The Criterion Collection has announced the four movies that will be joining the prestigious list in March of 2022, with two films getting 4K UHD + Blu-ray combo editions.
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First, Márta Mészáros’ Adoption will release on March 8, 2022, in standard 4K Blu-ray. The film tells the story of Kata, an unmarried female factory worker who attempts to adopt a child. The film became the first film directed by a woman to win the Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival, and will now have a home forever in The Criterion Collection. The release also comes with the following special features:
- New 4K digital restoration undertaken by the National Film Institute Hungary – Film Archive, supervised by cinematographer Lajos Koltai and approved by director Márta Mészáros, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray
- New video essay by scholar Catherine Portuges
- Interview with Mészáros from 2019
- Blow-Ball, a 1964 short film by Mészáros
- Márta Mészáros: Portrait of the Hungarian Filmmaker, a 1979 documentary by Katja Raganelli featuring on-set interviews with the director and creative collaborators
- Trailer
- New English subtitle translation
- PLUS: An essay by film scholar Elena Gorfinkel
Following Adoption, Jean-Pierre Melville’s Le Cercle Rouge will release on March 15, 2022, in both 4K UHD + Blu-ray combo. Le Cercle Rouge is a Franco-Italian crime film that is most famously known for its incredible heist sequence, which lasts almost 30 minutes and features nearly no dialogue. The film’s special features will include:
- New 4K restoration from STUDIOCANAL of the uncut version of the film, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack
- One 4K UHD disc of the film presented in Dolby Vision HDR and one Blu-ray with the film and special features
- Segments from a 1971 episode of Cinéastes de notre temps featuring director Jean-Pierre Melville
- Interviews with assistant director Bernard Stora and Rui Nogueira, author of Melville on Melville
- On-set and archival footage, featuring interviews with Melville and actors Alain Delon, Yves Montand, and André Bourvil
- Trailer
- New English subtitle translation
- PLUS: Essays by film critics Michael Sragow and Chris Fujiwara, excerpts from Melville on Melville, a 2000 interview with composer Eric Demarsan, and an appreciation by filmmaker John Woo
✨ Announcing our MARCH 2022 titles! ✨
March brings a genre-defining concert doc by Scorsese, a 1976 stunner by Hungarian auteur Márta Mészáros, Theodore Witcher’s tale of Black love and poetry, a psychologically charged survival epic, and more! https://t.co/v9jTYECmzK pic.twitter.com/43Bf6H06PY
— Criterion Collection (@Criterion) December 15, 2021
Towards the end of the month, Robert Aldrich’s The Flight of the Phoenix will release on March 22, 2022. Unfortunately for fans hoping for a 4K release, the film will only release on Blu-ray, and will only be a 2K digital restoration of the original film. The final two films set for release in March are Martin Scorsese’s The Last Waltz, which is also getting a 4K UHD + Blu-ray combo, and Theodore Witcher’s Love Jones.
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Both films will be new 4K digital restorations, both of which have been supervised by their respective directors. However, The Last Waltz will have two separate presentation options, with one 4K UHD disc of the film presented in Dolby Vision HDR and the Blu-ray having the standard film. Pre-orders for the five films are available now from Criterion’s website.
