4 Portraits By David Downtown
david downtown is not a name with which i was familiar before Criterion decided to use his portrait of Catherine Deneuve as the cover for their forthcoming BELLE DE JOUR disc, but methinks i’m something of a fan. i say “something” of a fan, because i’m not sure i’m able to fully appreciate the brunt of Downtown’s work… the dude is famous for the illustrations he contributes to Vogue, the efficacy of which is often determined by how they can hock fashion, and i’m typing this from the inside of an overlarge New York Rangers sweatshirt. but i really dig his portraits, the soft wide strokes and the blown-out exuberance that so often seems to anchor them down. and yet, looking at the Deneuve job above, the whole thing feels just a half-step removed from some sort of post-apocalyptic, Jubilee-esque graffiti.
anyway, i’m a fan. just wish our worlds collided a bit more.
check out his site for more.
JANUARY 2012 CRITERION RELEASES ANNOUNCED!
this is gonna be super brief as i’m running around like a madman today (but unfortunately, not like a Mad Man, as that would require much more dapperness than my current sleep schedule allows). tidy month for Criterion, as January 2012 will see them adding only three titles to the Collection, but all big ones. also arriving is the forever-rumored Jean-Pierre Gorin Eclipse Series. huzzah!
#593 BELLE DE JOUR (dir. Luis Bunuel) 1967
perhaps the greatest Bunuel film that had yet to be inducted into the Collection, this release is gonna be a doozy. loaded to the gills with features and topped off with some of the most fetching artwork to have ever graced a dvd / blu-ray / thing.
#594 GODZILLA (dir. Ishiro Honda) 1954
MAN-IN-SUIT.MAN-IN-SUIT.MAN-IN-SUIT.MAN-IN-SUIT.MAN-IN-SUIT.MAN-IN-SUIT.
the fact that this exists is kinda shocking and sublime. the fact that it looks like it does is just… they should have sent a poet. a mecha-poet.
#595 THE MOMENT OF TRUTH (dir. Francesco Rosi) 1964
haven’t seen this one (though it’s already up on Criterion’s Hulu page), but i love me some Rosi and men getting horribly gored by bulls, so despite the simmering disappointment that Almodovar’s TALK TO HER is *not* in fact heading imminently joining the Collection, i’m still mighty excited. that being said, not sure i’m wild about the cover, which captures the pivotal event in question in a blur of drama.
BLU-RAY UPGRADE:
#151 TRAFFIC (dir. Steven Soderbergh) 2000
just what my blu-ray collection needs: more topher grace.
