Criterion & Eclipse Cover Art & Packaging Babble-on Vol. 7

[DimitriL]

Point Blank is one of their greatest artworks. Sublime.

It's brilliant. I love the way it incorporates the Criterion 'C' too.

[Walter Kurtz]

Point Blank is a top five all-time Criterion cover

- The great retro-style poster

- His inferno quantum rage in the netherworld (left side) de-cohering icy white-cold in the pseudo-world (right side)

- The quantum slices on the left both fracturing his rage and echoing each step of Walker’s hard-soled consequence

- And inside the cover and case and disc is a burnt umber and dirty-gold clad vision that makes me regret I didn’t matriculate somewhere in Vermont, in the late fall, falling slowing into leaves, into a warm caress

[domino harvey]

It’s a good cover but not that good! Singleton cover is great, though

[Kracker]

Damn two great months in a row. Not pictured but Life of Brian FINALLY. Wondered if they were holding out for Python trilogy set or something.

[Finch]

Does Keller have a negative reputation? He can be a tad prickly at times based on my few direct social media interactions with him over the years, but he's clearly a smart guy.

I had nothing against him; worst I can say is I thought his press blurbs for some of his MoC curations could be a bit much. The Trouble in Paradise DVD cover was the only work I outright disliked.

[HinkyDinkyTruesmith]

Re: Trouble in Paradise –– It's admirable in a way they've completely abandoned trying to capture old hollywood stars' likenesses, but I also find it to be one of the worst covers they've ever done.

I love it, and nothing captures the period like an Al Hirschfeld style doodle.

If only the cover featured such a doodle! What we have is soulless.

[Swift]

Love the design elements of the Point Blank cover, though a better main image could have been chosen.

re: the Singleton cover, why the inclusion of an air vent eliminating some of the artwork? The incorrect angle of it looks clumsy too. Presumably the painting is of an actual real life location, but surely the air vent on the building could have been removed without anything lost?

[ryannichols7]

count me in on loving Point Blank. Trouble in Paradise is pretty cool too

It beats the old MoC cover though that Craig Keller used. Huge font covering up everything else. The only thing I don't like about Criterion's new cover is the cartoon silhouettes but that's par for the course with Criterion's covers of 1930s films.

Does Keller have a negative reputation? He can be a tad prickly at times based on my few direct social media interactions with him over the years, but he's clearly a smart guy.

I like him and do enjoy following him (though as Finch said, sometimes he's a little extra with his prose), but the only thing that really, really bothered me was his weird vendetta against Drive My Car since people were comparing Hamaguchi to Rohmer. I like it substantially better than any Rohmer I've seen, so I'm sure he would not like my opinion either. but he did great work at MOC, The Film Desk, etc and he's very knowledgeable

[rrenault]

count me in on loving Point Blank. Trouble in Paradise is pretty cool too

It beats the old MoC cover though that Craig Keller used. Huge font covering up everything else. The only thing I don't like about Criterion's new cover is the cartoon silhouettes but that's par for the course with Criterion's covers of 1930s films.

Does Keller have a negative reputation? He can be a tad prickly at times based on my few direct social media interactions with him over the years, but he's clearly a smart guy.

I like him and do enjoy following him (though as Finch said, sometimes he's a little extra with his prose), but the only thing that really, really bothered me was his weird vendetta against Drive My Car since people were comparing Hamaguchi to Rohmer. I like it substantially better than any Rohmer I've seen, so I'm sure he would not like my opinion either. but he did great work at MOC, The Film Desk, etc and he's very knowledgeable

I remember him hating Drive My Car too. It did seem out of character for him. Filipe Furtado, for instance, actually thought highly of Drive My Car, so...

Keller also seems to hate Kieslowski and Wenders, for what it's worth, but so do a lot of auteurists.

P.S. I didn't really get Rohmer vibes from Drive My Car. To me, it felt more like Kiarostami meets Antonioni. Rohmer's brand of realism does have a certain immediacy that really draws you in, especially in some of his stronger 80s films like The Aviator's Wife (I still think My Night at Maud's is great). Drive My Car feels a bit more "distant". It may be heretical of me to say this, but some of the lesser Rohmer films tend to feel like quintessential examples of what an upper middle class New Yorker has in mind when they think of a "French movie".

However, Rohmer sort of feels like the avant la lettre practitioner of the type of French movie an upper middle class New Yorker thinks of when they think of a "French movie" the way Ingmar Bergman is the avant la lettre practitioner par excellence of the "arthouse film".

That being said, I think a large part of Keller's issue with Drive My Car is how it would be the avatar for Japanese cinema to an audience that had little knowledge of cinema history the way French cinema equalled Amelie or the way Brazilian cinema equalled City of God, etc. It's the notion that Drive My Car is seen as the pinnacle of Japanese cinema to someone who hasn't seen any Mizoguchi or Naruse just as people who know nothing of Bresson will see Amelie as a "pinnacle of French cinema".

That being said, there is a certain type of film critic/cinephile that has a pathological hatred for any critically acclaimed foreign film that garners that kind of crossover appeal, which is funny, since new films by acclaimed English-language directors like Scorsese and PTA don't experience that default disdain to quite the same degree.

[CSM126]

I would like to add to the praise for Point Blank. Absolutely jaw-droppingly beautiful.

The Singleton covers are nice as well. Trouble in Paradise is basically what you expect them to do with a film of the period but the original cover was honestly more interesting.

[Brian C]

I get the complaints about Trouble in Paradise, but I'm still into it.

Agreed that Point Blank looks great too, but it's a design that I think will maybe lose something in a plastic case. Should be a digipak, ideally with a rougher kind of paper like On the Waterfront has.

[Zot!]

Now you're gonna make me have to rewatch Drive My Car .... I remember thinking it was just okay, but this is the second time this week its come up as something special. Covers look solid this month.

[DimitriL]

If only the cover featured such a doodle! What we have is soulless.

As a fan of the Florence-based artist Simone Massoni, celebrated for his hand-drawn art, pardon me if I find that ridiculous. To each their own.

I find the new cover for Trouble in Paradise to be very charming and a big step-up from the DVD cover. I also like the color-scheme on the Tanaka set. Very pleasing to the eyes.

I really want to see this one in person, because there’s a barely-visible jet black Eiffel Tower in the background that I presume will be printed in a different ink.

[HinkyDinkyTruesmith]

Is him being from Florence supposed to endow him with some innate artistic vigor?

The fact is the cover doesn't capture anything specific about the movie. It suggests a vague art style, Paris (which is not even the most distinct city in the movie), and doesn't convey the fact that they're art thieves or even reflect the elegance that both Lubitsch and the film's characters possess in spades. It suggests stylishness, which is not the same thing. Just as the Cluny Brown cover tried to suggest something mechanical about Cluny because she wants to be a plumber and work with bolts and wrenches (missing the essential earthiness of her profession), this film misses the essential grace and elegance of thievery that is the film's central throughline by replacing it with a glamorous stylishness (made kitsch by the art).

[therewillbeblus]

I get the complaints about Trouble in Paradise, but I'm still into it.

Agreed that Point Blank looks great too, but it's a design that I think will maybe lose something in a plastic case. Should be a digipak, ideally with a rougher kind of paper like On the Waterfront has.

Yeah, while recognizing areas of improvement I'm into all the covers this month

[bottlesofsmoke]

The Trouble in Paradise cover reminds me of the opening credits of My Man Godfrey, more Broadway than “Paris, Paramount.”

[Feego]

The ideal Trouble in Paradise cover would be a play on the opening titles, with the words “Trouble in” at the top, a painting of a bed in the middle, and the word “Paradise” at the bottom. For added spice, they could even include the silhouettes of Francis and Marshall on the bed.

[DimitriL]

Is him being from Florence supposed to endow him with some innate artistic vigor?

No, it's just hilarious to hear an artist renowned for his playful soulfulness have his art described that way.

Anyway, I couldn't disagree more with all your critiques. So it goes.

[Matt]

I like the ideas behind the Singleton artwork and the execution, but the lettering on the front of the box looks like an afterthought. The individual boxes look so much better, and it would have been nice to see the mixed graffiti-style and large Gothic script typography carried over to the box art.

I agree with those saying Point Blank is an all-timer. Very evocative of the aesthetic of the film.

Trouble in Paradise feels true to the spirit of the film, a light and effervescent trifle, but not really as charming or clever as the Caitlin Kuhwald covers for the other Lubitsch films and light comedies in the collection. To Be or Not To Be being another Criterion all-timer cover.

[DimitriL]

I agree with you about the type on the Singleton set. It doesn’t cohere, not with this set.

[andyli]

The Singleton set will be a digipak, per the 3-D rendering provided in Criterion's newsletter.

[Blutarsky]

I think the individual covers for the Singleton set are great, but to echo everyone else there is something slightly off about the main cover.

Point Blank is a knock out, the only thing I wish was it had an elaborate digipack packaging to go with it. But beggars can’t be choosers.

I am glad they kept the Life of Brian art. Something about that dark blue is gorgeous.

[cdnchris]

Lubitsch Musicals
PlayTime [4K]
A Woman Under the Influence (Booklet)
3:10 to Yuma [4K] (Booklet)
Network [4K]
The Man Who Wasn't There [4K]

[domino harvey]

The board now notifies us of these updates if on desktop, btw

[CSM126]

Love the disc design for Man Who Wasn’t There.