Word: criterion
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...during its interval as a laser disc company that Criterion virtually invented the DVD as we know it. Over the years the Criterion collection has developed beyond its origins with the Janus inventory to become a very well selected group of more than 300 titles, almost always produced to standards that very few other DVD companies bother with...
...just that Criterion focuses mostly on great films that they produce in impeccable transfers or that they have helped to reassemble or restore a host of films by great directors. It's that they surround these films with fascinating extras. It's not unusual for a Criterion set to include radio broadcast versions of the film, interviews filmed especially for the disc, alternate versions, lucid and useful commentary tracks, sometimes more than one, and a printed edition of any published work that a film was based on. (Check out the volume of Raymond Carver stories packaged with Robert Altman...
...record show that it was a clever marketing ploy for Criterion to number its releases, with the number printed on the spine of the packaging. That lets you know, when you look at your collection lined up on a shelf, where the gaps are. The dedicated collector will feel these gaps like they were missing bicuspids. This plays to his or her worst pathologies and has probably boosted Criterion's profit margins by a healthy amount every year...
...list that follows is not a selection of the greatest films of all time. That list would have to include a number of titles, like Vertigo, Citizen Kane and 2001, that are not Criterion. It's not even a list of the greatest films, like L'Avventura and Jules and Jim, that are in Criterion's inventory. This is a list of the best Criterion releases considered as imaginative products and, if you will, public services - the discs that have the most beautifully cleaned up prints, the most desirable extras, the most illuminating commentary tracks...
...record, I am not associated with the good people at Criterion, and have not, so far as I know, ever met or spoken with any of them. But for a long time it's been obvious to me that they can read my movie-loving mind...