The Criterion Channel Doesn’t Officially Launch Until April 2019, But They’ve Already Started Streaming Out Of Print Classics

Only five days before cinephiles should have celebrated its second anniversary, WarnerMedia announced plans to shutter FilmStruck. Film buffs and filmmakers alike mourned but also took action, not allowing the Turner Classic Movies/Criterion Collection-curated streaming service to disappear without a fight. Open letters to WarnerMedia executives, change.org petitions, and thousands of social media posts interrupted the final countdown, at which point Criterion announced plans for a stand-alone service to continue the FilmStruck mission.

The Criterion Channel launches Apr. 8, and none too soon. Life without FilmStruck has been like surviving on Wonder Bread and Kraft Singles after traveling for two years with Anthony Bourdain (RIP) trying the best cheese sandwiches—chilled, grilled, deconstructed—around the world.

FilmStruck possessed many virtues, none greater than the access it provided to otherwise unavailable films. If, like me, you wanted to do a deep dive on every version of A Star Is Born before seeing Lady Gaga in Bradley Cooper’s now-Oscar-nominated version, only FilmStruck offered George Cukor’s What Price Hollywood? (1932), released five years before the first A Star Is Born (1937) with a nearly identical storyline. While all four films sharing the iconic title are widely available, good luck now finding the earlier Oscar nominee for “Best Writing, Original Story.”

Nov. 29 was to be FilmStruck’s d-day, but viewers (including yours truly) just kept watching, trying to catch all the hard-to-find titles possible before they disappeared: The fascinating (but appalling) relic of 1930s social mores presented in The Silver Cord (1933); the graphic but engrossing British reform school girls drama Scrubbers (1982); and Cluny Brown (1946), the final film completed by Ernst Lubitsch, along with dozens of others, became impossible to watch once FilmStruck shut-down. Hopefully, the launch of The Criterion Channel will make many of these films accessible once again.

And even with seven-plus weeks remaining before launch, the embers of FilmStruck’s phoenix have begun to glow. Every Wednesday, Criterion Channel “Charter Subscribers” have access to a new film (plus supplementary material) at criterionchannel.com. The “Movie of the Week” remains a surprise until it goes live and remains available for just one week, until the next selection appears.

Becoming a charter subscriber has already provided some fantastic offerings. First up was Elaine May’s Mikey and Nicky (1976), which recently received the Criterion treatment with Blu-Ray and DVD releases last month but remains unavailable to stream elsewhere.

Also unavailable elsewhere, Wong Kar-wai’s Chungking Express (1994) followed, with all of the out-of-print Criterion edition’s supplemental materials included as well as an episode of “Under the Influence” featuring Barry Jenkins describing Wong’s influence on his work.

Next was a double feature celebration of the great actor Albert Finney, who had passed away the week before on Feb. 7. Tom Jones (1963) is widely available, and features one of Finney’s most famous performances, which earned him the first of his five Oscar nominations (and criminally no wins). But completely unavailable is the phenomenal Saturday Night and Sunday Morning (1960), featuring the actor’s breakout and first major lead role.

This week’s selection, Andrei Tarkovsky’s sci-fi masterpiece Stalker (1979), comes with all of Criterion’s extras. So set aside three hours and get your charter subscription. Doing so now will lock-in discounted subscription fees ($9.99/month or $89.99/year) for as long as you keep your subscription active, and you won’t even be charged until an additional 30-day trial period ends on May 8. Plus, the anticipation for each Movie of the Week reveal and eventual launch of the full service? Well, that seems priceless.

Aaron Dobbs (@aaronoof) is a writer, film programmer, and festival producer living in Brooklyn with his wife and two kids. His writing has appeared on Gothamist.com, Indiewire.com, TribecaFilm.com, and his neglected blog Out of Focus.

Stream Stalker on The Criterion Channel (For A Limited Time Only!)