Criterion Collection Announces July Film Restoration Slate Featuring Five New 4K Ultra HD Editions (Eight Films In All) • Toplined By Director Mike Nichols' Carnal Knowledge On July 22

The Criterion Collection will be delivering five new 4K Ultra HD releases (eight films in all) during the month of July and, as always, it is a subjective call as to what is the leader of the pack is … everyone has their favorites.

Indeed, you have one from Kubrick, that will be high on many lists.   Criterion also has the Truffaut collection featuring the two decades-long adventures of Antoine Doinel (as played by Jean-Pierre Leaud) … that is certainly a very worthy candidate.

However, we are going with director Mick Nichols’ 1971 film release of Carnal Knowledge as the leading 4K Ultra HD title among Criterion’s July parade of new film restorations.
Based on an unproduced stage play by playwright and Pulitzer Prize-winner cartoonist Jules Feiffer, the twenty-year sexual escapades of ill-fitted college pals — played by Jack Nicholson and folk artist Art Garfunkel — is at the core of the film.  However it is the cast that sparks the interest all these years later.

In addition to Nicholson and Garfunkel, Carnal Knowledge features performances by Ann-Margret (Oscar-nominated in the Best Support Actress category), Candice Bergen, Cynthia O’Neal, Rita Moreno and Carol Kane in her film debut.

The film actually sparked a series of court battles that took three years to play out.  The Supreme Court finally ruled in 1974 that Carnal Knowledge was not obscene, long after the film had play out theatrically and moved on to the repertory universe.   A little film called Deep Throat reset all the rules anyway.

Bonus features for this 4K Ultra HD/Blu-ray Combo Pack include a newly-minted commentary from playwright Neil LaBute (The Shape of Things, Some Girl(s), In the Company of Men), video sessions with Nichols’ biographer Mark Harris (“Mike Nichols: A Life”) and film critic Dana Stevens, film-editing historian Bobbie O’Steen and (archival) Nichols in conversation with fellow filmmaker Jason Reitman.

As to other new 4K Ultra HD entries from Criterion during the month of July, we begin with director Fritz Lang’s 1953 film noir triumph, The Big Heat (July 1, with commentary … also available on Blu-ray); Stanley Kubrick’s 1975 film, Barry Lyndon, arrives on July 8; the four-film collection titled The Adventures of Antoine Doinel features auteur filmmaker Francois Truffaut’s The 400 Blows, Stolen Kisses, Bed and Broad and Love on the Run (July 15 … also available on Blu-ray) and finally director Kenneth Lonegran’s 2000 film release titled You Can Count on Me will be available on Blu-ray and 4K Ultra HD for the first time on July 22.