I'd like to maintain a master list that briefly compares the merits of the releases for all films that have been put out by both Criterion and MoC. I'm primarily concerned with the presentation of the film, and with any substantial extras that might be on one edition but not on the other. I'm not so much interested in cataloguing every single difference between the two editions, but rather, just the big ones that might have factored into someone favoring one edition over the other. In most cases, I'm only familiar with one edition (or neither) and am mostly going off of DVD Beaver comparisons or other reports on the internet. If anyone feels I've misrepresented anything, or missed something important (and I probably have), please let me know.

Ace in the Hole - Both on Blu-ray, roughly comparable PQ, Criterion has more extras
A nos amours - PQ roughly comparable between the two, some extras unique to each release, MoC's a little more extensive
Le Beau Serge - PQ roughly comparable, CC has commentary, MoC has more on-disc extras including L'Avarice
The Burmese Harp - CC is more cleaned up but also pictureboxed, MoC has it on Blu-ray, some unique extras on each release
Colossal Youth - MoC has slightly better PQ and more extras, but CC comes with Ossos and In Vanda's Room
Les Cousins - PQ roughly comparable, CC has commentary, MoC has more on-disc extras including The Man Who Sold the Eiffel Tower
The Devil and Daniel Webster - PQ roughly comparable between the two, CC has more on-disc extras but MoC has a substantial booklet
The Face of Another - CC has slightly better PQ (but pictureboxed), only comes in Teshigahara box with lots of extras, MoC has Rayns commentary, MoC is OOP
F for Fake - PQ roughly comparable between the two, unique extras on each release, MoC has the trailer in color
Floating Weeds - MoC has it on Blu-ray and with more accurate color scheme, CC includes A Story of Floating Weeds
The Flowers of St. Francis - CC has sharper image but is also a little cropped compared to MoC, some unique extras on each release
For All Mankind - both editions roughly comparable
Gate of Hell - PQ roughly comparable, both have minimal extras
General Idi Amin Dada Autoportrait - PQ probably roughly comparable between the two (can anyone confirm this for certain?), both have minimal extras, MoC is OOP
Grey Gardens - MoC has slightly better PQ on the DVD but a CC Blu-ray is forthcoming, CC has The Beales of Grey Gardens, MoC has substantial unique extras of its own
Hands Over the City - MoC has it on Blu-ray, Criterion has more extras including the sequel
Harakiri - framing slightly better for MoC, CC picture more "worked on" (for better or worse), unique extras on each release but CC's a little more extensive
Harold and Maude - Both have it on Blu-ray, awaiting MoC reviews for comparison
House - CC in correct ratio and on Blu-ray, unique extras on each release but CC's more extensive, including the short Emotion
The Idiot - PQ roughly comparable between the two but MoC has extras, CC only available in Eclipse set
If.... - Both have it on Blu-ray, awaiting MoC reviews for comparison
The Insect Woman - MoC has it on Blu-ray, CC only comes in Imamura box with lots of extras (including Intentions of Murder), MoC includes Nishi Ginza Station
Island of Lost Souls - PQ roughly comparable between the two, some unique extras on each release
Judex - Criterion has it on Blu-ray including a couple Franju shorts, MoC includes Nuits rouges
Kuroneko - Both have it on Blu-ray, MoC has a little darker image, CC has more extras
Kwaidan - MoC has the full film (20 minutes longer), better PQ, and a substantial booklet
L'Enfance nue - CC is yellow-tinged which they defend but is probably wrong, some unique extras on each release
M - PQ roughly comparable between the two (though CC more "worked on," for better or worse, and a German edition trumps them both), some unique extras on each release
Make Way for Tomorrow - MoC has it on Blu-ray, extras roughly comparable between the two
Martin Scorsese's World Cinema Project - Transfers comparable, different Scorsese intros for each film, differing release schedules: MoC plans to release smaller volumes more frequently, Criterion larger volumes less frequently; current overlaps: Trances, Dry Summer; current Criterion exclusives: Touki Bouki, Redes, A River Called Titas, The Housemaid; current MoC exclusives: Revenge
Nashville - Both have it on Blu-ray, awaiting MoC reviews for comparison
La notte - Both have it on Blu-ray, CC has slightly more extras
Onibaba - MoC has it on Blu-ray and with more extras, including Shindo commentary
The Passion of Joan of Arc - MoC has it on Blu-ray w/ two scores and framerates and a thick book, CC has Voices of Light score
Pigs & Battleships - MoC has it on Blu-ray, CC only comes in Imamura box with lots of extras (including Intentions of Murder), MoC includes Stolen Desire
Pitfall - CC has slightly better PQ (but pictureboxed), only comes in Teshigahara box with lots of extras, MoC has Rayns commentary, MoC is OOP
Red River - Both on Blu-ray, Criterion has more extras including additional version of film and the source novel
Repo Man - PQ roughly comparable (though CC slightly more red and opened up to 1.78:1), both have substantial extras, most of which are on both releases
Salesman - PQ roughly comparable between the two, some unique extras on each release
Sansho the Bailiff - PQ roughly comparable (though CC a little more "worked on"), both have unique extras and substantial booklets, CC has commentary, MoC has Gion bayashi
Scandal - CC has better PQ but MoC has extras, CC only available in Eclipse set
Shoah - CC has it on Blu-ray with substantial extras including three bonus films, MoC has 184-page book
Street of Shame - MoC has it on Blu-ray with extras (in OOP set), Criterion is in an Eclipse set
The Testament of Dr. Mabuse - MoC has it on Blu-ray, CC has more extensive extras
Trouble in Paradise - MoC has sharper image and slightly more info along edges, CC has more extensive extras, including The Merry Jail
Twenty-Four Eyes - MoC has slightly better PQ, CC is windowboxed, both have minimal extras
Two-Lane Blacktop - Both are on Blu-ray, CC has slightly better PQ, both have substantial extras, some unique on each release
Ugetsu - MoC has it on Blu-ray, both have unique extras, CC has Rayns commentary and Shindo doc, MoC has Oyu-sama
Vampyr - PQ roughly comparable between the two (though CC more "worked on," for better or worse), both have substantial extras, some unique on each release, MoC has Del Toro commentary
Vengeance Is Mine - CC DVD has better PQ than MoC but MoC Blu-ray is best of all, some unique extras on each release, MoC has a Rayns commentary
White Dog - MoC has it on Blu-ray, Criterion has more extras

Last updated 4/22/14

There's indication that Criterion may rock a Twenty Four Eyes disc....

which, as peerpee has pointed out, kind of screws MoC since Europeans will often splash out on Region 1 product over R2, given that there may be more special features and nearly everyone in Europe has a region free player. Commerce doesn't move the other way so far. I'm all for open market but this may discourage MoC from approaching many titles if there is even a remote chance that CC will nail it later. For us, I believe less overlap is better? I mean if you are serious about your cinema on dvd (inferring ownership of a region free player--shit, I have three now).

I am not so sure this would be the case, in fact the whole situation you describe is arbitiary to say the least.
Take the case of 'Twenty Four Eyes' who's going to be buying this? Cineastes...certainly not joe public! Given this is the case, the criteria for buying this or that copy is quite complex, indeed I own the Panorama disc (R3) but believe me I won't wait around for a R1 edition in the full knowledge that a MOC edition is immanent.
The only downside I can see for film lovers worldwide is the current UK exchange rate...quality is unlikely to be an issue.

Also MOC is not in competition with Criterion or any other R1 company for that matter

That's strange...if anything, when Criterion feels they are losing significant market share, they would do their best to limit MOC...perhaps sabotage their releases, make threatening phone-calls, blackmail, stalking etc. I thought that's what business was all about.

Yes, MoC most certainly IS competing with Criterion....and just about every other R1 company. You'll notice that R2 titles are not sold on amazon.com; whereas R1 titles (such as CC) are sold on amazon.co.uk even if just by individual sellers. That puts Onibaba CC right in the search results of Onibaba MoC.

Following Matt's suggestion over in the CC "Vengeance is mine" thread, let me simply express my disappointment over the new announcements for Criterion's May releases here. Not one single release not available in excellent versions from MoC already or coming soon ("Sancho"), plus "Army of Shadows" already available in an apparently excellent version from the bfi. Apart from this, only the re-make of "The Third Man" (which may of course be interesting). Not only that Criterion again produces 'doubles', but they also do it with releases that cannot be possibly improved upon. If they must do doubles of Japanese films , why not Kobayashi's "Human Condition" (recently made available in France with French subs only). Just one example...

I know I'm repeating myself with this, but I never was as disappointed with the company's announcements as this month.

Be prepared for increasingly more months like this then. As more labels enter into the must-have arena of 'art' cinema there's going to be more overlap (CC, MOC, BFI, and to an ever greater extent Second Sight and Second Run). Can we honestly fault the CC for releasing these essential titles? Keep in mind: these titles are for the US market. Who else do expect to release them?

I already have the BFI Army of Shadows, but bought this knowing full well that the CC was going to get around to it probably this year. Of course you don't HAVE to buy all the versions that come out (are you going to double dip for an extra ten minutes of interview or a different commentary?); nor do you have to buy CC's version. I'm not buying CC's Sansho until I see what MOC comes up with. If you're not in a hurry it's great to have choices; who doesn't have a pile of stuff to (re)watch in the meantime?

If we're going to express opinions on May: my 'must-have right this damn minute title' is The Third Man. Even just one great title is a great month to me.

[post that doesn't say anything that hasn't already been said a hundred times]

I don't see what the problem is, personally. Vengeance Is Mine seems to have only a handful of interviews, and it shouldn't bother anyone that the MoC seems the better choice, and The Third Man has already been released, but...complaining about Sansho the Bailiff (unavailable as of yet on DVD to the English speaking market, and which seems to be coming with some nice supplementary material) and Army of Shadows (which looks to, by all means, dwarf the BFI) is pretty silly. Especially since everyone already *knew* that Criterion would put out Army, and as they should have expected after all of the hubbub, in such a superior edition. Criterion is releasing DVDs for the R1 market, and that's that.

That said, I'm not buying the Criterion Vengeance, and I'll rent the Criterion Sansho for the supplements...and I have no doubt that Nick and co. can match Criterion, if not surpass them, and there are two unavailable films in the set anyway. I'm very, very glad I passed up the BFI Army of Shadows.

Agreed, having just looked at the specs. Must be a fabulous release by all means.


I didn't exactly complain about releasing "Sansho" per se, but as you say yourself, you're not buying the Criterion "Vengeance" and you're not going to buy "Sansho" until you know what's in the MoC set . The problem is that knowing we will get the MoC set, the release of a single Mizoguchi film isn't really satisfying for anyone. The R2 people will not buy it because they will not want to have to double-dip once the MoC set is out (unless they want to miss out on the two other films, and of course knowing that they will have to re-buy "Ugetsu" on top of it), and the R1 market (or at least those who want to stay region-locked) will miss out on those other films anyway, at least for the time being. So in a way Criterion is challenging MoC without really doing so.

I guess what I wanted to say with my initial post apart from expressing my feeling of personal disappointment is that as long as there are still so many great films of 'arthouse importance' unavailable or available only in mediocre to average editions, why does Criterion get into a useless competition with the two only dvd companies that have proven to be a match for them?

Another problem, thankfully unrelated to Criterion yet, is of course the tendency to bring out box sets without making the films available individually. That applies of course to the MoC Mizoguchis as well as to their forthcoming Lubitsch box (already discussed in another thread), but also to the forthcoming Naruse set from the bfi. I'm not buying "When a woman ascends the stairs" as long as I cannot be sure if it's not included in the bfi set, too.

Again, you're taking a world view that the CC's main market does not take. Americans are not like Europeans; very few of them are region free or are even aware that there is such a thing. As soon as you start talking about R2 vs the CC you're missing the fact that the CC is not really competing with the MOC, but are operating as a US counterpart in a way. You say that the R1's will be missing out on the other films available in the MOC box. They are unlikely to be aware of what they're missing out on any more than you are 'missing out' on those titles available in Hungary but not in Germany. Eventually the CC will get around to those as well doubtless.

As far as personal disappointment, well like I said, this will only increase. I just hope we don't have the 'Criterion 2006' thread debacle again.

Which is one of those things that I will probably never understand, not in the case at least of the 'typical' Criterion clientele (I'm of course not having the 'normal' customer in mind who is not an avid film fan/collector and who perhaps wouldn't buy a Criterion disc simply because it would be considered too pricey in comparison to what the major companies release).


Yes, I'm unaware of Hungarian titles, but not because I'm uninterested but simply because of the language barrier or at least the absence of any subs I can read. But this doesn't apply to the American vs the British market.

Yea, the problem here seems to be that while MOC and other R2 companies have to compete with Criterions in Europe, Criterion doesn't really have significant R2 competetion, because the bulk of its audience is the US where most people are not region-free -- only a very small subset of hardcore cineastes. I'm slightly disappointed in these releases, because I was hoping for some other stuff that I wanted to see, but otherwise I'm just not buying them, so no big deal. I have the MOC Vengeance, and I'll be getting their Mizoguchi box, so it's really a no-brainer to skip those two CCs. I will be adding Third Man and Army of Shadows to my wishlist though, since those look great and I hadn't picked up the BFI yet.

I only hope that such CC competition doesn't wind up hurting MOC too badly -- I'd hate to see them lose business on their Mizo set because a lot of people already have 2 of the 4 films from Criterion.

Yep, the extras on "Army" look fabulous, probably as great for a Melville fan as those of "49th parallel" for a Powell fan (the one release where I can't wait to double-dip..).


My great fear is that it might slow down the work on the MoC Mizoguchis, as they might no longer be considered as 'top priority' as before and also perhaps in order to let the attention for the CC "Sansho" subside a little. I hope that will not be the case, but considering all the other things already announced by MoC and the work that has to go into them as well... Let's see... I'm still hoping for a summer release, but am slightly uncertain now.

Criterion has a "cream of the crop" philosophy -- so cherry picking Mizoguchi's output and releasing only the most already acclaimed films (like Sansho and Ugetsu) makes sense -- for its target audience. I think MOC is more adventurous -- and is more willing to serve up less familiar fare. They seem to aim at a somewhat different (more auteurist?) audience. FWIW, their philosophy is closer to my own -- so I will tend to favor their releases -- even if it means waiting a little longer for isolated titles.

Don't forget that sometimes overlap is a *very* good thing. How many horrible R1 or R2 editions have been thankfully replaced with a superior counterpart? That's what DVDBeaver is there for, isn't it?

But aren't they doing two 4-disc sets? If they're smart they'll put Sansho in one and Ugetsu in the other...

I'm not sure I understand the "MoC is a victim" line of reasoning here. Business is business. It's quite evident that the rules of the game in Europe do not protect European DVD producers the way U.S. rules protect ours. I'm sure the WTO would love to hear the arguments. The good people at MoC no doubt have sufficient business acumen to be well aware of the competitive environment.

Completionist victimhood aside, the overwhelming desire for monopoly among dvd consumers is misguided.

Has anyone seen an empirical study of the international dvd market? I haven't, and I feel like I'm often making things up. There's an assumption here that a lot of folks in R2 buy R1 discs, and vice versa. But if everyone in the UK buy Criterions, then MoC never, ever would've entered the game by duplicating Criterion releases.

At minimum, it's safe to say that the DVD rental market is very significant to these companies, and US rental outfits like Blockbuster and Netflix are strictly R1. I am guessing that is almost exclusively because offering discs from other regions isn't financially viable.

My own bald assumption is that the enormous cost of restoring these films to pristine quality and then digitizing them, especially now that digitizing for HD is essentially obligatory for the long-term, gives the companies fronting the bill a major incentive to recoup costs through licensing to other regions. By overlapping releases in different regions, the cost of restoration gets spread around as more markets are reached, making it easier to finance future restorations. A robust competitive environment will help the industry continue to create lasting, definitive editions of quickly aging masterworks. I'm ok with that.

... and besides, a vast chunk of MOC's titles overlap previous releases as well, from CC and others, not to mention the bulk of their silent catalog. It works both ways. I myself prefer whenever possible to blurp over the quirks of PAL video, though I must admit MoC's telecine has been more consistently measuring up lately to CC.

Let'd face it guys, almost everybody overlaps everybody at times. My point is only that they're both-- MoC & CC-- "guilty" of this. I for one think CC are kicking ass over the past couple months of announcements.

Plus, all three of them share material. Wasn't Nick just thanked on a recent Criterion disc? And I'm just about to watch Boardline which has a score from bfi. They're all in bed together.

Just to clarify: I was under the impression that MoC does not--contrary to Criterion--do their own film-to-video transfers. They get the telecine master (usually HD) from outside sources, and then do digital clean-up, progressive PAL or NTSC encoding, etc. That's why the video quality of their products, with all due respects to the MoC people, varies, from the great KWAIDAN to the less satisfactory SCANDAL.

The MoC Series have made their own telecine and often pay to have new telecines made, depending on the circumstances, but they do not have their own inhouse dept and staff for this, like Criterion.

Thank you for correcting me, Nick. I always admire your great work on MoC releases.

Aw shucks, fanks!