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CORPORATE HISTORY Because it is a privately held Company , there is a dearth of publicly accessible information regarding the Criterion Collection as a business, as well as its relationships with other entities. Nevertheless, what information can be gathered from media sources reveals that the Criterion Collection shares a close business relationship with Janus Films and with Home Vision Entertainment (HVE), which is a publicly traded company in the US {Link without Title} . The Criterion Collection was founded in 1984 by Robert Stein , Aleen Stein (then Robert's wife), and Roger Smith . In 1985 , the Steins, William Becker , and Jonathan B. Turell (son of Saul J. Turell ) founded The Voyager Company . Voyager was a developer of Multimedia CD-ROM s that released dozens of high-quality educational CD-ROM s between 1993 and 2000 . During that time, the Criterion Collection became a division of Voyager. In March of 1994 , Verlagsgruppe Georg Von Holtzbrinck GmbH purchased a twenty percent share of Voyager for US$ 6.7 million. The four founders themselves each retained a twenty percent share. In the late 1990s , Voyager was broken up. In the winter of 1994, Aleen Stein divorced Robert Stein and left the active management of the company to start another CD-ROM publishing company, Organa, LLC, although she retained her share in Voyager. In the winter of 1997 , Holtzbrinck sold 42 Voyager CD-ROM titles, the Voyager brand name, the Voyager web site, and associated assets to Learn Technologies Interactive (LTI) LLC (Robert Stein had himself sold 42 Voyager CD-ROM titles to LTI some time earlier in exchange for his shares in Voyager/Criterion). At this time, the remaining founding partners, Aleen Stein, William Becker and Jonathan Turell retained complete ownership of Criterion, each with 1/3 share of the company; Turell became the CEO and Becker's son, Peter Becker , became the president (Peter Becker had been the president of Voyager and, before that, the director of its Criterion division). Aleen Stein no longer has a role in the day-to-day operations, but she continues to own one third of the company. {Link without Title} Janus films Janus Films , Inc. was founded by Bryant Haliday and Cyrus Harvey, Jr. in 1955 ; they sold it in 1966 . At some point thereafter, it was acquired by William Becker and Saul Turell. It is likely, although unverified, that Becker and Turell were the 1966 purchasers of Janus Films. HVE Charles Benton founded Public Media, Inc. (PMI) in 1968 . PMI's home video division, HVE, was established in 1986. Charles' daughter, Adrianne B. Furniss , became PMI's president in 1996 , and its CEO in 1999 . Adrianne B. Furniss is also the Chief Executive Officer of HVE. Charles Benton is the Chairman of HVE. HVE, which is also a privately held company, distributes Criterion DVD releases; however, it does not own Criterion. HVE also provides sales, advertising, and marketing services for Criterion. HVE releases its own line of DVDs on its own HVE line, including and James Ivory , and The Classic Collection, "a joint venture between Home Vision Entertainment and Janus Films." The latter appears to be dedicated to releasing DVDs under the HVE imprint of films for which Janus Films holds DVD rights and are not released by the Criterion Collection. Films under the Classic Collection imprint have also been released by the Criterion Collection. In 2005, HVE was acquired by Image Entertainment . As a result of this transaction, Image Entertainment became the exclusive distributor of the Criterion Collection. It is unclear whether or not HVE will continue to exist as an independent label. CONTRIBUTIONS AND INFLUENCE Criterion pioneered many innovations in the way movies are presented on video that have become standard today. These include the use of letterboxing, the release of multi-disk and 'special editions', and definitive versions. Letterboxing Letterbox ing is a practice in which Widescreen movies are presented in their original theatrical Aspect Ratio s for viewing on the home television screen. Though at first resisted by consumers (due to the fact that letterboxing requires the image to be shrunk and bracketed top and bottom by black bars to accommodate a television's roughly square screen), it was soon embraced by movie enthusiasts who were quick to recognize its benefits over the alternative, a film image that was sometimes severely cropped on the sides. The 1987 Criterion laserdisc of Ridley Scott 's '' Blade Runner '' was a seminal home video release that helped legitimize letterboxing {Link without Title} {Link without Title} . Special editions The company's debut releases were the 1984 laserdiscs of ''. Today, special edition DVDs, even for the most trivial of films, are becoming the norm rather than the exception. They have even gone so far as to release the same DVD (e.g. '' The Red Shoes '') with and without a "Special edition" sticker on it. But they have admitted that the only special thing about the ones with the sticker is that they've got a sticker on them! They are really all the same "Special edition". Definitive versions Criterion has released definitive, and in some cases unique, video editions of such films as '''', '' Jason And The Argonauts '', and the aforementioned ''Blade Runner'' under license with the respective companies that own (or have at some point owned) them. Many of these editions are now out of print, either because they were only released on the now-defunct laserdisc format or because the titles have changed hands and are no longer licensed to Criterion. As a result, many Criterion titles are now collectors items. For instance, the original Criterion DVD release of '' This Is Spinal Tap '' contains supplementary content not represented in MGM 's current DVD release (such as the 16 mm 'test' film); the Criterion laserdisc version of ''Blade Runner'' is the original unedited international version (this was not included on subsequent laserdisc and DVD releases of the film due to legal issues); ''The Prince of Tides'' includes a commentary track by Barbra Streisand and other supplements not included on Columbia/TriStar's current DVD; and ''Close Encounters of the Third Kind'' contains footage from the original version (in film context) not represented on the later "collector's edition" video releases (they are available separately on Sony's recent DVD). These versions can occasionally be found on Internet auction sites. Licensing Some of Criterion's titles (e.g., '' Salò '') are now "out of print" and unavailable and sell at high prices on auction sites. Usually, titles go out of print only when Criterion's license for them expires and is not renewed; this typically happens when the original licensor wishes to release its own version of the title, as happened with '' The Silence Of The Lambs '' and '' RoboCop ''. In a few cases, early releases (such as the laserdisc edition of '' Citizen Kane '', or the DVD editions of '' Beauty And The Beast '', '' M '', and '' The Wages Of Fear '') are taken out of print to make way for Criterion's own re-releases, which typically feature improved transfers and more comprehensive supplements. And whereas the unintentionally Public Domain Audrey Hepburn - Cary Grant comedy '' Charade '' is available in many low-priced, budget-line editions, Criterion nonetheless went through the expense to produce a properly restored DVD edition of the film, with extras. (They did this twice, in fact, the second time to create a new Anamorphic transfer.) Restorations Criterion usually selects foreign films, established classics, and obscure critically-admired movies over mainstream Hollywood fare, though it has released the occasional mainstream blockbuster, such as '' Armageddon '' and '' The Rock ''. Criterion is noted for spending a great deal of effort and money tracing the best source materials for classic films, and engaging in thorough restorations — a practice that has influenced other companies. Laserdisc and DVD Criterion was a laserdisc pioneer, but it entered the DVD market cautiously, not releasing its first titles on the new format until DVD had been on the market for approximately a year. Indeed, Criterion's early DVD releases of widescreen films were presented in letterbox format as was the case with widescreen laserdisc films, rather than being ''). Nonetheless, in 1998 the company discontinued its line of s are no longer available, bonus extras, such as commentary tracks, have appeared on DVD releases issued by other companies. The commentary by director Martin Scorsese which appears on the newly released special edition of '' Raging Bull '' is an example. It is suspected that these commentary releases are the result of business transactions between Criterion and other studios which could potentially allow Criterion to release films on DVD which it otherwise would not have access to. Today, though the company is no longer alone in the care and dedication with which it treats its films, nor in the elaborate content of the special editions, the Criterion Collection remains synonymous with quality. PRICING As with any brand associated in the mind of consumers with quality, Criterion DVDs tend, on the whole, to be more expensive than DVDs released by other entities (the price range as of 2006 is about US$30 for a one-disc set and US$40 for a two-disc set). Whether this pricing structure is due to increased costs necessary to ensure the best possible film elements and extras and to compensate for a smaller market for the titles it releases, or whether it is a means to capitalize on the cachet of its reputation has been debated. With an emphasis on quality over quantity, only a comparatively few films have been selected to be "saved" by the company. In 2004 , Criterion released a DVD "holiday gift set" exclusively on Amazon.com , with a total of 282 discs at a cost of about $5,000.00. It was not a complete set of the Criterion releases at that point, as Criterion no longer had the rights to certain films. It was, and remains, one of the biggest and most expensive DVD products available to consumers. As of December 2005, Criterion had issued over 300 DVD releases. REFERENCES
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