criterionforum.org

That's a full half-year of Criterion releases with a single upgrade.

Ribs wrote:That's a full half-year of Criterion releases with a single upgrade.

Can someone please explain to me why this is of significance?

Clouds of Sils Maria ("Box Art Coming Soon") looks like hold-up culprit.

Or Dr. Strangelove because they didn't add those people until today...

chrisandy wrote:

Ribs wrote:That's a full half-year of Criterion releases with a single upgrade.

Can someone please explain to me why this is of significance?

We used to receive at least one upgrade every month alongside new releases.

Good covers, good releases (even if some are superfluous for region free folk), good month for the lead in to the BN sale

They are probably trying to backlog catalog titles that they can get UK rights to...so that when upgrades resume...it'll also give them the benefit of having a healthy UK slate.

Strangelove seems... uncompelling? Like they cashed in one of their Warner acquisitions for it but don't appear to have done a whole lot with it- and zero commentaries for the month. On the other hand, I'm excited about La Chienne, and 'an entire extra Renoir film' is certainly nothing to turn one's nose up at.

matrixschmatrix wrote:Strangelove seems... uncompelling? Like they cashed in one of their Warner acquisitions for it but don't appear to have done a whole lot with it- and zero commentaries for the month.

Isn't Strangelove Sony? Probably Sony asked them to do it, since putting out a third Sony-branded Blu wouldn't sell the way a Criterion branded would, and Criterion is always game to get back an LD catalog title.

But, yeah, would be nice to see it a little more stacked. Even "archival Laserdisc features!" would have been interesting.

jedgeco wrote:

matrixschmatrix wrote:Strangelove seems... uncompelling? Like they cashed in one of their Warner acquisitions for it but don't appear to have done a whole lot with it- and zero commentaries for the month.

Isn't Strangelove Sony?...

Yes, Warners licensed Strangelove from Sony for the various Kubrick box set releases.

criterion10 wrote:

domino harvey wrote:As ever, I immediately suspect and blame Beatrice Welles

Speaking of which, what on earth ever happened to that release of The Other Side of the Wind?

Still stuck in contracts being renegotiated after a certain personage backed out on an agreement - it was not Ms. Welles.

chrisandy wrote:

Ribs wrote:That's a full half-year of Criterion releases with a single upgrade.

Can someone please explain to me why this is of significance?

My educated guess is that this could have some potential implications as far as the rise of 4K/UHD blu-ray. Many of the titles they now have that haven't been upgraded to blu-ray exist as HD masters, and Criterion may be waiting on them, as an upgrade to blu-ray could be a waste of resources if they wind up have to do a new master in 4K further down the road. It's prudent on their part, I think, and I don't mind. I'd rather wait and get something I know has been sourced from a new 4K master, as opposed to a blu-ray derived from a decade old HD master which in 2016 is all but obsolete.

Brianruns10 wrote: It's prudent on their part, I think, and I don't mind. I'd rather wait and get something I know has been sourced from a new 4K master, as opposed to a blu-ray derived from a decade old HD master which in 2016 is all but obsolete.

Welcome back, 2006!

But then why release Bicycle Thieves? Surely it'd be a big seller for Criterion to put out such an art house classic as one of their launch titles for UHD like they did with 400 Blows and Third Man on BD.

It may have been the last of a string of titles for which they had started working on the BD upgrade a long time ago. (They mentioned that they would be putting it out eventually as far back as the 2013 Wexner chat.) They could have decided a while ago that they wanted to see how UHD panned out before investing too much effort in further upgrades of the back catalog.

And this time around things are much different. Ten years ago you had two competing HD formats and Criterion was being prudent by waiting to see which would emerge.

This time around there seems to be no such looming format war as UHD Blu-ray will be the physical media of delivery. I wouldn't be surprised if by the end of this year, or a year from now we'll know when Criterion will begin rolling out its first titles in 4K.

Had Criterion merely slowed down on upgrading DVD titles, it would make sense to me, but the complete halt does not. At any given time, they have new HD masters available for some titles they released on LD, some that were DVD only, and many they haven't released in any form. Why they'd discriminate so completely against the former DVD titles doesn't add up to me, but lately it seems they've been going after the former LD titles with a vengeance and focusing the remainder of their resources on films new to the Collection. I still think there will be the occasional DVD upgrade in the near future. Would they really hold back something like The Lady Eve for a UHD release?
Just like they're surely driven to go after the Studio Canal titles again with a vengeance as soon as they can, I think they've decided to release many of the former LD titles that were denied them during the DVD boom. Dr. Strangelove is an obviously prestigious one to bring back to the fold, and Here Comes Mr. Jordan seemed like a film that had personal significance for Jonathan Turrell. He spoke of it over and over in last year's CrowdSource podcast. There may be less excitement at Criterion about revisiting most of the remaining potential upgrades in the DVD list.

They may be just as bewildered as the rest of us who wander over to the DVD section of Barnes and Noble during the sale and go, "Oh wow, I forgot Criterion released that" over and over

I suspect the main reason they haven't upgraded titles for which there are new HD masters is most likely that they are still sitting on a lot of inventory for those titles. Better to wait until inventory is low for a title and do an upgrade at that time rather than jumping the gun and getting stuck with a lot of obsolete inventory. Even better masters may appear in the interim. (For example, look at "The Leopard").

Personally, I wish they'd address those kinds of problems by permanently dropping the prices on those titles they want to clear out in order to make room for the new editions. That's the most common model in other businesses.

If Criterion jumps into the UHD game I hope they simply bundle it with the regular Blu-ray release and they don't charge anymore for it. Otherwise, I'm going to full luddite.

Criterion will never go UHD. Mark my words. Or don't, or maybe they will, whatever

I would guess that the UK releases does signify it's not happening anytime soon - surely it'd be way easier to have just held off and released titles on UHD and not need to prepare any region-locking at all?

For the love of God, please close this thread. Won't someone think about the children?

Of Mice and Men
Oedipus Rex
Boyhood
The Before Trilogy

Monday

Boyhood
McCabe & Mrs. Miller
New World
The Squid and the Whale
Exterminating Angel Blu