Coming out this September, The Criterion Collection has announced some juicy titles set to be released on physical media as their upcoming lineup includes the massive 10-film Wes Anderson box set, “Isle of Dogs,” “The French Dispatch,” Akira Kurosawa’s “High & Low,” Rob Reiner’s “This Is Spinal Tap,” recent Oscar-winner “Flow,” “Born In Flames,” “Read My Lips,” and “The Beat That My Heart Skipped.”
Here is a breakdown of those September titles and what they’re all about.
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High & Low (September 9):
Toshiro Mifune is unforgettable as Kingo Gondo, a wealthy industrialist whose family becomes the target of a cold-blooded kidnapper in High and Low, the highly influential domestic drama and police procedural from director Akira Kurosawa. Adapting Ed McBain’s detective novel King’s Ransom, Kurosawa moves effortlessly from compelling race-against-time thriller to exacting social commentary, creating a diabolical treatise on class and contemporary Japanese society.
Born In Flames (September 16):
A blistering rallying cry issued loud, clear, and unapologetically queer, Lizzie Borden’s explosive postpunk provocation is a DIY fantasia of female rebellion set in America ten years after a revolution that supposedly transformed the country into a democratic socialist utopia. In reality, racism, sexism, and economic inequality are as virulent as ever, and a band of radicals—led by Black, lesbian, and working-class women—join forces to fight back. Told through a furiously fractured, kinetically edited flurry of television news broadcasts, pirate radio transmissions, agitprop, and protests shot guerrilla-style on the streets of New York City, Born in Flames is a shock wave of feminist futurism that’s both an essential document of its time and radically ahead of it.
This Is Spinal Tap (September 16):
Spinal Tap has come to be recognized as England’s loudest and most punctual band. In the legendary rockumentary This Is Spinal Tap, now beautifully restored, Nigel Tufnel (Christopher Guest), David St. Hubbins (Michael McKean), and Derek Smalls (Harry Shearer) embark on their final American tour, with filmmaker Marty DiBergi (Rob Reiner) capturing all the mishaps, creative tensions, dwindling crowds, and ill-fated drummers. This Is Spinal Tap takes DiBergi’s brilliant vérité style and turns it up to eleven!
Flow (September 23):
A thrilling tale of friendship and survival that took indie animation to ecstatic new heights of ambition and imagination, this Academy Award–winning international sensation follows a courageous cat after its home is devastated by a great flood. As the cat teams up with a capybara, a lemur, a bird, and a dog to navigate a boat in search of dry land, the crew must rely on trust, courage, and their wits to survive the perils of a newly aquatic planet. Working with a small team using open-source software, visionary DIY animator Gints Zilbalodis conjures a sublime sensory odyssey and a profound meditation on the fragility of the environment and the spirit of community.
The Beat That My Heart Skipped (September 23):
A riveting character study in the guise of a gritty underworld thriller, Jacques Audiard’s international breakthrough features an explosive performance from Romain Duris as a real-estate broker torn between the dirty dealings of his slumlord father (Niels Arestrup) and his recently rekindled love for classical piano. Can music offer salvation from a life of sin? Winner of eight César Awards, including Best Film, this bold reimagining of the New Hollywood cult classic Fingers showcases Audiard’s gift for balancing breathtaking tension with galvanic human drama.
Read My Lips (September 23):
Two outcasts are drawn together by crime and passion in this early tour de force from director Jacques Audiard. Carla (Emmanuelle Devos, who won a César Award for her performance) is an unappreciated, hard-of-hearing employee at a nondescript construction company. Her lonely life gets a jolt of excitement when she hires a new assistant: Paul (Vincent Cassel), an ex-con who soon enlists her (and her lip-reading ability) in a risky scheme. With visceral camera work and sound design, Audiard immerses viewers in the duo’s increasingly turbulent world, blending noir conventions with complex character development for a thriller of unique depth and emotion.
The Wes Anderson Archive: Ten Films, Twenty-Five Years (September 30):
Wes Anderson’s first ten features represent twenty-five years of irrepressible creativity, an ongoing ode to outsiders and quixotic dreamers, and a world unto themselves, graced with a mischievous wit and a current of existential melancholy that flows through every captivating frame. This momentous twenty-disc collector’s set includes new 4K masters of the films, over twenty-five hours of special features, and ten illustrated books, presented in a deluxe clothbound edition.
The French Dispatch of the Liberty Kansas Evening Sun (September 30):
A salute to writers and expatriates, Wes Anderson’s tenth feature takes the form of the final edition of The French Dispatch, a weekly magazine chronicling life in the city of Ennui-sur-Blasé, France (for American readers). Made up of three featured stories—a profile of a tortured artist, a report on student revolutionaries, and a recounting of a tabloid kidnapping with a gourmet twist—plus an obituary and a travelogue, this dazzlingly constructed anthology mixes everything from theatrical interludes to tableaux vivants to comic-book animation. The superb ensemble cast includes Adrien Brody, Timothée Chalamet, Benicio Del Toro, Frances McDormand, Léa Seydoux, Owen Wilson, and Jeffrey Wright.
Isle of Dogs (September 30):
Wes Anderson conjures a dystopian future Japan in magical stop-motion. After a canine virus outbreak, the dogs of Megasaki are exiled to a vast island garbage dump. When Atari (the daring twelve-year-old ward of the city’s mayor) sets out to rescue his beloved Spots, he meets a pack of mongrel friends and is launched on an epic quest. Innovatively blending English and Japanese dialogue through a cross-cultural voice cast that includes Bryan Cranston, Greta Gerwig, Jeff Goldblum, Scarlett Johansson, Yoko Ono, and Koyu Rankin, this fable of loyalty and disobedience combines Anderson’s signature themes—friendship among outsiders, the adventure of rebellion—with a delight in the boundless possibilities of animated storytelling.
If you’re unfamiliar with these upcoming releases at The Criterion Collection, you can view their trailers below to better understand what you’re in store for.
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