Inconceivable! A mainstream, populist romantic comedy fantasy adventure film by Rob Reiner in the Criterion Collection? It’s happening, 1985’s “The Princess Bride” is coming to the esteemed Criterion Collection in October. Granted not all Criterion releases are formalist, chin-scratching, slow cinema longreads (jk)—Criterion released, Michael Bay‘s “The Rock,” Kevin Smith‘s “Chasing Amy,” “RoboCop” and most recently, John Hughes‘ “The Breakfast Club” — but this may be their most crowdpleasing release in some time. A sign of a new trend following ‘Breakfast Club’? Hard to say.
READ MORE: ‘The Princess Bride’ 30th Anniversary Trailer: The Greatest Bedtime Story Ever Filmed
Meanwhile, “The Princess Bride,” charts at 88 on the American Film Institute‘s (AFI) “100 Years…100 Passions” list of the 100 greatest film love stories, and in 2016, the film was inducted into the National Film Registry, being deemed as culturally, historically or aesthetically significant (incidentally, if you’re a huge fan of this film, we humbly you suggest you check out HBO‘s recent, very-excellent “Andre The Giant” documentary where “Princess Bride” factors into it quite heavily).
Director Hal Ashby also receives his third Criterion release following “Harold And Maude” and “Being There” with the 1975 classic and American farce “Shampoo” starring Warren Beatty who dreamed up the project about a lothario hairdresser, co-wrote the script with the legendary screenwriter Robert Towne (“Chinatown“), and enlisted Hal Ashby as director who still put his stamp on the picture despite his notoriously-controlling star and producer. His various lovers in the film include Goldie Hawn, Julie Christie, and Lee Grant who also worked with Ashby on his debut film, “The Landlord” and centers prominently in the recent, Sundance-premiering 2018 doc about the filmmaker, “Hal.”
Also arriving in October is a Blu-Ray upgrade of Cornel Wilde‘s gritty, violent explorations of the nature of man in “The Naked Prey,” Rainer Werner Fassbinder‘s 495 minute, five-episode TV series “Eight Hours Don’t Make a Day,” a working-class family drama the German filmmaker was commissioned to make for public television and was only made available in the U.S. in March with a restored re-release, an upgrade of Brian DePalma‘s first foray into horror “Sisters” starring the late Margo Kidder, who most know as Lois Lane from Richard Donner‘s “Superman,” and scored by the late great seminal composer Bernard Hermann.
More into and release dates over at Criterion.
Rodrigo Perez is the founder and editor-in-chief of The Playlist, which he launched in 2008. He has worked in entertainment journalism since 2000, including at MTV, and has written for SPIN, IndieWire, Pitchfork, Complex, Magnet, and various music, film, and entertainment publications over the past two decades.
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