Criterion Collection Releases Special Blu-ray Edition of The Last Picture Show (2023)

4K UHD Releases, Blu-ray Releases | Nov 14, 2023

Criterion Collection

Peter Bogdanovich’s The Last Picture Show is one of the key films crafted during the American seventies cinema renaissance. The film is set in the early 1950’s, in the loneliest Texas nowheresville to ever dust up a movie screen. This aching portrait of a dying West, adapted from Larry McMurtry’s novel, focuses on the daily shuffles of three futureless teens—enigmatic Sonny (Timothy Bottoms), wayward jock Duane (Jeff Bridges), and desperate-to-be-adored rich girl Jacy (Cybill Shepherd) — and the aging lost souls who bump up against them in the night, including Cloris Leachman’s lonely housewife and Ben Johnson’s grizzled movie-house proprietor. Featuring evocative black-and-white imagery and profoundly felt performances, this hushed depiction of crumbling American values remains the pivotal work in the career of invaluable film historian and director Peter Bogdanovich.

Criterion Collection Special Edition Features:

  • 4K digital restoration of the director’s cut, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack
  • One 4K UHD disc of the film presented in Dolby Vision HDR and two Blu-rays with the film and special features
  • Texasville (1990), the sequel to The Last Picture Show, presented in both the original theatrical version and a black-and-white version of Peter Bogdanovich’s director’s cut, produced in collaboration with cinematographer Nicholas von Sternberg
  • Two audio commentaries, featuring Bogdanovich and actors Cybill Shepherd, Randy Quaid, Cloris Leachman, and Frank Marshall
  • Three documentaries about the making of the film
  • Q&A with Bogdanovich from 2009
  • Screen tests and location footage
  • Introduction to Texasville featuring Bogdanovich, Shepherd, and actor Jeff Bridges
  • Excerpts from a 1972 television interview with filmmaker François Truffaut about the New Hollywood
  • Trailers
  • English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
  • PLUS: An essay by film critic Graham Fuller and excerpts from an interview with Bogdanovich about Texasville, with a new introduction by Bogdanovich biographer Peter Tonguette
  • Cover by F. Ron Miller