Criterion (was, for a minute, Hikaru Hayashi)

[Chuck Stephens]

Thanks to Jason Gray for the info about Hayashi and Shindo's new 
film; if you could post here or email me an English-language copy of 
your review, I'd be very interested to read it.

Otherwise, it's amazing to me to see how quickly this discussion 
veered into uninformed quibbling about Criterion (for whom I work 
strictly as a freelancer and have no vested interest.)

Nuzumaki: the Criterion ONIBABA will be USD $29.00, and the version 
listed on YesAsia is USD $41.31, not including shipping, and it is 
clearly marked as Region 2. As for your ridiculous comment about 
Criterion discs being "not very good" -- care to back that up at all? 
Yes, some Criterion releases have had problems (Von Sternberg's 
SCARLET EMPRESS is a pretty thoroughly-discussed example.) But you go 
ahead and take a look at the recent Fassbinder BDR trilogy box set, 
or Jean-Pierre Melville's LE CERCLE ROUGE, or Imamura's PORNOGRAPHERS 
and get back to us. I'll leave aside your rather lopsided comment 
about how "the guys" who would want a DVD of ONIBABA  would already 
have ordered it from Japan, which presumes not only various cultural, 
geographic and market-force biases, but a rather sweeping gender 
assumption as well.

I have seen, in another forum, Michael Kerpan (who I believe is also 
a subscriber here) disparage Criterion's release of Ozu's OHAYO (GOOD 
MORNING) at the expense of the Japanese edition of same, and would 
enjoy hearing more from him with a comparative analysis.