One lucky lawyer got to spend 30 minutes on Wednesday trying to convince the U.S. Supreme Court that the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act violates the U.S. Constitution. The justices were, by most accounts, relatively unimpressed by his arguments, though some of them did seem to think Congress was generally cracked for allowing Disney to essentially extend the term of copyright every time the first Mickey Mouse movie nears public domain. Me, I think that as long as 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment is refusing to give outrageously great classics like Sunrise a proper release on DVD, there’s a strong argument for lapsing that puppy into the public domain so that hungry companies like the Criterion Collection can get their hands on it.

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The folks at Criterion have been circling the works of legendary avant-garde filmmaker Stan Brakhage for some time, but now word comes (from the unofficial Criterion Collection forum) that Criterion honcho Peter Becker made reference to specific work on some Brakhage films at the Anthology Film Archives back in March. Specifically, he thanked John Newell of Denver’s Western Cine Lab for striking "a bunch" of new prints for Criterion and promised to make ’em look just right when they’re digitized. No, Fred Camper isn’t reaching for his wallet, but it’ll be great if Brakhage’s films can be preserved on video for a (somewhat) wider audience that doesn’t have access to the man’s legendary first-person screenings.

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Even as U.S. officials refuse to bend the rules so that Abbas Kiarostami, easily a contender for the title of world’s greatest living filmmaker, can appear at the New York Film Festival, word comes out of Tehran that his countrymen would rather slouch around the house watching Hollywood movies on DVD than go out and see the geek-revered art films that play in local theaters. Ticket sales are down, investors are reluctant to put money in the film industry, and fears are that theaters will continue to close and fewer actual Iranian films will be made. Meanwhile, director Shekhar Kapur argues in the pages of the Guardian that Hollywood’s dominance of the global film industry is about to end. "15 years from now, we won't be discussing the domination of the western media but the domination of the Chinese media, or the Asian media," he writes. "Soon we will find that in order to make a hugely successful film, you have to match Tom Cruise with an Indian or a Chinese actor." I love Hollywood movies, and I would never bet against the ol’ U.S. when it comes to a capacity for cultural imperialism, but this is sort of an exciting idea nonetheless.

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Jackie Chan says he wants to be "a real actor." Guess being one of the two or three greatest physical comedians in the history of the medium isn’t enough for some people. On the upside, he’s apparently set to appear in a film by Edward Yang, who made the magnificent Yi-Yi. And no matter what Jackie does, Drunken Master 2 will always be among the best. Movies. Ever.

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From the department of things I hoped DVD would be able to prevent comes news that the forthcoming The Exorcist: The Beginning, starring Stellan Skarsgaard as the WWII-era Father Merrin (the role Max Von Sydow originated), will be directed by none other than Paul Schrader. Never mind that Schrader’s last studio picture, Cat People, wasn’t exactly a box-office success. Anyone who’s checked out Universal’s recent Cat People special edition disc realizes not only that Schrader has little interest in horror in the first place but also that his attitude toward the genre is downright condescending. (Check out the commentary, where he comments matter-of-factly on how his tech crew "improved" the swimming pool scene, which he ripped wholesale from the original movie.) So I guess I’m hoping for the best — the script by novelist Caleb Carr may or may not be a good sign, given his lack of experience as a screenwriter — but preparing for the worst.

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The Scratch DVD released last month by Palm Pictures is terrific, with an entire second disc of bonus material including an enlightening scratch school presided over by and excerpts from an interactive tutorial disc created by DJ Qbert that actually takes advantage of DVD’s multi-angle and multi-audio functions. The movie itself ain’t too shabby, neither, with cool live turntable footage (including a re-creation of Double Dee & Steinski’s legendary "Lessons" that was staged for a Thud Rumble event) and a witty editorial sensibility.

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Image is releasing X2000, a DVD collecting four short films by 8 Women director François Ozon, in December.

Comments

We can only be thankful for a company like Criterion, even more here in germany, where the rc2-dvd-supply is really desolate in terms of classic films. for god´s sake, the only DVD of Fritz Lang´s "M" I knew of was Criterion´s. At least now they´re releasing this one domestically

Posted by: Heiko Stullich at October 12, 2024 05:45 AM

When I bought a DVD player that could convert PAL signals to NTSC on the fly, I was pretty stoked about all the great European DVDs that I expected shortly to be watching in the comfort of my home. But it's hard work finding interesting material. Almost without exception, the European DVD retailers I buy from are focused overwhelmingly on the same Hollywood titles I can get here in the states! So I try to keep my ears open for good title recommendations from like-minded movie buffs. Thank god for the Internet, which has made it immeasurably easier to keep lines of communication open between cinephiles in various corners of the globe etcetera.

The last PAL disc I really enjoyed was Alex de la Iglesia's Day of the Beast (or El dia de la bestia, I think). Not a great movie, but a pleasantly wacky horror comedy.

-bf-

Posted by: Bryant at October 12, 2024 10:19 AM

Bryant, you should try reasching for interesting PAL material in Spain (www.fnac.es) they have stuff like the Buñuel films, which haven't been released in the US.

Posted by: Patricio Lopez at October 13, 2024 12:22 PM

A number of european dvds are available through scarecrow.com, including Il Gattopardo and Delicatessen. BFI has also released a few films that can't be gotten in the US, but I have no idea what the quality is like. You can also get most of Miyazaki's films from amazon.co.jp, all of which have english subtitles. If you speak japanese, they are releasing some 24 of Kurosawa's films, the transfers of which have been overseen by one of his main cinematographers. But I'm sure you've found all of this out already. . .

Posted by: Jun-Dai Bates-Kobashigawa at December 12, 2023 07:30 PM

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