The Criterion Collection has announced two titles for release on September 22: Jean-Luc Godard's masterpiece 'Pierrot le fou', and 'The Complete Monterey Pop Festival'. 'Pierrot le fou' will be presented in 2.35:1 AVC video, with a mono PCM soundtrack. 'The Complete Monterey Pop Festival' will be a two-disc set. Video will be 1.33:1 AVC, with new remixed multichannel soundtracks.
Pierrot le fou
Dissatisfied in marriage and life, Ferdinand (Jean-Paul Belmondo) takes to the road with the babysitter, his ex-lover Marianne Renoir (Anna Karina), and leaves the bourgeoisie behind. Yet this is no normal road trip: genius auteur Jean-Luc Godard's tenth feature in six years is a stylish mash-up of consumerist satire, politics, and comic-book aesthetics, as well as a violent, zigzag tale of, as Godard called them, “the last romantic couple.” With blissful color imagery by cinematographer Raoul Coutard and Belmondo and Karina at their most animated, 'Pierrot le fou' is one of the high points of the French New Wave, and was Godard's last frolic before he moved ever further into radical cinema.
Special features include:
"A Pierrot Primer", a new video program with audio commentary by filmmaker Jean-Pierre Gorin
"Godard, l'amour, la poésie", a fifty-minute French documentary about director Jean-Luc Godard and his work and marriage with Karina
Archival interview excerpts with Godard, Karina, and actor Jean-Paul Belmondo
Theatrical trailer
A booklet featuring a new essay by critic Richard Brody, a 1969 review by Andrew Sarris, and a 1965 interview with Godard
The Complete Monterey Pop Festival
On a beautiful June weekend in 1967, at the height of the “Summer of Love,” the first and only Monterey International Pop Festival roared forward—capturing a decade's spirit and ushering in a new era of rock and roll. Monterey would launch the careers of Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, and Otis Redding, but they were just a few among a wildly diverse cast including Simon and Garfunkel, The Mamas and the Papas, The Who, The Byrds, Hugh Masekela, and the extraordinary Ravi Shankar.
Special features include:
Two hours of performances not included in the original film, from the following artists: The Association, Big Brother and the Holding Company, The Blues Project, The Byrds, The Paul Butterfield Blues Band, Country Joe and the Fish, The Electric Flag, Jefferson Airplane, Al Kooper, The Mamas and the Papas, Laura Nyro, Quicksilver Messenger Service, Simon and Garfunkel, Tiny Tim, and The Who
Audio commentary on Monterey Pop by Festival producer Lou Adler and D.A. Pennebaker
New video interview with Lou Adler and D.A. Pennebaker
Audio interviews with Festival producer John Phillips, Festival publicist Derek Taylor, and performers Cass Elliot and David Crosby
Photo essay by photographer Elaine Mayes
Original theatrical trailer for Monterey Pop
Original theatrical radio spots for Monterey Pop
Monterey Pop scrapbook
Audio commentary on Jimi Plays Monterey by music critic and historian Charles Shaar Murray
Two audio commentaries on Shake! by music critic and historian Peter Guralnick:
Otis Redding's Monterey performance, song by song
Redding before and after Monterey
Interview with Phil Walden, Otis Redding's manager from 1959 to 1967
Original theatrical trailer for Jimi Plays Monterey
Video excerpt: Pete Townshend on Monterey and Jimi Hendrix
Count me in for Monterey! Feelin' Groovy! Who can't forget Jimi Hendrix setting his guitar on fire during "Wild Thing"w/ Ronson lighter fluid,timeless!And The Who destroying their gear at the end of My Generation! Otis Redding was awseome too! Ravi Shankar seems to get the largest chunk of the movie with his raga,the final performance in the movie. I guess Criterion saw Warner release Woodstock on Blu,so now we'll have to great festivals on Blu,I guess Isle of Wight we be released on Blu,eventually!
MONTEREY POP on Blu!!! Yea baby! I caught this a couple years ago & Otis Reddings' performance was awesome, and the whole concert movie was very cool as a whole. 1st day buy for sure!
Down in Monterey! I'd been holding out for years because the DVD was too expensive and there were complaints about what was included and what was left out.
Regardless, if it's in Blu-ray, it might very well be worth the extra expense. Especially with Woodstock out, too.
I don't miss the more egregious aspects of the sixties as much as some, so I won't be preordering these with the same mindless speed as Criterion's June, July and August titles.
Here's hoping for the success of these releases, though -- for the connoisseur, they do sound lovely. I'll be off in the corner hoping for more variety (and more titles per month!) for the rest of the year.
(BTW, I had a chance to see "Revanche" at a film festival recently, and it's a masterpiece. Can't wait to own it on a Criterion BD.)
