The Cap'n finally got one of my Out of Print Criterion DVDs back. While it's not Sid and Nancy or Dead Ringers or even a completely gone one like This is Spinal Tap or Tokyo Olympiad, I was happy to find a copy of Alfred Hitchcock's Notorious at a downright reasonable used price. Maybe it's because of the 20th Century Fox boxed set, which also carries alternate editions of similarly OOP Rebecca and Spellbound, but somehow I got Notorious for less than it would have been new six years ago.
Looking at Amazon, it wouldn't be too difficult to get Spellbound and Rebecca at reasonable prices too. Sid and Nancy is still pretty pricey, and Tokyo Olympiad is downright ridiculous at $64 used and $115 new. This is Spinal Tap is comparably silly at $48.95 and $109.99. Many of them aren't so bad any more, as when Criterion loses the rights other companies typically swoop in. Even Hard Boiled and The Killer aren't where they once were (pushing $500), and I bet the guy trying to sell Criterion's old version Salo is going to have his work cut out for him at $68 (to wit: it once sold for $2000 on eBay. Seriously).
The Silence of the Lambs and Robocop have fallen dramatically from where they once were, which is fine because I still have those. If there's one I wish I still had that I don't, it's Bruce Robinson's How to Get Ahead in Advertising, which is baselining around $50 (discount the $20-30 copies, as they're rentals and missing components). Oh, make that two; I had no idea Fellini's Nights of Cabiria was out of print. Damn.
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My goal with Spine Numbers is to no longer try to get all of them (it is, after all, a fool's errand to keep up with a collection that shows no sign of ending), but to seek out the ones I really want and rent the films that sound interesting. For example, right now I'd really like to have Salesman, Peeping Tom, Sullivan's Travels, Shock Corridor, The Naked Kiss, Mona Lisa, The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Insomnia, Nanook of the North, The Friends of Eddie Coyle, House of Games, and Kind Hearts and Coronets. I wouldn't mind having Night and Fog, La Jetee, Hoop Dreams, The Long Good Friday, That Obscure Object of Desire, The Horse's Mouth, Burden of Dreams, Overlord, Children of Paradise, and The Orphic Trilogy. I don't know that I need Maitresse, Border Radio, El Norte, Dodes ka-den, Bad Timing, I am Curious, or Fishing with John. There are others that aren't occurring to me that fit in a nebulous category of "I'd probably just rent it", but I think you get the idea. My days of being a completist are over and done.
I envy some of you mad men and women out there trying to conquer the collection. I no longer want to be you, although I may have to drop some coin in order to pick up a few of those OOP discs (the Sid and Nancy one is worth it for the commentary track alone, which is comprised of members of the NYC punk scene, many of whom dispute the portrayal of Sid Vicious and Nancy Spungen in the film). I don't know that I'd ever need the John Woo movies, or even This is Spinal Tap, but I suppose it is nice to know they haven't totally vanished from the face of the earth.
Thus endeth the blathering.
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