criterionforum.org

ando wrote:a decent lineup of recent foreign films.

This is the main draw to their streaming service for me (along with the TV shows, though they seem to be losing a lot of older / classic shows now). It's been a big help in working through the 2010-14 lists project.

Fee go wrote:... their "classic" selections leave a lot to be desired - very little in the way of classic black-and-white films of the 1930s and 40s, mostly stuff that airs regularly on TCM...

Luckily, I never bother with TCM and have managed to avoid most Gregory Peck vehicles. But with four NF streamers featuring Peck, including that Harper Lee treatment, it's looking like a Greg Peck week. I was impressed with Man in the Gray Flannel Suit, which I viewed for the first time the other day (though Jennifer Jones' facial contorted emotional interpretations always make her look like a petulant 8 year old). The Mankiewicz script for the '44 film, Keys of the Kingdom, looks promising.

The first three new installments of Bionicle are up. The concept/world doesn't appear terribly sophisticated but kids love it.

And I'm finally getting around to Patrice Chéreau's restored version of Queen Margot . The older, shorter theatrical release was a favorite for years. The reasons for the extensive cutting must make an interesting story though to my knowledge no special edition disc of the film exists.

Netflix Is Intentionally Lowering Video Quality for Some Customers. ​No, you weren't just imagining it.

Kate Storey wrote:Netflix admitted Thursday that they intentionally lower video quality for customers with AT&T and Verizon, according to the Wall Street Journal.

I use neither AT&T nor Verizon for streaming (I use my local cable system), but the quality dropped considerably last year right around the time Netflix announced they didn't feel the need to encode all selections at higher bit rates. What appears to be the acceptable average for the company usually results in a poorly defined image with macro blocking performing "The Wave" across it.

Netflix selection is 31% smaller than 2.5 years ago

Not only are their fewer movies, but it seems impossible to find them unless you search a film out. The terrible "recommendation" system that puts the same movies at the top of the page no matter what you watch and offers no other way to sort through them. I just found they had The Comedy yesterday after never seeing it pop up on New Arrivals, buried 8 pages deep in "indie and art house".

And there's no real way to verify it, but I know almost every film being added next week was on the site sometime in the past 6 months already. Relicensed material is not new material. I guess I can't complain because I leech it off someone else but I would never dream of actually paying for this service continously

I have Hulu+ and Netflix, and they basically have the same programming at this point with Hulu+ obviously having the Criterion Collection which gives it the edge for me.

I would have dumped Netflix over a year ago if it wasn't for the original programming, which I think it mostly stellar.

Director Zach Clark recently discovered that his own film White Reindeer is leaving Netflix this weekend and has penned a column with some thoughts. Expiring Soon: My Own Movie is Leaving the Infinite Shelves of the Internet’s Video Store

Until reading the column, I was not aware that the film did not receive any physical release. It depresses me that a film that got as much notice on the festival circuit as White Reindeer and that got picked up by as big a distributor as IFC did not get any physical media release at all. I had to miss its area festival screenings, so I'd been waiting for it to come out, and wasn't aware it was on Netflix. If I hadn't seen the column, I wouldn't have known to watch the film this weekend, and then it would have been gone.

I saw his film Modern Love Is Automatic at SXSW in 2009 and his film Little Sister at SXSW this year. I liked them both a lot, especially Little Sister, which was a highlight of this year's festival for me.

PfR73 wrote:Director Zach Clark recently discovered that his own film White Reindeer is leaving Netflix this weekend and has penned a column with some thoughts. Expiring Soon: My Own Movie is Leaving the Infinite Shelves of the Internet’s Video Store

Until reading the column, I was not aware that the film did not receive any physical release. It depresses me that a film that got as much notice on the festival circuit as White Reindeer and that got picked up by as big a distributor as IFC did not get any physical media release at all. I had to miss its area festival screenings, so I'd been waiting for it to come out, and wasn't aware it was on Netflix. If I hadn't seen the column, I wouldn't have known to watch the film this weekend, and then it would have been gone.

I saw his film Modern Love Is Automatic at SXSW in 2009 and his film Little Sister at SXSW this year. I liked them both a lot, especially Little Sister, which was a highlight of this year's festival for me.

Unfortunately, that article is a week old, and the movie was removed on Monday.

Dagnabbit, I only saw the article for the first time yesterday and didn't realize the dates had already passed. I feel like the early Easter this year has really messed me up on dates this week.

I'm sympathetic to Zach Clark's problem, because it's terrible to not get a physical release, but on the other hand, I should hope he knows that foreign DVDs of White Reindeer are available, some quite cheaply. I will say that I also found the original Kickstarter page for the film, on which Zach Clark was selling 100 DVDs (perhaps DVD-R) for North America at $25 each, and these discs still seem to be available here.

Here are the non-US DVDs I found:

UK DVD

Australian DVD and a review of the disc

German DVD

And finally, apparently, a German Blu-ray was planned, but most unfortunately, not released. The Australian DVD distributor (Accent) has done a few Blu-ray upgrades of its titles in the past several months, and there are also a few markets where the film doesn't seem to have had a release yet (France, Italy, Spain and also the Asian market), so perhaps a Blu-ray will come along someday.

Netflix has a new(?) genre category called "LOL!" and one of the first films that I see advertised under this category is Mary Poppins. I don't know what anything means anymore.

swo17 wrote:Netflix has a new(?) genre category called "LOL!" and one of the first films that I see advertised under this category is Mary Poppins. I don't know what anything means anymore.

Well there is that scene with the crazy uncle who literally gets high from LOL-ing, so...

Netflix may be losing the vast bulk of their Miramax library at the end of the month—it's not entirely clear yet, since some titles that were listed as expiring suddenly lost their expiration dates. But as of right now, the vast majority are down as expiring on June 1st. This isn't entirely surprising, since the five-year deal signed in 2011 runs out in June. It's possible they'll work out a last-minute renewal for the entire catalog, but if you don't want to take that chance, here's a list of what is currently set to expire (note that this includes some non-Miramax titles). If all these titles actually do leave the service, it'll make the departure of the Epix catalog look like a drop in the bucket.

Summer press release summarizing what's to come. The big takeaway is that September is the start of their exclusive deal with Disney/Marvel/Lucasfilm/Pixar.

This is the strangest, best coup for Netflix in years. They seem to really be making an effort to improve their movie selection this Summer.

It's a very teasing glimpse into the curatorial service Netflix could be if licensing was easier and cheaper. Even a rotating, limited selection of themed movies would be great.

The Narrator Returns wrote:All of Albert Brooks' directorial efforts are coming to Netflix on July 1

Unless I'm not looking hard enough, these didn't make it to Netflix Canada?

The Narrator Returns wrote:All of Albert Brooks' directorial efforts are coming to Netflix on July 1

Before you get too comfortable with them there, Brooks said on Twitter that they expire on September 1.

Ahh, how fun! The streaming experience holds a myriad of delights for the consumer.

It's actually only Defending Your Life being taken down, for some reason.

I thought I was out, but they pulled me back into a free month - 2 disc out plan. See how it goes.

edit: Netflix dvd round #2...

Signed back up for my free 2 dvd out month on Saturday, Sep 17. It's now very early Wednesday morning Sep 21 and I have yet to receive a disc. Hopefully it will be in today's mail. Back in the day I would have received, watched, and returned, and they would have received 2 discs by Wednesday - easy. I have more than 2 dozen in my queue, yet only one (1) dvd shipped Monday. I had to call early Monday morning to tell them that my 2nd disc was not shipping from my queue. Tuesday, it still didn't ship. At this rate I don't see myself paying a penny to continue this nonsense.

Perhaps...shifting tide for exhibiting motion pictures.

The National Association of Theatre Owners (NATO) is sounding the alarm over a recent deal between Netflix and iPic, in which the luxury-theater chain will screen 10 movies simultaneously with their release on the streaming service.

Kagemusha (Kurosawa, 1980) is one of a seeming handful of NF Criterion streamer holdouts (I've yet to make the Filmstruck plunge). Man, is it beautiful - with a theme that would only be tackled by a master. I haven't read any comparisons to Shakespeare's Measure For Measure (where the Duke leaves for a spell with an "inferior" in charge - and doppelgangers are Shakespearean hallmark) but the spectre of a replacement ruler's decisions in the eyes of his sovereignty (and adversaries) and the extent to which identity is a collective vs. an individual construction was certainly a late career consideration for The Bard.