Die Criterion-Titel für Juli 2009 wurden bekannt gegeben. Das Highlight stellt das 4-DVD-Set des dreiteiligen Masaki Kobayashi-Klassikers “Barfuß durch die Hölle / Ningen no joken / The Human Condition” dar. Umso bedauerlicher, daß die Filme (vorerst) nicht auf Blu-ray erscheinen.
Irgendeinen Titel scheint Criterion noch nachzureichen, denn die #482 bleibt bisher frei. UPDATE: Criterion hat die #482 nachgereicht. Wie zu erwarten war, ist es es Godards “2 oder 3 Dinge, die ich von ihr weiß / 2 ou 3 choses que je sais d’elle / 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her” [F 1967] geworden.

14. Juli 2009
Blu-ray #54: “For All Mankind” [USA 1989, Al Reinert]
1 Disc
$39.95
1.33:1
English

In July 1969, the space race ended when Apollo 11 fulfilled President Kennedy’s challenge of “landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth.” No one who witnessed the lunar landing will ever forget it. Al Reinert’s documentary For All Mankind is the story of the twenty-four men who traveled to the Moon, told in their words, in their voices, using the images of their experiences. Forty years later, it remains the most radical, visually dazzling work of cinema yet made about this earth-shaking event.

DISC FEATURES

• New, restored high-definition digital transfer, supervised and approved by producer-director Al Reinert
• DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 soundtrack
• Audio commentary featuring Reinert and Apollo 17 commander Eugene A. Cernan, the last man to set foot on the moon
• An Accidental Gift: The Making of “For All Mankind,” a new documentary featuring interviews with Reinert, Apollo 12 and Skylab astronaut Alan Bean, and NASA archive specialists Don Pickard, Mike Gentry, Morris Williams, and Chuck Welch
• On Camera, a collection of excerpted on-screen interviews with fifteen of the Apollo astronauts
• New video program about Bean’s artwork, accompanied by a gallery of his paintings
• NASA audio highlights and liftoff footage
• Optional on-screen identification of astronauts and mission control specialists
• PLUS: A booklet featuring essays by film critic Terrence Rafferty and Reinert

14. Juli 2009
DVD #54 (Neuauflage): “For All Mankind” [USA 1989, Al Reinert]
1 Disc
$39.95
1.33:1
English

In July 1969, the space race ended when Apollo 11 fulfilled President Kennedy’s challenge of “landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth.” No one who witnessed the lunar landing will ever forget it. Al Reinert’s documentary For All Mankind is the story of the twenty-four men who traveled to the Moon, told in their words, in their voices, using the images of their experiences. Forty years later, it remains the most radical, visually dazzling work of cinema yet made about this earth-shaking event.

DISC FEATURES

• New, restored high-definition digital transfer, supervised and approved by producer-director Al Reinert
• Audio commentary featuring Reinert and Apollo 17 commander Eugene A. Cernan, the last man to set foot on the moon
• An Accidental Gift: The Making of “For All Mankind,” a new documentary featuring interviews with Reinert, Apollo 12 and Skylab astronaut Alan Bean, and NASA archive specialists Don Pickard, Mike Gentry, Morris Williams, and Chuck Welch
• On Camera, a collection of excerpted on-screen interviews with fifteen of the Apollo astronauts
• New video program about Bean’s artwork, accompanied by a gallery of his paintings
• NASA audio highlights and liftoff footage
• Optional on-screen identification of astronauts and mission control specialists
• PLUS: A booklet featuring essays by film critic Terrence Rafferty and Reinert

14. Juli 2009
DVD #480: “Barfuß durch die Hölle - Teil 1 - 3 / Ningen no joken 1 -3 / The Human Condition 1 -3” [J 1959 - 1961, Masaki Kobayashi]
4 Discs
$79.95
2.35:1
Japanese

Masaki Kobayashi’s mammoth humanist drama is one of the most staggering achievements of Japanese cinema. Originally filmed and released in three parts, the nine-and-a-half-hour The Human Condition (Ningen no joken), adapted from Junpei Gomikawa’s six-volume novel, tells of the journey of the well-intentioned yet naive Kaji (handsome Japanese superstar Tatsuya Nakadai) from labor camp supervisor to Imperial Army soldier to Soviet. Constantly trying to rise above a corrupt system, Kaji time and again finds his morals an impediment rather than an advantage. A raw indictment of its nation’s wartime mentality as well as a personal existential tragedy, Kobayashi’s riveting, gorgeously filmed epic is novelistic cinema at its best.

FOUR-DISC SPECIAL EDITION

• New, restored high-definition digital transfer
• Excerpt from a rare Directors Guild of Japan video interview with director Masaki Kobayashi, conducted by filmmaker Masahiro Shinoda (Double Suicide)
• New video interview with actor Tatsuya Nakadai
• Video appreciation of Kobayashi and The Human Condition featuring Shinoda
• Japanese theatrical trailers
• New and improved English subtitle translation
• PLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by critic Philip Kemp

21. Juli 2009
DVD #481: “Made in U.S.A.” [F 1966, Jean-Luc Godard]
1 Disc
$29.95
2.35:1
French

With its giddily complex noir plot and color-drenched widescreen images, Made in U.S.A was a inal burst of exuberance from Jean-Luc Godard’s early sixties barrage of delirious movie-movies. Yet this chaotic crime thriller and acidly funny critique of consumerism—featuring Anna Karina as the most brightly dressed private investigator in film history, rummaging through an intricate plot for a former lover who might have been assassinated—also points toward the more political cinema that would come to define Godard. Featuring characters with names such as Richard Nixon, Robert McNamara, David Goodis, and Doris Mizoguchi, and appearances by a slapstick Jean-Pierre Léaud and a sweetly singing Marianne Faithfull, this piece of pop art is like a Looney Tunes rendition of The Big Sleep gone New Wave.

DISC FEATURES

• New, restored high-definition digital transfer
• Interviews with stars Anna Karina and Lászlo Szábó
• A video piece on the personal and the political in Made in U.S.A and 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her, featuring Godard biographers Richard Brody and Colin MacCabe
• A visual essay cataloguing the multiple references in the film
• Original and rerelease theatrical trailers
• New and improved English subtitle translation
• PLUS: A new essay by film critic J. Hoberman

21. Juli 2009
DVD #482: “2 oder 3 Dinge, die ich von ihr weiß / 2 ou 3 choses que je sais d’elle / 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her” [F 1967, Jean-Luc Godard]
1 Disc
$29.95
2.35:1
French

In 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her (2 ou 3 choses que je sais d’elle), Jean-Luc Godard beckons us ever closer, literally whispering in our ears as narrator. About what? Money, sex, fashion, the city, love, language, war: in a word, everything. Considered by many to be among the legendary French filmmaker’s finest achievements, the film takes as its ostensible subject the daily life of Juliette Janson (Marina Vlady), a housewife from the Paris suburbs who prostitutes herself for extra money. Yet this is only a template for Godard to spin off into provocative philosophical tangents and gorgeous images. 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her is perhaps Godard’s most revelatory look at consumer culture, shot in ravishing widescreen color by Raoul Coutard.

DISC FEATURES

• New, restored high-definition digital transfer
• Archival television interviews: the first featuring actress Marina Vlady on the set of the film, the second with Jean-Luc Godard engaged in debate with a government official on the subject of prostitution
• New video interview with Godard friend Antoine Bourseiller
• A visual essay cataloguing the multiple references in the film
• New and improved English subtitle translation
• PLUS: A new essay by Sasha Frere-Jones

28. Juli 2009
Blu-ray #483: “Ekel / Repulsion” [GB 1965, Roman Polanski]
1 Disc
$39.95
1.85:1
English

Roman Polanski followed up his international breakthrough Knife in the Water with this controversial, chilling tale of psychosis, starring Catherine Deneuve as Carol, a fragile, frigid young beauty cracking up over the course of a terrifying weekend. Left alone by her vacationing sister in their London flat, Carol is haunted by specters real and imagined, and her insanity grows to a violent pitch. Thanks to its unforgettable attention to disturbing detail and Polanski’s unparalleled adeptness at turning claustrophobic space into an emotional minefield, Repulsion remains one of cinema’s most shocking psychological thrillers.

DISC FEATURES

• New, restored high-definition digital transfer
• Uncompressed monaural soundtrack
• Audio commentary featuring director Roman Polanski and actress Catherine Deneuve
• A British Horror Film (2003), a documentary on the making of Repulsion, featuring interviews with Polanski, producer Gene Gutowski, and cinematographer Gil Taylor
• A 1964 television documentary filmed on the set of Repulsion, featuring rare footage of Polanski and Deneuve at work
• Theatrical trailer
• PLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by film scholar and curator Bill Horrigan

28. Juli 2009
DVD #483: “Ekel / Repulsion” [GB 1965, Roman Polanski]
1 Disc
$39.95
1.85:1
English

Roman Polanski followed up his international breakthrough Knife in the Water with this controversial, chilling tale of psychosis, starring Catherine Deneuve as Carol, a fragile, frigid young beauty cracking up over the course of a terrifying weekend. Left alone by her vacationing sister in their London flat, Carol is haunted by specters real and imagined, and her insanity grows to a violent pitch. Thanks to its unforgettable attention to disturbing detail and Polanski’s unparalleled adeptness at turning claustrophobic space into an emotional minefield, Repulsion remains one of cinema’s most shocking psychological thrillers.

DISC FEATURES

• New, restored high-definition digital transfer
• Audio commentary featuring director Roman Polanski and actress Catherine Deneuve
• A British Horror Film (2003), a documentary on the making of Repulsion, featuring interviews with Polanski, producer Gene Gutowski, and cinematographer Gil Taylor
• A 1964 television documentary filmed on the set of Repulsion, featuring rare footage of Polanski and Deneuve at work
• Theatrical trailer
• PLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by film scholar and curator Bill Horrigan