Crumb [Criterion Collection] [Blu-ray] [1994]

Terry Zwigoff's landmark 1995 film is an intimate documentary portrait of underground artist Robert Crumb, whose unique drawing style and sexually and racially provocative subject matter have made him a household name in popular American art. Zwigoff candidly and colorfully delves into the details of Crumb's incredible career, as well as his past, including his family of reclusive eccentrics, some of the most remarkable people you'll ever see on-screen. At once a profound biographical portrait, a riotous examination of a man's controversial art, and a devastating look at a troubled family, Crumb is a genuine American original. Director-approved Special Edition features new, restored high-definition digital transfer, approved by director Terry Zwigoff, two audio commentaries, one from 2010 with Zwigoff, and one from 2006, featuring Zwigoff and critic Roger Ebert, outtakes and deleted scenes, stills gallery plus a booklet featuring an essay by critic Jonathan Rosenbaum.

Though not as commonly recognized today as other pre-New Wave French directors such as Marcel Carné and Jean Renoir, Sacha Guitry (1885-1957) once claimed legions of fans in France. Often drawing comparison to Noël Coward, Guitry was essentially a playwright who embarked on a cinematic career as a means of attaining broader exposure. In lieu of filming stagy material, however, Guitry enlisted radical cinematographic techniques that were years ahead of their time. This edition of The Criterion Collection's Eclipse series brings four Guitry features to American audiences for the very first time. It includes: The Story of a Cheat (1936), with the director himself starring as a wily and conniving card shark; The Pearls of the Crown (1937), the tale of how the various pearls of England's crown originated and the journeys they took before arriving on the diadem of the British monarch; Désiré (1937), with Guitry as a Machiavellian butler who repeatedly seduces various mistresses; and Quadrille (1938), a bubbly sex comedy about several characters whose lives intersect in a posh Parisian hotel.