KD^3C^3 - 20240811 Rock'n'rollin' 'til the break of dawn
Our local walmart won't let us buy frozen vegetables for curbside pickup. I don't know if this is a national thing, or a local problem, but I am not going inside walmart for frozen vegetables.
Poorly Organized Thoughts about The Criterion Collection CC40 Box Set
Criterion Collection! For a lot of film buffs it’s the gold standard in boutique Blu-ray and physical film collecting. I can say that for me, at least, it was the doorway to a deeper understanding of film. They put out high quality physical releases of movies. Generally they are movies people consider outstanding and worth recognition. Not every movie they release is a masterpiece, but anything they put out is at least worthy of consideration. They have a reputation for putting out snooty art house fare, but the actual variety in the collection is quite broad.
Poorly Organized Thoughts about The Criterion Collection CC40 Box Set
Criterion Collection! For a lot of film buffs it’s the gold standard in boutique Blu-ray and physical film collecting. I can say that for me, at least, it was the doorway to a deeper understanding of film. They put out high quality physical releases of movies. Generally they are movies people consider outstanding and worth recognition. Not every movie they release is a masterpiece, but anything they put out is at least worthy of consideration. They have a reputation for putting out snooty art house fare, but the actual variety in the collection is quite broad.
I’ve been collecting Criterion DVDs for a long time. And one of my general practices is to use a random number generator to select a movie when I need one more to bump my order over the free shipping threshold. It’s been pretty successful strategy and I have discovered some absolute favorites that way. (Shameless plug: I even made a youtube essay because of one I picked randomly). Because there are literally over a thousand movies in the collection it can be pretty overwhelming to pick out some. Criterion seems to have realized this and done something to remedy this with their recent announcement of CC40, a 40 film box set collection of movies from the collection. It was put together to celebrate 40 years of the Criterion Collection existing (they started with Laserdisc!) The box set has some really well known and very good films in it, the complete list is
8½ (1963), Tokyo Story (1953), All That Jazz (1979), Bicycle Thieves (1948), Repo Man (1984), Naked (1993), Jules and Jim (1962), Being There (1979), Weekend (1967), Yi Yi (2000), The Night of the Hunter (1955), Pickpocket (1959), Sweet Smell of Success (1957), On the Waterfront (1954), Do the Right Thing (1989), Ratcatcher (1999), Sunday Bloody Sunday (1971), Mirror (1975), Barry Lyndon (1975), Safe (1995), Seconds (1966), His Girl Friday (1940), Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters (1985), Y tu mamá también (2001), My Own Private Idaho (1991), Love & Basketball (2000), Night of the Living Dead (1968), Ace in the Hole (1951), 3 Women (1977), The Red Shoes (1948), Down by Law (1986), La Ciénaga (2001), Wanda (1970), House (1977), Sullivan’s Travels (1941), The Battle of Algiers (1966), A Woman Under the Influence (1974), Cléo from 5 to 7 (1962), Persona (1966), In the Mood for Love (2000) all on Blu Ray.
Now all of these are existing movies that are available in the criterion collection, either individually or in another box set. The retail price for each of these movies on blu ray is $40. So if you do some math that means if you bough all of these movies individually it would cost $1600, which is a lot! Of course most people probably would buy them during the semi-regular 50% off sales, putting the actual likely price down to $800. Still a lot! And $800 is what the MSRP is for this box set. So far, this sounds like a decent deal; 40 well liked movies in a high quality presentation with all the supplements you could want for twenty bucks each. It’s a pretty big initial cost, but generally I would say the movies are worth it. And it’s yet to be seen if this box set will also be eligible for the 50% off sale, which would push it down to $400 or $10 per film, which is actually a very good price compared to the $40 individual film MSRP.
But this assumes you want all the movies, or don’t already own them as a criterion collector. I’ve been actively collecting for at least 10 years, buying 6-10 movies per year, and as a comparison, through sheer coincidence I happen to own 8 of the films in the box set, which if I buy it on sale means that I would be paying $12.50 per movie for the ones I don’t already own. So even then this seems like a really good deal, assuming you can stomach the upfront cost. And that cost is still pretty steep.
Sometimes people (it’s me, I’m people) talk about the Criterion collection as a film school in a box. That is, because of their robust supplemental features like commentaries, essays, and behind the scenes videos that come with every movie, buying a Criterion movie or tow is a great way to start learning about the art form of film. And now there is this literal Criterion Collection In A Box for the people who want to dive in head first a(nd have 400-800 dollars to spend.)
I’ve seen some people calling this a cash grab, which i think is pretty funny o it’s face. Because if it was a cash grab it would probably be more expensive. What I think this actually is, is a starter set for someone new to collecting Criterion Collection films. It’s a (relatively) inexpensive way to kickstart a collection of movies with a single upfront purchase. It’s not ideal for the people who own most of the movies, and If you’re the sort of person who feels like you have to buy all the criterion releases, then you might be pretty conflicted buying this if you already own most or all of the movies. But that can easily be solved by not buying this.
The one area of compliant I kind of understand is that of aesthetics. The movies come in a big box, which means you’re missing out on the display opportunities of individual releases. There’s something to be said for this. I like displaying my movies, and one of the things that Criterion boxes are known for is their above average box art. Often they have absolutely gorgeous covers the boxes and they are an art all to themselves. In one big box you don’t have that aspect of owning the movies. But also, I don’t store my DVDs facing out, because that’s very inefficient and I’m not running a blockbuster. I have them spine out on a shelf and I own them because of what’s in the box more than I ever would because of the outside cover.
So am I going to buy this? I don’t know! I don’t exactly have a spare $400, but also the box doesn’t some out until November, which means the next Criterion Flash Sale it would be in is not until February. So maybe? We’ll see.
A Thing in my Possession: a big batch of caramelized onions.
I spent the morning yesterday caramelizing onions. It’s not a complicated process, but it is time consuming. I threw a stick of butter into a dutch oven over low heat and let it melt. Then I sliced about four or five pounds of onions, which was probably the worst part. I did it with the slicing disc on my food processor, so really the hardest part was peeling the onions before slicing them. Once they were all sliced I dropped them into the pot and butter. I put on the lid and every fifteen minutes or so for the next three hours I got up and stirred the pot for a bit. What happened then was culinary magic. The onions stank by probably 75-80% as they cooked out all the water, and turned from white to a deep rich brown. the end result was a sort of rich flavorful jammy onion blob. I then took that oniony goodness and spread it out into two ice cube trays. This is the most crucial step. Caramelized onions are great in everything, but since they’re so time consuming it’s hard to have them on hand at short notice. So by putting them into ice cube trays, I can freeze individual portions, and when I want some for a dish, I can pop a cube of them into the pot along with the rest of the whatever it is I am cooking and then get an instant intense burst of additional flavor. I don’t know if this is what the term flavor bomb was invented for, but it seems like a perfect use.
Stuff I’m watching:
Cartoons! Because some things never change, there are cartoons from my youth that are still being made today. Say what you will about the Intellectual property giants taking over everything in hollywood (and most of the things I would say are bad) but This week I started watching the brand new episodes of Futurama, an animated series about Batman and one about the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. These are all things I enjoyed as a kid and now that I am definitely not a kid, it’s wild that they are still making these shows.
Futurama is technically a continuation of the original show from 2000. It’s been cancelled and brought back twice (three times?) now and with a lot of the same creatives at the head and all of the original voice cast. One the three shows I’m talking about here, it’s probably doing the worst. Satire of modern culture is hard and the more specific it gets the less well it ages. SO the first episode back being about NFTs is real evidence of that. People stopped caring about NFTs a while ago, but with the long lead times of animation, it’s hard to make jokes that anyone is interested in about them.
Batman: Caped Crusader isn’t technically the same show as Batman The Animated Series from my youth, but it does have that show’s creator Bruce Timm at the head and it apes a lot of the former show’s style. Instead of being set in a modern day Gotham, it’s explicitly a period piece, taking place in roughly the 1940s. This lends a grounded feel to everything, where batman’s gadgets are a little more plausible and he has to do some real detective work to solve mysteries. So far it’s a lot of fun, showing you can have still have a serious Batman cartoon, whithout going into grimdark territory.
Finally Tales of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is the largest deviation from my youth, but still in conversation with it. No creatives from the 1987 show here, but Turtle fans are used to that and embracing new interpretations o the characters. From the live action movies, to the four other animated series that came before this one, and even the Michael Bay movies (which have some good parts!) the Turtles are a flexible product and this is another chance to flex them around. This show has the same voice cast as the movie that came out last year, Mutant Mayhem, and that voice cast did a great job. The turtle brothers actually felt like brothers in a way that doesn’t always happen, and they felt like teenagers. Probably because they were played by actual teenagers for the first time. The animation style is based on the movie, and I’m not sure it translates well to the 2d space from 3d, but I’m willing to give it a chance. The TV series is a little more heavily serialized than I would like, at least so far, but that’s also the curse of almost every modern TV show. I hoped a cartoon for kids could lean a little less heavily on that but in the can time i’ll watch it anyway and wait for the pendulum to win back to episodic stories. Also the theme song doesn’t have lyrics, which is a huge mistake.
This Week's Crazy Ex-Girlfriend Song of the Week is I have Friends
Here's a picture of a cat
But this assumes you want all the movies, or don’t already own them as a criterion collector. I’ve been actively collecting for at least 10 years, buying 6-10 movies per year, and as a comparison, through sheer coincidence I happen to own 8 of the films in the box set, which if I buy it on sale means that I would be paying $12.50 per movie for the ones I don’t already own. So even then this seems like a really good deal, assuming you can stomach the upfront cost. And that cost is still pretty steep.
Sometimes people (it’s me, I’m people) talk about the Criterion collection as a film school in a box. That is, because of their robust supplemental features like commentaries, essays, and behind the scenes videos that come with every movie, buying a Criterion movie or tow is a great way to start learning about the art form of film. And now there is this literal Criterion Collection In A Box for the people who want to dive in head first a(nd have 400-800 dollars to spend.)
I’ve seen some people calling this a cash grab, which i think is pretty funny o it’s face. Because if it was a cash grab it would probably be more expensive. What I think this actually is, is a starter set for someone new to collecting Criterion Collection films. It’s a (relatively) inexpensive way to kickstart a collection of movies with a single upfront purchase. It’s not ideal for the people who own most of the movies, and If you’re the sort of person who feels like you have to buy all the criterion releases, then you might be pretty conflicted buying this if you already own most or all of the movies. But that can easily be solved by not buying this.
The one area of compliant I kind of understand is that of aesthetics. The movies come in a big box, which means you’re missing out on the display opportunities of individual releases. There’s something to be said for this. I like displaying my movies, and one of the things that Criterion boxes are known for is their above average box art. Often they have absolutely gorgeous covers the boxes and they are an art all to themselves. In one big box you don’t have that aspect of owning the movies. But also, I don’t store my DVDs facing out, because that’s very inefficient and I’m not running a blockbuster. I have them spine out on a shelf and I own them because of what’s in the box more than I ever would because of the outside cover.
So am I going to buy this? I don’t know! I don’t exactly have a spare $400, but also the box doesn’t some out until November, which means the next Criterion Flash Sale it would be in is not until February. So maybe? We’ll see.
A Thing in my Possession: a big batch of caramelized onions.
I spent the morning yesterday caramelizing onions. It’s not a complicated process, but it is time consuming. I threw a stick of butter into a dutch oven over low heat and let it melt. Then I sliced about four or five pounds of onions, which was probably the worst part. I did it with the slicing disc on my food processor, so really the hardest part was peeling the onions before slicing them. Once they were all sliced I dropped them into the pot and butter. I put on the lid and every fifteen minutes or so for the next three hours I got up and stirred the pot for a bit. What happened then was culinary magic. The onions stank by probably 75-80% as they cooked out all the water, and turned from white to a deep rich brown. the end result was a sort of rich flavorful jammy onion blob. I then took that oniony goodness and spread it out into two ice cube trays. This is the most crucial step. Caramelized onions are great in everything, but since they’re so time consuming it’s hard to have them on hand at short notice. So by putting them into ice cube trays, I can freeze individual portions, and when I want some for a dish, I can pop a cube of them into the pot along with the rest of the whatever it is I am cooking and then get an instant intense burst of additional flavor. I don’t know if this is what the term flavor bomb was invented for, but it seems like a perfect use.
Stuff I’m watching:
Cartoons! Because some things never change, there are cartoons from my youth that are still being made today. Say what you will about the Intellectual property giants taking over everything in hollywood (and most of the things I would say are bad) but This week I started watching the brand new episodes of Futurama, an animated series about Batman and one about the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. These are all things I enjoyed as a kid and now that I am definitely not a kid, it’s wild that they are still making these shows.
Futurama is technically a continuation of the original show from 2000. It’s been cancelled and brought back twice (three times?) now and with a lot of the same creatives at the head and all of the original voice cast. One the three shows I’m talking about here, it’s probably doing the worst. Satire of modern culture is hard and the more specific it gets the less well it ages. SO the first episode back being about NFTs is real evidence of that. People stopped caring about NFTs a while ago, but with the long lead times of animation, it’s hard to make jokes that anyone is interested in about them.
Batman: Caped Crusader isn’t technically the same show as Batman The Animated Series from my youth, but it does have that show’s creator Bruce Timm at the head and it apes a lot of the former show’s style. Instead of being set in a modern day Gotham, it’s explicitly a period piece, taking place in roughly the 1940s. This lends a grounded feel to everything, where batman’s gadgets are a little more plausible and he has to do some real detective work to solve mysteries. So far it’s a lot of fun, showing you can have still have a serious Batman cartoon, whithout going into grimdark territory.
Finally Tales of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is the largest deviation from my youth, but still in conversation with it. No creatives from the 1987 show here, but Turtle fans are used to that and embracing new interpretations o the characters. From the live action movies, to the four other animated series that came before this one, and even the Michael Bay movies (which have some good parts!) the Turtles are a flexible product and this is another chance to flex them around. This show has the same voice cast as the movie that came out last year, Mutant Mayhem, and that voice cast did a great job. The turtle brothers actually felt like brothers in a way that doesn’t always happen, and they felt like teenagers. Probably because they were played by actual teenagers for the first time. The animation style is based on the movie, and I’m not sure it translates well to the 2d space from 3d, but I’m willing to give it a chance. The TV series is a little more heavily serialized than I would like, at least so far, but that’s also the curse of almost every modern TV show. I hoped a cartoon for kids could lean a little less heavily on that but in the can time i’ll watch it anyway and wait for the pendulum to win back to episodic stories. Also the theme song doesn’t have lyrics, which is a huge mistake.
This Week's Crazy Ex-Girlfriend Song of the Week is I have Friends
Here's a picture of a cat