Blood/Flesh, Breaker Morant, possibly Othello, etc). They might just push these titles forward several months/years - as they most likely did with Army of Shadows/other Studio Canal titles. Do recall that - different titles went OOP at different times with Studio Canal -thus some went OOP immediately (Ran/Contempt), others very soon (Third Man), while others took several years) - so I'd certainly buy the above titles at the next Criterion sale, but I don't think they'll be leaving us today. I guess the good news is that Criterion has already released perhaps the best of Westchester's holdings, with a few stragglers remaining (mentioned above).

On another note, the Criterion newsletter has a "Follow Criterion on Instagram!" with our favorite Grand Illusion picture. At least two departments must be in on the joke now.

I think the list is more like:

Insomnia
Stagecoach
Foreign Correspondent
John Cassavetes Box
Hoop Dreams
To Be or Not To Be
Godzilla
I Married a Witch
Quadrophenia
Hopscotch
The Ruling Class
The Shooting
Ride in the Whirlwind

criterion10 wrote:Jesus, it's like all the shit is hitting the fan at once for Criterion. First, the brown Blu-Rays, then the Erasehead error, now this... What next?

Just wait until some guy on YouTube starts bending copies of La Dolce Vita.