@Dimitris-I know that Kino has released much more films and probably much more significant films than criterion, but I think Kino is way overpriced. Especially since most of their really good films that they release have poor transfers and no special features. I dint mind that it doesn’t have many supplements but I don’t think it’s worth the price they ask. Although I was speaking specifically about the American DVD market, MoC and Second Run have released many films that I am more interested in and that’s where much of my buying has gone into.
I didn’t know RUS was still around.
Honestly, without Criterion I wouldn’t have ever gotten here (theauteurs/MUBI). So, I’m definitely 100% against a boycott. That, and it’s kind of childish. It’s not like they’re keeping you from sitting wherever you like in a movie theater.
Criterion is going to pay the bills with Broadcast News? I didn’t know that there was such a demand for this film. I saw it about ten years ago; it didn’t leave much of an impression one way or the other.
Kino releases better films than Criterion? That must have slipped by me… probably because I’m not interested in paying top dollar (ie. Criterion prices) for Kino’s crappy packaging and appalling transfers (on DVD at least)
Kino releases being better meaning the actual films rather than how they are presented. Most of the transfers are garbage but every now and then they are fairly decent. The latest Battleship Potemkin looks amazing, considerably better than the earlier release. But I’m thinking of great films like The Mirror and The Sacrifice, and all of the major D.W. Griffith films. I think if Criterion were to get a hold of them they’d be beautiful. Like I said, the price is way too high for what they’re selling.
I think we can all agree that both Criterion and Kino are superior to Facets. Right?
Broadcast News is a superior choice for inclusion. It is an extraordinarily potent indictment of just how corporatized and glamourized even the concept of ‘news’ became in the 80s, eleven years post-Network, and a character study of those stalwarts still desperately clinging onto the concept of truth. And it’s done with wit , while still pointing out that such wit is a part of the downfall of honesty.
In it, Holly Hunter and Albert Brooks are remarkable. William Hurt does what he needs to.
When is James L. Brooks going to get the love and respect he’s so diligently earned? This is certainly a good step towards it.
I get all my Kino, Facets, and Criterion films from the library for free, so I don’t care about price. If we’re going to start the Kino/Facets/Criterion discussion, why not MoC/Second Run/Artificial Eye?
“Broadcast News” is one of the more famous romantic comedy-dramas of the 1980s, so it’s surprising at least one person on this forum confesses to not even having HEARD of it.
Speaking for myself, I do prefer “Network” much more than “Broadcast News”. In fact, I’ll even rate “Switching Channels” ahead of “Broadcast News”…and of course “Goodnight, and Good Luck” ahead of all the above except “Network”. I say “Broadcast News” is a fine film, but many superior films about television have been produced. Albert Brooks is quite good as others have mentioned, but the conclusion is very idealistic and sitcom-ish. A little more cynicism would have given the film a much sharper bite.
Switching Channels was crap and nowhere near the quality of Broadcast News.
Switching Channels has one of the later charismatic Reynolds roles other than that…ehh
“…but the conclusion is very idealistic and sitcom-ish. A little more cynicism would have given the film a much sharper bite”.
—I read it as pessimistic, if anything.
^^and we know pessimism is a good thing for cinema.
Broadcast News is fine and all, but it’s kinda trapped in that 1980s capsule. It’s better than all those 80s movies like the Paper, Switching Channels and the like, but the characters are so obvious in what they will do and say that it’s not hard to figure things out.
I sorta think Criterion should take all 80s films and fix them, because prints from this time period generally look like, and sound like crap.
Let’s not forget we’re talking about Hollywood 80’s, eh?
I thought The Paper by Ron Howard was 90’s but maybe I’m confusing it with another Paper?
Are you fucking kidding me? Boycott this?
497-500 Roberto Rossellini’s War Trilogy Roberto Rosselini
503 Lola Montes Max Ophuls
505 Make Way for Tomorrow Leo Mccarey
506 Dillinger is Dead Marco Ferreri
507 Bigger Than Life Nicholas Rey
508-511 Letters from Fontainhas: Three Films by Pedro Costa
512 Vivre Sa Vie Jean-Luc Godard
513 Summer Hours Olivier Assayas
515 The Fugitive Kind Sidney Lumet
516 Stagecoach John Ford
517-518 By Brakhage: An Anthology Volume One and Two Stan Brakhage
519 Close-Up Abbas Kiarostami
520 Everlasting Moments Jan Troell
522 Red Desert Michelangelo Antonioni
523 Night Train to Munich Carol Reed
524-526 The Only Son/There Was a Father Yasujiro Ozu
527 The Secret of the Grain Abdellatif Kechiche
528-531 3 Silent Classics by Josef Von Sternberg
532 Louie Bluie Terry Zwigoff
533 Crumb Terry Zwigoff
534 L’Enfance Nue Maurice Pialat
535 Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence Nagisa Oshima
536 The Thin Red Line Terrence Malick
537 The Magician Ingmar Bergman
538 Paths of Glory Stanley Kubrick
539 House Nobuhiko Obayashi
541 The Night of the Hunter Charles Laughton
19 Chantal Akerman In the Seventies
20 George Bernard Shaw on Film
21 Oshima’s Outlaw Sixties
22 Presenting Sacha Guitry
23 The First Films of Akira Kurosawa
24 The Actuality Dramas of Allan King
I don’t see what’s your beef Johnson? You’re whining like a little baby when some of your examples like the First Films of Akira Kurosawa is like a literature psycho saying “oh man, i haven’t read every single fucking book by fucking Dickens, blasphemy!!!”.
Anyone who gets incensed from a RUS thread is being duped. He’s taking the piss, guys. He’s much smarter than the thread title would belie, he just likes flaming everyone.
That includes you two.
RUS is a flamer?
If I ask most people about broadcast news they either vaguely remember it or haven’t seen it/heard of it. I like that criterion is putting out this film, even though I’m not personally interested in it, making it availabe for people to rediscover/discover is what criterion does best. I mean it is an “important” film being nominated for best picture and having a director with such a prolific career, and it’s certainly “contemporary.” I don’t think this is anything to complain about, criterion isn’t releasing anything outside of their standards, plus we get Fuller reprints, Chaplin, night if the hunter, and whats appearing to be criterion’s best boxset ever. So suck it up, grow a pair, and ignore it if you don’t like it.
then just dont buy it.
theres plenty of other titles criterion has to chose from.
Dimitris – yeah you’re right about the Paper, it was 90s, but it felt like the 80s….
@Dimitris: First off, he never said that not having seen the films listed made you a fake cinephile, he just listed what he considered to be a bunch of quality recent releases. It just so happens that there are millions of people who enjoys the films of Akira Kurosawa, and even though I’m not a huge fan myself, I’m pleased as punch that Criterion has made all these films available, so that others who love the man more than I can enjoy them.
Man, they should’ve done a release of the master director Jay Levey’s “UHF,” starring “Weird Al” Yankovic and our favorite controversial comdeian Michael Richards. That’s a masterpiece in ‘80s films about television. It’s like better than Broadcast News and Videodrome put together. Anyway, it doesn’t matter if Criterion doesn’t live up to our expectations on what to release. Find a life, get laid, take your anti-depressants, and don’t worry so much about this.
Uli Cain, Cinefidel¹³
My thing is just do it right. I love great extras, but most important is a clean, crisp transfer. The first DVD I bought of Raised the Red Lantern looked like it was transferred from VHS, finally I found a good copy.