We here at The CriterionCast wear our admiration for The Criterion Collection squarely on our sleeves. Not only is it in the very title of this website and the podcast from which it spawned, but it is in the very DNA of what we strive to do through both ventures. At their very best, The Criterion Collection doesn’t so much bring to light gloriously dense home video releases of beloved, crystal clear classics from the history of film, but instead highlights lesser known masterpieces from throughout the world and spanning the entirety of film’s history as an artform. Be it esoteric experimental works like that of director Jean Painleve to baroque world cinema classics like La Cienaga, Criterion’s greatest achievement is giving the world a new glimpse at world history through the lens of those directors commenting on it through their films.
And few films quite hit...
And few films quite hit...
- 10/24/2016
- by Joshua Brunsting
- CriterionCast
In the wake of this past week’s essential Jean Epstein retrospective at New York’s Anthology Film Archives I was searching for posters for Epstein’s films and not having much luck. Two of the best posters I found however were both signed by the same artist, Jean A. Mercier or J.A.M., whom I’ve been wanting to feature for some time and not just for the following personal reason.
On the poster collector site Rue des Collectionneurs, Pierre Tchernia, a producer and TV host known in France as “Monsieur Cinema,” is quoted as saying (and I’ll translate as best I can): “It took a long time for me to discover that the ‘A’ in ‘J.A.M.’, the ‘A’ of Jean A. Mercier, the signature associated with the most beautiful movie posters, the most beautiful films of René Clair, the most beautiful films in general,...
On the poster collector site Rue des Collectionneurs, Pierre Tchernia, a producer and TV host known in France as “Monsieur Cinema,” is quoted as saying (and I’ll translate as best I can): “It took a long time for me to discover that the ‘A’ in ‘J.A.M.’, the ‘A’ of Jean A. Mercier, the signature associated with the most beautiful movie posters, the most beautiful films of René Clair, the most beautiful films in general,...
- 6/8/2012
- MUBI
In the fall of 1946, Frank Stauffacher mounted a major, and very influential, retrospective of avant-garde film in the U.S. at the San Francisco Museum of Art. The series was called “Art in Cinema” and it featured ten different programs from filmmakers in the U.S., France, Germany and Canada.
By the mid-’40s, the avant-garde hadn’t taken a strong hold in the U.S. yet, so the majority of the films screened came from Europe, or by Europeans who relocated to the U.S. However, by that time also, the European avant-garde had pretty much completely petered out. Still, Stauffacher wanted to show that there was a continuity to avant-garde film history that, up until that point, had yet to be fully considered.
In conjunction with the series, the San Francisco Museum of Art published a catalog, pretty much like one would find with any major art exhibit.
By the mid-’40s, the avant-garde hadn’t taken a strong hold in the U.S. yet, so the majority of the films screened came from Europe, or by Europeans who relocated to the U.S. However, by that time also, the European avant-garde had pretty much completely petered out. Still, Stauffacher wanted to show that there was a continuity to avant-garde film history that, up until that point, had yet to be fully considered.
In conjunction with the series, the San Francisco Museum of Art published a catalog, pretty much like one would find with any major art exhibit.
- 12/15/2010
- by Mike Everleth
- Underground Film Journal
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