- published: 13 Jan 2010
- views: 67609
The Criterion Collection (or simply Criterion) is an American video-distribution company which specializes in licensing "important classic and contemporary films" and selling them to film aficionados. Criterion is noted for helping to standardize the letterbox format for widescreen films, bonus features, and special editions for home video.
The Criterion Collection company was founded in 1984 by Robert Stein, Aleen Stein, and Joe Medjuck, who later were joined by Roger Smith. In 1985, the Steins, William Becker, and Jonathan B. Turell founded the Voyager Company, to publish educational multimedia CD-ROMs (1989–2000), during which time The Criterion Collection became a subordinate division of the Voyager Company. In March 1994, Verlagsgruppe Georg von Holtzbrinck GmbH bought 20 percent of Voyager for US$6.7 million; the 4 founders each retained a 20 percent owner’s share.
In 1997, the Voyager Company was dissolved (Aleen Stein founded the Organa LLC CD-ROM publishing company), and Holtzbrinck Publishers sold the “Voyager” brand name, 42 CD-ROM titles, the Voyager web site, and associated assets, to Learn Technologies Interactive, LLC (LTI). Robert Stein sold 42 Voyager titles to LTI from his Voyager–Criterion company share. The remaining 3 partners, Aleen Stein, William Becker (President) and Jonathan Turell (CEO) owned The Criterion Collection company, which has a business partnership with Janus Films, and had one with Home Vision Entertainment (HVE) until 2005, when Image Entertainment bought HVE. On November 4, 2013, it was announced that Sony Pictures Home Entertainment will now handle distribution.
Daring in its refusal to make the socialist leader into an easy martyr or hero, Che paints a vivid, naturalistic portrait of the man himself (Benicio del Toro), from his overthrow of the Batista dictatorship to his 1964 United Nations trip to the end of his short life. Learn more: http://www.criterion.com/films/20987
Featuring an intense performance by Michael Fassbender, Hunger, about IRA member Bobby Sands's 1981 prison hunger strike, is an unflinching, transcendent depiction of what a human being is willing to endure to be heard. Learn more: http://www.criterion.com/films/477
A gripping thriller and a tragic drama of nearly Greek proportions, Revanche is the stunning, Oscar-nominated international breakthrough of Austrian filmmaker Götz Spielmann, a tense, existential, and surprising portrait of vengeance and redemption. Learn more: http://www.criterion.com/films/85
Out on Blu-ray and DVD on February 8th 2011! Learn More: http://www.criterion.com/films/27540-still-walking The lyrical, profoundly moving Still Walking (Aruitemo aruitemo) is contemporary Japanese master Hirokazu Kore-eda's most personal work to date, an extraordinary portrayal of the ties that bind us.
Out on DVD and Blu-ray on June 29, 2010! Learn more: http://www.criterion.com/films/21118 Swedish master Jan Troell, director of the beloved classics THE EMIGRANTS and THE NEW LAND, returns triumphantly with EVERLASTING MOMENTS, a vivid, heartrending story of a woman liberated through art at the beginning of the twentieth century.
Out now in DVD and Blu-ray special editions! Three siblings must decide what to do with the country estate and objects they've inherited from their mother. From this simple story, Olivier Assayas creates a nuanced, exquisitely made drama about the material of globalized modern living. Learn more: http://www.criterion.com/films/473
Out on Blu-ray and DVD on June 14, 2011! Learn more: http://www.criterion.com/films/27618-insignificance Four unnamed people who look and sound a lot like Albert Einstein, Marilyn Monroe, Joe DiMaggio, and Joseph McCarthy converge in one New York City hotel room for this compelling, visually inventive adaptation of Terry Johnson's play, from director Nicolas Roeg. With a combination of whimsy and dread, Roeg creates a fun-house-mirror picture of cold war America that questions the nature of celebrity and plays on a society's simmering nuclear fears. Insignificance is a delirious, intelligent drama, featuring magnetic performances by Michael Emil as "the professor," Theresa Russell as "the actress," Gary Busey as "the ballplayer," and Tony Curtis as "the senator."
Out on Blu-ray and DVD on June 21, 2011! Learn more: http://www.criterion.com/films/27620-kiss-me-deadly In this atomic adaptation of Mickey Spillane's novel, directed by Robert Aldrich, the good manners of the 1950s are blown to smithereens. Ralph Meeker stars as snarling private dick Mike Hammer, whose decision one dark, lonely night to pick up a hitchhiking woman sends him down some terrifying byways. Brazen and bleak, Kiss Me Deadly is a film noir masterpiece as well as an essential piece of cold war paranoia, and it features as nervy an ending as has ever been seen in American cinema.
Out on Blu-ray and DVD on October 25, 2010! Learn more: http://www.criterion.com/films/27523 How to describe Nobuhiko Obayashi's indescribable 1977 movie HOUSE (Hausu)? As a psychedelic ghost tale? A stream-of-consciousness bedtime story? An episode of Scooby-Doo as directed by Mario Bava? HOUSE might have been beamed to Earth from some other planet.
A young sister and brother are abandoned in the harsh Australian outback and must learn to cope in the natural world, without their usual comforts, in this hypnotic masterpiece from Nicolas Roeg. Learn more: http://www.criterion.com/films/522-walkabout
Daring in its refusal to make the socialist leader into an easy martyr or hero, Che paints a vivid, naturalistic portrait of the man himself (Benicio del Toro), from his overthrow of the Batista dictatorship to his 1964 United Nations trip to the end of his short life. Learn more: http://www.criterion.com/films/20987
Long time since I've seen Your smile
But when I close my eyes, I remember, I remember
You were no more than a child
But then so was I, young and tender
Time carries on
I guess it always will
But deep inside my heart
Time stands still
Stay for a while
Well, it's good to see Your smile
And I love your company
Stay for a while
And remember the day's gone by
For a moment it can seem
Just the way it used to be
Snowfalls, phone calls, broken hearts
Clear summer days, warm and lazy
Long walks, long talks after dark
We vowed we'd never forget, now it's hazy
Time takes its toll
And time alters our view
It would be nice
To spend some time with you
Oh, stay for awhile
Well, it's good to see Your smile
And I love your company
Stay for a while
And remember the day's gone by
For a moment it can seem
Just the way it used to be
Stay, please stay
Stay, stay, stay
One, two, one, two
Stay for awhile
Well, it's good to see Your smile
And I love your company
Oh, stay for a while
And remember the day's gone by
For a moment it can seem
Just the way it used to be
Stay for a while
Oh, it's good to see Your smile
And I love your company
Won't you stay with me for a while
And remember the day's gone by
For a moment it can seem
Just the way it used to be
The way it used to be, be
The way it used to be
Now, now, now, now, now, now