Another month, another set of new The Criterion Collection releases. And while December is typically the lightest month for releases on Criterion’s calendar, three titles will be out in time for the holidays: two remasters, with the addition of four other films to one of those releases, and one new spine #.
So what’s getting inducted into the Collection in December? None other than “Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio,” which premiered on Netflix last year. Criterion’s release of the film is a 4K digital master supervised by del Toro, Mark Gustafson, and Dolby Atmos and comes plush with special features. Among those are “Handcarved Cinema,” a new doc featuring interviews with del Toro, the film’s cast & crew, and its puppet creators, puppet designers, and animation supervisor. Del Toro also sits down with Gustafson for a conversation about the film, and curator Ron Magliozzi sits down to discuss MoMA‘s 2022 exhibition about the film. There are bunch of other conversations, interviews, and panel discussions on the disc, too. The release’s accompanying booklet also features essays by Matt Zoller Seitz and Cornelia Funke.
Next up: Albert Lamorisse‘s “The Red Balloon,” which already had a Criterion release that now gets an update with four additional films added. The other shorts in the new release include “Bim, The Little Donkey,” “White Mane,” “Stowaway In The Sky,” and “Circus.” The new release in December features new 4K digital restorations for “The Red Balloon” and “White Mane” and 2K ones for the other three films. Plus, the new remasters of “White Man” and “Stowaway In The Sky” feature English narrations by Peter Strauss and Jack Lemmon, respectively. The release also features “My Father Was A Red Balloon,” a 2008 documentary from Pascal Lamorisse and his daughter Lysa about Pascal’s father. The new release also features an essay by critic David Cairns.
Finally, Allen Baron‘s brutal noir “Blast Of Silence” gets a new 4K restoration and Blu-Ray release. Baron’s film is a stylish, low-budget depiction of Manhattan at its grittiest, following a hitman carrying out an assignment during the holiday season. The new Blu-Ray release features all of the special features that accompanied the film’s previous release, including rare on-set Polaroids, location photos featuring places in the film from 2008, an essay by film critic Terence Rafferty, and a graphic-novel adaptation of the film by Sean Phillips.
So, three films isn’t exactly a huge haul of new Criterion releases but they’ll make the perfect stocking stuffer for someone’s favorite cinephile. Check out trailers for each new release below.