Criterion in November 2023: Jackie Chan, Martin Scorsese, Claude Chabrol

This is no joke: early Jackie Chan is coming to the Criterion Collection.

Joining his stone-cold classics Police Story and Police Story 2 in the esteemed home-video company's library, Jackie Chan: Emergence of a Superstar will be released in November 2023 in a fancy box-set.

These films have been available on the Criterion Channel for your streaming pleasure since May/June 2020, when I wrote about them, but home-video buffs know that streaming quality does not equal physical-media quality, plus you never know when streaming services will lose their rights or even (gasp!) go away altogether, so those who know and love the 'emerging superstar' will pre-order now. The box-set includes new audio commentaries for two films, The Fearless Hyena and The Young Master, as well as an interview with author, raconteur, and fearless Hong Kong cinema expert Grady Hendrix, who (literally) wrote a great book on it (These Fists Break Bricks).

Now, for those few of you who are not fans of the early Jackie Chan, your excitement will surely swell with the opportunity to own any or all of the following, which will all be available in 4K: Martin Scorsese's Mean Streets, which should look gritty; Terrence Malick's Days of Heaven, which should look divine; and Peter Bogdanovich's The Last Picture Show, which should look awesome in black and white, especially since it comes with the sequel, Texasville, in both color and black and white versions.

Plus, for fans of superb and classy fare, Claude Chabrol's very tasty La cérémonie will be available on Blu-ray and DVD.

Note: all these titles will be available in November, so you will legitimately have no money left to give gifts to others in December. And so it goes. Visit the official Criterion site to place your orders and/or weep over lost youth. Or maybe that's just me. Ah, the 70s. And young Jackie Chan.