Dear Criterion,

Thank you.

This past October, I completed a task fifteen years in the making. On the final day of that month, I finished watching every film in the Criterion Collection. Every film with a spine number. Every. Single. Film.

There are others who have completed this task before me, and I’m sure there are still more who are doing the same as I write this. But I want to talk to you about my journey, and pay my respects to the people who made this possible. Because for me, this was more than a way to entertain myself; it became a transformative experience through the looking glass of cinema.

My Criterion journey began, believe it or not, with a commercialized samurai tale. After watching The Last Samurai, I Googled “great samurai films” and a list containing Akira Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai showed up. The film moved to the top of my watchlist. After the first watch, I was in love. This epic about a group of peasant farmers and the samurai they hire for protection is a perfect film in my eyes. For a samurai film, the action is minimal. Instead, Kurosawa favors the character development of each samurai, which then helps to justify the acts of violence and vengeance which occur later in the film.

It is also a tender film. It addresses young love, the growing iration among the samurai for one another, and the tense relationships between the peasants and samurai. It’s a tension that gives way to a form of altruism that ensures that good will triumph over evil—because each person in the film sacrifices a bit of themselves for the good of all. Which isn’t easy to pull off on screen or in real life, and it’s hard to find in most movies about a group of red-blooded warriors.

This hunger for more led me to find (and buy!) the Criterion edition of this film. During this time, I learned more about Criterion and your mission, and because of your hard work, over the years it has become my number one film of all time. A cherished possession.

My ion for Seven Samurai led me to ask: “What if there are other great films in this collection? Is it possible to find another needle in this ever-growing haystack?” And this is how my adventure started: not as a challenge, but with the hope that I could revisit that feeling through other Criterion films. If it happened one more time, then I’d be happy. If it happened more than once, I’d consider it a miracle.

Over the course of fifteen years, I’ve been able to feel that way countless times. Several Criterion films have found their way into my all-time favorites list alongside Seven Samurai. I’m thinking of Ermanno Olmi’s The Fiancés (I fidanzati), a film about a man and a woman whose relationship is tested when one lover departs for a job in the south of Italy. For me, this beloved romantic drama captures not only the rapture but also the fragility of a union in liminal space.

I must also mention La Jetée, a film that has inspired me so much that I don’t want to know anything about it; how it was made, why it was made, or what it’s about. I just want to watch it and remain in awe of Chris Marker’s ability to generate such commotion through stillness.

I could go on. And on.

My contributions to Letterboxd are a result of the works your team restores on a daily basis. You have shaped my tastes and encouraged me to better understand why the films I love make me feel the way they do.

But that isn’t the only thing that I’ve learned throughout this process.

Criterion centers its mission around releasing important classic and contemporary works. But what’s “important” is subjective. Cinema will always be personal to us as movie lovers, which is why our cinematic world requires many companies who do what you do, working alongside you. And while we may sometimes be able to achieve a consensus, rarely is the adoration for any film in a collection absolute.

But that’s okay. Because you’ve also shown me that one of the joys of the collection is the search for my next favorite film. And once it’s discovered, I realize that I’ve traversed the world due to the selections. I’ve defined what’s important to me when it comes to what I love about cinema. I value restraint in the films that I love, which is my favorite aspect of Götz Spielmann’s Revanche, a film that opens with a rash decision yet “builds its tension with austerity” according to Hutch, one of my Letterboxd buddies. I also credit Criterion, and cinema in general, with helping me cope with the unease and discomfort of the world we live in. A world perpetually in limbo; a space that is not unlike Safe, Todd Haynes’ environmental drama that predates our struggle with Covid. Yet it still channels the fear and paranoia of a time in which the threat is unseen yet ever-present.

But this process of discovery has also exposed me to a world outside of my own four walls.

Many years ago, I gave up on Hollywood due to its lack of representation, embracing international cinema for its diversity of people and perspective. I still didn’t see a lot of people who looked like me—but unlike the USA, that’s not uncommon in late-communist Poland, German-occupied , or the streets of Tehran. I’d include the continent of Africa as well. The unique experiences that Black Africans face are much different than my own and highlighted expertly in films like Djibril Diop Mambéty’s Touki Bouki and Arie and Chuko Esiri’s Eyimofe (This is My Desire). Yet I was still able to connect to their stories. The same goes for the fortunes, both good and bad, that the subjects in these films have to deal with. After many movies, I’ve recognized my privilege and I count my blessings, all while sharing in the joys and sorrows of the characters on the screen.

We didn’t need to grow up in the same country. We don’t need to speak the same language. Nor do we need to share the same world-view or live during the same period of time. The films are enough because they lay bare the human condition and show me that there are no obstructions to my sympathy. My concern for another knows no bounds once the lives of others project onto the screen in front of me.

And that’s why I’m stopping to say “Thank you”. Not because of a specific film, but because of the way that these films make me feel. That feeling has everything to do with the love and care that shines through in the work that you do. You may think that you’re only restoring a film, but these films can also restore attributes of our humanity that are in short supply. Attributes such as patience, sensitivity, a meditative spirit, and curiosity. Your work rekindled these attributes in me.

I hope this message encourages you as you continue to pursue your mission, knowing that keeping us entertained isn’t the only thing that your work is good for. It’s also reshaping the hearts and minds of those who are willing to open themselves up: both to a new type of cinema as well as stories that push us beyond our own perspective. A perspective that then becomes a reflection as we recognize, in each film, the ties that bind us all.

Sincerely,
Adam Davie

P.S. I am not one to jump in your mentions and/or DMs in order to ask you to release a particular film, but since I have this platform... I recently watched a film that I believe is important enough for you to consider restoring: A Time for Burning. It’s an Oscar-nominated documentary about a white pastor who attempted to integrate his all-white church during the civil rights movement. My synopsis won’t do the film justice (though Ads’ Letterboxd review might help).

The streaming options, as of today, are limited to YouTube and The Internet Archive, but it’s a beautiful film that’s in need of some TLC, and it’s my hope that you’d consider taking this film in, restoring it, and giving it the platform that it absolutely deserves.