Who's Getting Safe in August? We All Are!

I don't mean to besmirch the rest of Criterion's just today announced line-up for August 2026 but when the headliner is Todd Haynes' 1995 masterpiece Safe getting a 4K upgrade I'm going to be somewhat hyper-focused. Haynes has several masterpieces under his belt but I'd say this is the crown-jewel -- or to continue the belt metaphor this would be the buckle. And now I need to own a belt buckle that has that famous image from the poster of that woman in her white body-suit lurching like Bigfoot through a field. (Which reminds me that I own a copy of the original Safe poster and how the hell is that not hanging on my wall?) Anyway I couldn't cough up enough superlatives about this movie -- I think it's one of the greatest American films ever made, and it only feels more resonant and affecting with every year that passes. While I'm still dying for Velvet Goldmine to get an upgrade already -- long long long overdue, that one -- the ocassion of Safe in 4K is a hallelujah moment if ever there was one. That lands on August 4th.

Safe aside August will also bring a double-feature of Barbara Kopple documentaries -- her most celerated one Harlan County USA from 1976 is getting the 4K upgrade from a previous release, while 1990's American Dream, about a labor strike in Austin in the mid0-80s is hitting the Collection for the first time. I've never seen the latter so that'll be something to look forward to. 

Next up is French legend Bertrand Tavernier's 1981 classic Coup de torchon starring Isabelle Huppert in a Jim Thompson adaptation about a corrupt cop in West Africa and the dangerous and unprectiable gal he falls for. "Dangerous and Unpredictable" -- has there ever been  a quicker distillation of The Whole Huppert Thing? After that there's James Gray's directorial debut Little Odessa from 1994 -- I have never seen this! Could this be the movie that convinces me James Gray deserves the hype people throw on him? Because I have yet to really get it. With a cast that includes Tim Roth, Vanessa Redgrave, Maximillian Schell, and Edward Furlong... uhh I don't know where I was going with that. With every name that list of names got weirder and weirder and threw me off. Anyway the final August release from our favorite physical media barons is a box-set of documentaries from the Japanese legends Kazuo Hara & Sachiko Kobayashi -- Extreme Private Eros: Love Song 1974 and The Emperor’s Naked Army Marches On have both been on my To Watch list for years and years so I embrace this golden opportunity to fill them holes. In summation -- SAFE IN 4K!!!!!!