The Daniel Clowes Filmography

Comic writer/ artist Daniel Clowes' most celebrated film is, of course, Ghost World (Clowes was even nominated for an Oscar!), which I've already covered here.  But it's not the whole of his filmography.  Heck, it might not even be his best film.  Well... okay, actually it is.  But still, I'd argue his other movies come a lot closer than you may've been lead to believe or remember.  I had been happily living without these films in my collection, but upon a recent revisit, I realized this could not stand.  And as a bonus, these blus are rather cheap these days.  👍

Following Bad Santa, 2006 saw director Terry Zwigoff reunite with his most famous collaborator for Art School Confidential, based on a simple 4-page strip in an issue of Eightball, though Clowes also wrote the screenplay.  In both cases, I can see why these movies didn't really land.  In this case, it's sort of a defiantly artsy indie flick, but at the same time, first feels too indebted to lower common denominator comedies like Porky's, Superbad or Revenge Of the Nerds.  The first half in particular borrows pretty heavily from the young men on a quest to lose their virginity formula.  But I'd say that's more of a marketing issue, leaving this movie struggling to find its audience with a "who is this for" dilemma.  When it came out, I remember thinking Funny Pages was the movie this had failed to be.

But looking beyond that, this is an acerbic look on the art school world, from the students to the faculty and the entire institution.  And it's a thoughtful dialogue on art itself, all wrapped up in a clever murder mystery plot.  It's actually the film Velvet Buzzsaw wanted and failed to be.  And since Ghost World was so acclaimed, this movie was able to secure a fantastic cast all eager to be a part of this, including Anjelica Houston, John Malkovich (who also produced), returning Steve Buscemi, Mallrats' own Ethan Suplee, The Last Days of Disco's Matt Keeslar and the great Jim Broadbent.  The ending is ingenious, and Clowes unique writing definitely shines through the conventions.

2006 Sony DVD top; 2018 MVD BD bottom.

So MVD is clearly using the same base master as the original Sony, with essentially identical color timing, brightness levels, framing, etc.  Well, I say the framing is "essentially" identical, because both discs are 1.84:1, but the DVD is slightly vertically pinched, which the BD corrects.  ASC was shot on film, but you'd never know it from looking at these smooth, grainless transfers.  Still, the BD is sharper and less compressed than the DVD, so it's a fine jump to basic HD improving on the DVD, just an old transfer.

Sony's DVD features a 5.1 mix with optional English subtitles, plus a bunch of foreign subs and dubs.  MVD keeps all of that, bumping the 5.1 up to DTS-HD, and also adds a stereo mix in LPCM.

For extras, I wouldn't call it a proper special edition, but we get some decent stuff.  Both discs are virtually the same in this department, except the DVD has more bonus trailers.  We get a basic, promotional 'making of' featurette and a second featurette covering the film's debut at Cannes, both of which feature brief interviews with many of the cast and crew.  Then there's about fifteen minutes of deleted scenes (there are some amusing bits, but nothing major), and a short blooper reel.  Only the blu-ray includes the actual ASC trailer.

A decade later, we get the next Clowes film, 2017's Wilson.  Clowes wrote this screenplay too, adapted from his own comic of the same name, though now they've got a new director: Craig Johnson.  soft ending.  Fox execs probably got involved and said, this is a legit rom-com starring Woody Harrelson now.  We can't end it so bleakly.  It's not a bad ending, but it does feel like a cop-out.

But except for that, this film is still a pretty excellent, on point Clowes adaptation.  If you're not familiar with the source material,. I can guarantee you won't predict all the places this story goes to.  And while Harrelson's casting might be a little outsized, the rest of the cast is perfect, from co-star Laura Dern to minor supporting players like Mary Lynn Rajskub, Cheryl Hines, Margo Martindale, Brett Gelman and Isabella Amara.  I get why mainstream audiences expect a cute, sunny comedy would bounce off of this, and the ending is a bit off a let down if you've read Clowes original, but it's still a surprisingly good film if you go in with the right mindset.

2017 Fox DVD top; 2017 Fox BD bottom.

As a combopack, you could safely assume you're getting the same basic transfer on two separate discs, with the only difference being the HD boost the BD allows.  And you'd be mostly correct, but there is a small, unexpected difference: The DVD is 1.83:1, while the blu is 1.85.  Basically, the DVD has a slight vertical pinch (maybe in solidarity with Art School? haha), which the BD again corrects.  Besides that, it's just the normal boost in clarity you'd expect from the BD, fixing the light soft focus of the DVD compression.  This film was shot on digital and finished in 2k, so it's looking about as good as it ever will, which in this case is absolutely fine.  I'm sure you could get a superior encode on a UHD, but it would be a slim gain and I wouldn't hold my breath for such any such release.

Fox's release features Wilson's original 5.1 track (in DTS-HD on the blu), with French and Spanish 5.1 dubs, plus an English Audio Descriptive track.  It also includes optional English and Spanish subtitles.

Wilson has featurettes, too - three of 'em - but they're even shorter.  Like two minutes or less each.  But taken together, they add up to one okay little featurette.  Besides a bunch of soundbites from the cast and crew, which at least impart a little information, they do some panel to frame comparisons, which give you a good feel for how the movie stacks up against the graphic novel.  They even animate the chat bubbles.  Somebody cared.  Better though, is the almost 20 minutes of deleted scenes, many of which may've hurt the film's pace, but otherwise are pretty funny or add some more character nuance.  There's also a stills gallery, the trailer and a couple bonus trailers.

So neither film comes with the deep special edition we'd like, but they're better than barebones, so fans will get some value out of 'em.  Both are easy recommendations.

Eddington

And to fully complete the picture of Danial Clowes' filmography, I should mention that in 2011, actress and former Beastie Boys love interest Ione Skye directed a short film adaptation of Ice Haven called David Goldberg.  Predictably but sadly, it's not available on home video at all (but you can find it on Youtube).  I imagine it wouldn't be a simple prospect, but if a label like Criterion were ever to pick up one of these movies for a fancier, 4k release, David Goldberg would be a sweet special feature.  And additionally, Clowes appears in the 2010 documentary Shut Up, Little Man, which is available on DVD, and fleetingly in Ari Aster's Eddington, which is out on DVD, BD and UHD.  But now we've veered off into hardcore devotee territory.  I'd recommend Art School Confidential and Wilson to anybody, however, and their current treatment on blu-ray isn't exactly exciting, but they're fine, and definitely worth having.

Criterion Catch-Up 2, Part 2: Crumb

"Presented" by David Lynch, 1994's Crumb is a documentary that will have you saying "wow."  Underground comic pioneer Robert Crumb is already an interesting subject for a documentary, and this film isn't afraid to get into it with his exes, critics and the man himself   This is no puff piece that's going to gloss over the accusations of sexism and racism in his work; it charges headfirst into the worst of it.  But then as director Terry Zwigoff (Ghost World) gets increasingly incredibly candid footage with Crumb's family and delves into their issues of abuse and depression, it goes beyond the man's work to deeper places than almost any documentary about anybody has gone.  The film's most memorable scene for me isn't even about Robert, but his brother Charles, as they discuss his childhood artwork and show how his mental illness transformed his illustrative style into something unique and fascinating.

I've actually had a longer history of re-dipping on this title, but unfortunately I sold off my first two DVD copies before I started this site.  See, originally Crumb was released on DVD by Columbia Tri-Star in 1999.  It was barebones and mis-framed at 1.66:1, but I felt lucky to be able to replace my laserdisc of this quirky doc at all.  Little did I know how well it would wind up getting treated on home video over the years.  Because then in 2006, Sony upgraded it to a special edition, which fixed the framing and added a audio commentary by Zwigoff and Roger Ebert.  I figured that would be the last word.  But then, in 2010, Criterion announced their own edition with a "new, restored high-definition transfer" and over 50 minutes of unused footage.  Well, hot dog, I was in again.  That was early enough in the blu-ray era, though, that I was still buying DVD versions, so that's what I opted for (and that disc I do still have for this comparison).  Eventually, I realized I couldn't live without the proper BD, though, so I quadruple-dipped.

2010 Criterion DVD top; 2010 Criterion BD bottom.

So I'm disappointed we don't still have the older transfers to compare, if only for the fun of it.  But there is an interesting difference between the Criterion DVD and blu even though they were released at the same time.  See, I left the negative space around the first set of shots to show, though they're both 1.33:1, the DVD is window-boxed, I guess out of concern for 4:3 TVs' overscan areas (something Criterion routinely used to take into account).  But they've trusted the BD transfer to go right to the vertical edges (it's still pillar-boxed, of course, because it's a fullscreen film).  So that was a little surprise.  Otherwise it's the same master with the natural boost in clarity with the jump to HD.  It was shot in 16mm, so there's not a ton more detail unveiled, but edges are definitely crisper on the blu.

Both discs offer the original mono in 2.0 with optional English subtitles (as I recall, so did both of the older DVDs), but the BD bumps it up to LPCM.  The audio's never exactly crystalline, but the lossless track has a little extra oomph, which can make it a little easier to make out tossed off moments of dialogue.

So the original Crumb DVD was barebones, and the second introduced that audio commentary by Zwigoff and Ebert.  Apart from a bunch of bonus trailers, that was it.  Well, happily, Criterion was able to preserve that commentary, as well as record one of their own - also with Zwigoff.  The two commentaries weren't recorded to compliment each other, so as you could imagine, there's some repetition between them.  But it's not too much; Ebert manages to make his track distinct, and both tracks have good info in them.  Then there's all that unused footage, which includes everything from Crumb and Zwigoff jamming with in their band together (an element not even mentioned in the doc) to a trip to the mall with his wife, and yes, more on his brothers' issues.  Criterion also includes a small stills gallery, a 28-page booklet with notes by critic Jonathan Rosenbaum and a fold-out reproduction of Charles Crumb's art test (as shown in the film).

Never say never, but as a 16mm documentary, I don't imagine a Crumb 4k is around the corner, so even though upgrades have taken me by surprise before, I feel comfortable saying Criterion's blu is probably going to be the definitive release for a long time  We probably have just a slightly better shot in asking for a BD upgrade of Louie Bluie instead.  But really, unless Zwigoff makes a new, attention-getting film, what you see is probably all we're getting.  So it's a good thing they ended on a strong disc here.

Yay! Criterion Caught Up! Ghost World

Now that we're officially Caught Up with Criterion, we can do a brand new release: Terry Zwigoff colorful adaptation Dan Clowe's Ghost World!  For what it's worth, this is pretty much my favorite film based on a comic book, and it stands pretty tall even outside of those parameters.  After a while, there's some funny lines, colorful fashions and a handful of brilliant satirical and humanistic moments that really stick with you.  But revisiting it with this new blu, I'd forgotten how strongly it all hangs together as a genuinely touching piece.

lt's a little hard to believe Thora Birch, coming off of American Beauty, was a bigger star than Scarlett Johansson back then, but then again, between the two of them, it's Thora who really gives the moving, command performance.  Of course, some of that might simply be because her character has been shrunken a little from the original comic.  Yes, despite the fact that Clowes was hands-on with the creation of this film, this isn't a particularly faithful adaptation of the original Ghost World comic, which used to run as a segment in Clowes' Eightball comic.  Major characters from this film, including Ileana Douglass's art teacher, the convenience parking lot comic relief character who featured prominently in the marketing, and even Steve Buscemi, who could be said to have replaced Johansson as the co-star.  But on the other hand, many scenes and images/ panels seem to be very direct, and through it all, Zwigoff and Clowes never lose the spirit of the original work, even while bringing it to vivid color, and the core story of the two best friends growing apart.  I daresay it's an honest to god masterpiece, with perfect music, art design, and a terrific supporting cast including Bob Balaban, Terri Garr and David Cross.

Ghost World was a 2001 film, so it naturally landed on DVD in 2002 as a new release from MGM.  It was widescreen and had a couple extras (which we'll get into later), but it wasn't exactly a special edition.  But aside from issuing it in other regions, that release was all we had to hold us until it was time for HD.  It was first released in Germany in 2014, with a couple extra EPK interviews, and some problematic syncing issues.  But finally in 2017, Criterion has given the film a brand new, 4k scan and delivered the special edition Ghost World has always deserved.

2002 MGM DVD on top; 2017 Criterion blu below.

2002 MGM DVD left; 2017 Criterion blu right.

So, the first noteworthy change is the aspect ratio.  MGM's original DVD is anamorphic, but has very slim pillarboxing to a ratio of 1.76:1, while Criterion slightly letterboxes their image to a presumably more correct 1.85:1.  This effectively gives us identical framing on both versions, but with slightly more picture on the sides of Criterion's image.  Now, in terms of color, for once, the timing is essentially exactly the same between the old DVD and the blu, except their a little bit more robust and bolder on the blu.  In fact, more robust could describe the blu-ray's relationship to the DVD in general.  Naturally, the DVD is more compressed, but there's a very strong and appealing jump in clarity on Ghost World.  Not only is grain resolved much better (if a little light) thanks to this new 4k scan from a 35mm interpositive, but as you can see in the close-up comparison above, all the lines and details of the image are a lot cleaner and clear.  This is the kind of strong picture quality jump we buy blu-rays for.

Ghost World has always had a 5.1 mix, so that's the only option we get on the DVD and blu-ray, but the blu-ray's DTS-HD does make the music sound fuller.  Both discs also include optional English subtitles, with the MGM DVD also throwing in Spanish and French.

Now, again, the MGM DVD was a little light on features, but it wasn't barebones.  It included four deleted scenes, a decent 'making of' featurette, and what they call a "music video," but is actually the extended dance clip from the film 1965 Bollywood film Gumnaam that featured prominently in Ghost World's opening and closing credits.  We also get the trailer and a couple of bonus trailers including an ad for the Ghost World soundtrack. Oh, and there's an insert with chapter stops.

Criterion improved upon that in almost all aspects.  First, they brought in some killer new features, most notably an audio commentary by Zwigoff, Clowes and producer Lianne Halfon.  It's a pretty great track, apart from the fact that Clowes and Zwigoff's voices are so similar, it can be hard to determine who's speaking at any given time.  Then, there's a very extensive 42-minute featurette, editing together new on-camera interviews with Johansson (a pretty impressive get in 2017!), Birch and Douglass.  Then, they not only carry over the deleted scenes but uncover a couple extra.  And yes, they include the music video again, but the experience is greatly enhanced by a new, optional audio commentary.  Here, an uncredited woman gives a very informed history of the film-within-the-film, and translates some of the lyrics,even taking a shot at singing along.  It's pretty great.  There's also a substantial, 40-page booklet with notes by Howard Hampton, lots of sketches and artwork from the film, and an essay by Zwigoff himself on the music in the film.  There's also a separate reproduction of an Eightball comic, where you can see some Ghost World scenes before they were transformed into the film, plus some other looks at Clowes' works.

But you might've noticed one tedious, little absence.  Yes, Criterion has "pulled an Ice Storm" and left out the original 'making of' featurette.  It's not a huge loss, but it did have soundbites from Balaban and Buscemi, who are absent from Criterion's extras, and gives us some more glimpses behind the scenes, Clowes and Zwigoff on-camera, etc.  Again, there's nothing really important in there, and the extras Criterion created totally blow them away; but it's still a little disappointing that they didn't include it, and/ or the extended EPK interviews from the German blu.  Come on, fellas.  Now, if you've got those older discs, you've still got to hang onto them.

This is a great blu that really exceeded my expectations, and my expectations are pretty high whenever I spring for a Criterion disc.  I was thinking maybe I'd be fine with my old DVD, but I wound up biting and now I'm really glad I did.  The film comes to fresh life, and the new supplements are essential.  Unfortunately, it doesn't allow me to shuffle the old DVD out of my collection, but that's a minor gripe in the face of such a high quality edition we've just been handed.