Eclipse Series 9: The Delirious Fictions of William Klein

Discuss releases in the Janus Contemporaries, Eclipse, and Essential Art House lines and the films on them.
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putney
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#51 Post by putney » Fri Dec 21, 2007 8:28 pm

Fantastic...
Mr. Freedom is a personal favorite. I always describe it to friends as Godard trying to make a Robert Downey Sr. film (not "accurate", but that flavor.)
The thing that amazes me most about the film is John Abbey (Mr. Freedom) who everybody knows as the "American" in Playtime. As far as I know these are the only 2 films he made, besides some tv work. Very sad, as he was brilliant.
great news. worth the set for Mr. Freedom alone....

putney

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carax09
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#52 Post by carax09 » Fri Dec 21, 2007 11:02 pm

You know, I was just thinking that Mr. Freedom (or any of the films in this set), would make a great double-bill with Putney Swope.

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El Manchego
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#53 Post by El Manchego » Sun Dec 23, 2007 9:13 pm

I'm really looking forward to these films and pleased that Sundance is playing Polly Maggoo on January 2nd, providing me with an opportunity to preview Klein's work before the release date.

Is it just me or did they reverse the color scheme? I swear the blue and red were flipped when this was announced.

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domino harvey
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#54 Post by domino harvey » Mon Jan 21, 2008 11:39 pm

It's definitely been flipped. Gross.

Oh and can we get a mod to lock all Eclipse threads that aren't that awful Ozu Silents thread, I don't want to be alerted to a new post anywhere but there

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tavernier
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#55 Post by tavernier » Fri Mar 07, 2008 2:43 pm

New street date: 4/8

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dadaistnun
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#56 Post by dadaistnun » Sun Mar 16, 2008 12:11 pm

Tim Lucas writes briefly about the set on his blog. He'll have a full review in the April Sight & Sound (his reviews are usually on the S&S site as well.)

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headacheboy
Joined: Wed Nov 03, 2004 8:57 pm

Delirious Setback

#57 Post by headacheboy » Tue Mar 25, 2008 1:24 pm

I noticed that amazon changed the street date for this set to 20 May 2008, so I wrote a quick e-mail to Criterion and here's the response I got from Tamara:
Hi Anthony,

Yes, it's true, the street date has been changed to 5/20/08 for that title. Thank you for your patience, and please feel free to email Jon Mulvaney (cc'd here) if you have any other questions!
I misdirected my e-mail, sending it to criterion@ordering.com instead of Jon Mulvaney. I didn't have the heart to e-mail again asking what has prompted the delay.

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justeleblanc
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#58 Post by justeleblanc » Wed Mar 26, 2008 3:57 pm

Is it just me or do they keep changing the color scheme for this box.

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souvenir
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#59 Post by souvenir » Wed Mar 26, 2008 4:01 pm

justeleblanc wrote:Is it just me or do they keep changing the color scheme for this box.
Yeah, it looks to be back to the original layout. At least two of the individual covers changed at some point also. The ones up now are definite improvements.

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starmanof51
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#60 Post by starmanof51 » Wed Mar 26, 2008 4:27 pm

Tim Lucas over at his Blogspot, hyothesizes on why this might be in his March 25 entry. He has already seen the discs and discussed with some rave-ish language in his March 13 entry, a little further down the page. In between, and off topic here, are some delightful stills from a French release of Franju's Judex.

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domino harvey
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#61 Post by domino harvey » Wed Mar 26, 2008 5:39 pm

I like the new Polly cover but the original Model Couple was better

zone_resident
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#62 Post by zone_resident » Tue Apr 15, 2008 12:31 pm


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domino harvey
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#63 Post by domino harvey » Tue Apr 15, 2008 11:03 pm

zone_resident wrote:Beaver
Literally.

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Lino
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#64 Post by Lino » Wed Apr 16, 2008 4:23 am

Can anyone who bought this tell if in a scene in Mr. Freedom where you can see a Jesus figure on the subway is completely uncut? My japanese DVD suddenly jumps from this scene into another with no apparent sense. Does this happen also on the Eclipse disc?

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The Fanciful Norwegian
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#65 Post by The Fanciful Norwegian » Wed Apr 16, 2008 4:27 am

It shouldn't, since that scene is there in its entirety on the Arte disc and the Eclipse should use the exact same transfer (I can't seen them doing new ones when Arte has perfectly serviceable NTSC transfers).

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colinr0380
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#66 Post by colinr0380 » Sun May 04, 2008 3:06 pm


Perkins Cobb
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#67 Post by Perkins Cobb » Mon May 05, 2008 1:31 pm

Well, it's certainly an index of the myopia (or uselessness, to put it less kindly) of DVD reviewers that neither Gary nor Glenn saw fit to comment on Tim Lucas' strong feelings about the aspect ratio on The Model Couple being incorrect. And these guys are the best out there.

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domino harvey
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#68 Post by domino harvey » Sat May 24, 2008 5:55 pm

I was really looking forward to Polly Maggoo, but I honestly found it pretty obnoxious. The scene where Philippe Noiret and the other guy are walking through the corridor while clearly reading cue cards was pretty good, but for the most part it was like watching a French episode of the Monkees.

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sidehacker
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#69 Post by sidehacker » Sun May 25, 2008 11:52 am

Yeah, it does have a nice, spontaneous feel but all the "satire" is about as subtle as an episode of South Park. Not to mention the self-reflexive stuff seems really amatuerish, especially when all I'm use to is post-Week End Godard.

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klee13
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#70 Post by klee13 » Sat May 31, 2008 9:51 pm

I would really like to know how many times the word 'Freedom' is uttered or printed in Mr. Freedom. My guess places it at almost four figures.

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jbeall
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#71 Post by jbeall » Wed Jun 04, 2008 12:12 am

sidehacker wrote:Yeah, it does have a nice, spontaneous feel but all the "satire" is about as subtle as an episode of South Park. Not to mention the self-reflexive stuff seems really amatuerish, especially when all I'm use to is post-Week End Godard.
Well, I thought Mr. Freedom was more effective as satire than Team America, for example, but it is kinda one-note. I thought it was less obnoxious than more recent Parker/Stone stuff, as at least the satire usually has a point beyond simple gross-out. Politically, it was quite prescient, accurately capturing all the silly propaganda of the Bushies, only thirty five years early. (Or maybe this just shows how self-parodic all this conservative twaddle is.) I liked it well enough, but it mighta been better if it was only 45 mins. to an hour long.

MuzikJunky
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#72 Post by MuzikJunky » Fri Jun 06, 2008 1:52 am

Do the films in the collection originate from a 16- or 35-millimeter negative? Mr. Freedom is very, very grainy, so I would say it was originally shot on 16-millimeter film. Can anyone confirm this? IMDb is notoriously inaccurate on things like this. Peace.

Bajaja
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#73 Post by Bajaja » Mon Jun 09, 2008 1:14 am

What the Criterion people did with the aspect ratio of The Model Couple (and I have suspicions about Mr. Freedom, too) is inexcusable. One rarely sees such a blatantly incorrect aspect ratio on DVD, with heads chopped off so severely that often one cannot even see the eyes of the speaking character! Is really Tim Lucas (whose DVD review was mentioned a few posts above) the only sane person in the business? While I like the film(s), I also feel like asking my money back.

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jorencain
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#74 Post by jorencain » Wed Jul 16, 2008 5:58 pm

About "The Model Couple", Jon Mulvaney says:

"Thanks for your email, and your patience. Please rest assured that the film is supposed to be shown 1.66, not 1.33. The telecine was done from the original negative. There was no reframing of the image for the sake of restoration, and William Klein came to approve the final master. I was told that in this film Klein experimented a lot with the way he shot it, so the framing is very unique."

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Magic Hate Ball
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#75 Post by Magic Hate Ball » Fri Oct 03, 2008 11:33 pm

I've just seen Who Are You Polly Maggoo?, and while I think that it became occasionally muddled and dragged in a couple places, it's a really fantastic film. It's beautifully sad in that weird French sort of way, and the film feels like a mash-up of Fellini and Godard. I can't help but think that Jean-Pierre Juenet got a great deal of inspiration from this film (and perhaps Klein's other work), though you never know where inspiration bubbles up from for filmmakers.

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