criterion
can someone please tell me why this crap is being released by criterion?
what a bunch of sissies, this is supposed to be a gun club not a blasted singing society.
Criterion states it's mission statement as to release "important classic and contemporary films." Genre films such as this, whether you like it or not, are a huge and influential part of cinema.
I'm glad to see Criterion broadening their horizons a bit. Hopefully, by releasing these movies, they can expose some closed-minded people to a new range of film they might otherwise ignore.
In the beginning, it is always dark...share
I watched itm last night and whilst bI enjoyed it, in no way would I say it was a classic. It was obviously a rip off of Hammer films (token Christopher Lee appearance)but without the hammer class - it was shot in black and white. The only notable thing was Boris Karloff's sympathetic performance, something he had done many times before trhough.
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A "rip off" of which Hammer films? Hammer had made barely any horror films by 1958. None of the films they had made resemble this one at all.
shareThank you for your eloquent words in Criterion's defense. This film is hardly "crap." Like most of Criterion's releases, it is an important historical artifact featuring influential players -- horror greats Boris Karloff and Christopher Lee. Criterion did a superb job with the restoration and annotation. I'm grateful for Criterion's excellent restorations, especially when there are so many fly-by-night video and DVD operations.
Anyone who doesn't appreciate this film is free not to purchase or rent it, but they'd be missing out on a gem. I was fortunate enough to check this out from my public library.
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Criterion didn't do a proper restoration with Corridors, its still the heavily censored MPAA cut. They really should have held off until they located an uncut print.
The MPAA had nothing to do with the cuts made to Corridors of Blood. If you watched the accompanying extra materials, you would know that it was the British censor who suggested four split-second cuts, one of which (removing the shot of Christopher Lee's acid-scarred face) was apparently ignored by the producers. The censor's notes and uncut footage of the three censored scenes are included on the Criterion disc as an extra.
The cut footage was probably not reincorporated into the DVD transfer as there is a very noticeable difference in quality between the movie and the censored clips. In its current form Corridors of Blood could hardly be described as "heavily censored"; the cut footage amounts to several seconds at most. The only significant cut is a quick shot of a knife entering a body. The other two go by so fast you'd literally miss them if you blinked. If you're going to complain about this stuff, at least get your facts straight first.
As for the OP, you're exactly the kind of elitist film snob I can't stand. I'm glad the people at Criterion don't share your limited world-view.
These cut sequences that Criterion used as bonuses were lifted from my own original British VHS. I sent it to the late Richard Gordon as a proof that a longer version existed. My hope being that, with the help of this video cassette they could eventually ask (in UK) for the longer version. But Criterion preferred to use the cassette for a source of their bonuses. And incidentally they forgot to include some other cut shots, like part of the disfigurement of Christopher Lee by vitriol near the end - the original scene was longer. And I never got my cassette back, nor a copie of the DVD set - but THIS is another story. Jean-Claude MICHEL, France
shareThank you for the information, Jean-Claude. I was wondering why the censor’s memo mentioned the shot of Lee's acid-scarred face, but there was no corresponding scene in the extras. Just curious, what was the source of your videocassette? Was it a commercial release? It seems odd that Criterion would have settled for VHS-quality clips of the cuts as extras if there were film elements available that could have been incorporated into the DVD; they're usually pretty scrupulous about such matters.
It is a disappointment that the longer version wasn't or couldn't be used for the DVD, but I don't think the cuts hurt the film so badly that collectors should skip the Criterion release (as a previous poster suggested) in hopes of obtaining a more complete version that may never appear. I can't speak to the shot(s) of Lee's disfigurement, but the other cuts are relatively inconsequential and very brief.
As a completist, I would of course prefer to have the uncut version, but I'm also a realist, and until an uncut version surfaces, if ever, I'm very glad to have the Criterion set. And I got it on sale for half of what I paid for the four inferior Image releases in the early 2000s.
By the way, is it possible that you are the same Jean-Claude Michel that I corresponded with for a while as a teenager back in the 1970s? (I realize it is not a terribly uncommon name.) I sent him some Castle of Frankenstein magazines and film credits (long before the Internet and IMDb), and he sent me many Euro film credits and several issues of L'Ecran Fantastique, of which he was apparently a founder. He got my name (Paul Tabili) from a letter I wrote to the short-lived Monsters of the Movies magazine. Don't be alarmed, but I thought I read a number of years ago that that Jean-Claude Michel had died (!?!). If you are the same Jean-Claude Michel, I am glad that you are still around and happy to have met up with you again here on IMDb. If you are not the same Jean-Claude Michel—well, never mind!