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Rialto Nabs Theatrical Rights To StudioCanal Catalog

While their home video releases have been relatively underwhelming, the company known as StudioCanal still carries one of the most sought after catalogs in cinema, and it’s now in the distribution hands of none other than Rialto.

Variety reports that Rialto has nabbed the rights to the 2000+ film catalog of StudioCanal, starting with Paul Verhoeven’s Total Recall, which recently re-released into theaters in anticipation of the also recently released remake/reboot.

Rialto themselves have recently made waves with their upcoming release of ‘The Hitchcock Nine,’ nine silent films from the master of suspense which they and the BFI and Park Circus Films recently restored, will take on films like Godard’s Alphaville, a new restoration of Marcel Carne’s Port Of Shadows, This Is Spinal Tap, as well as films from Alain Resnais, Sam Raimi, Oliver Stone, Mike Nichols and a pair of Alexander Mackendrick pictures (The Ladykillers and The Man In The White Suit).

Personally, while it’s upsetting to see a name other than Janus take on this catalogue, at least something will happen with these films. I’m particularly interested in the new print of Port Of Shadows, a film I do really quite enjoy, and is obviously out of print via The Criterion Collection. It’s not one of their biggest titles, but it is very much a great film, so hopefully it will be one of their pending Blu-ray releases. Overall, this is great news for cinephiles, but Criterion fans may have to wait a minute before getting these pictures back in their grasp. There has been a relationship between Rialto and Janus/Criterion before (hence the giant Rialto 10th anniversary box set the company released), but with Canal’s much talked about excavation of their canon from Criterion’s ranks, it doesn’t seem like we’ll be getting another one of those any time soon. Remember, this is only for theatrical release. Who knows what this all may hold for home video down the line.

Source Variety

Joshua Brunsting

Josh is a critic, a member of the Online Film Critics Society, a wrestling nerd, a hip-hop head, a father, a cinephile and a man looking to make his stamp on the world, one word at a time.