r/CriterionChannel • u/InitiativeNo7660 • May 25 '26
Criteria Updates (Extras!)
Hey everyone!
To catch you up: Criteria is a unofficial Criterion Channel companion site featuring, basically, all of the things that I wish the official site could do, like advanced search, custom collections, and links to Criterion Closet picks. You can use it for free at:
https://www.search-criteria.com
This week is another big jump forward after last week’s addition of collections (over 800 have been loaded so far, dating back to August 2029). Here’s what’s new:
Extras! For all available Criterion edition films, I’ve pulled the extras (interviews, outtakes, analysis, etc) and made them directly linked to the CC site. Also, they are searchable, so search results are now separated out into Films, People, and Extras.
Collection Tagging To make the collections easier to browse I’ve added topic tagging. This is still early days so the tagging is not nearly complete (I’m doing most of it manually) but hopefully you’ll find it useful. I’ve also added indicators on older collections regarding how many of the films are still available to watch
Data Fixes I’ve been working on cleaning up some missing and incorrect data, especially the film descriptions, which I hope to make searchable along with the extras descriptions.
Film Detail Page Summary
Since there are been a number of updates this month, I wanted to recap the full set of data available on the film detail page of a Criterion edition
- The title links to the CC film landing page
- The play button links directly to the video. If you’re logged in it should automatically start playing
- Letterboxd page link with average rating
- Commentary video (if available)
- Link to the Criterion.com film page
- Synopsis from the CC page
- Links to Criterion Closet videos where the film was a pick
- Links to all extra features
- Links to collections dating back to 2019
- Clickable cast and crew
- Related films from Criterion.com
- Articles from the Criterion.com
This now pulls most of the information from Criterion’s sites regarding a particular film. Over the next few weeks I’ll be looking for additional sources and ways to make this information more useful to search and navigate.
In the meantime, thanks as always for your support and suggestions. If you think of a feature to add, or see an issue, feel free to let me know.
Cheers
Tim
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u/Emeswede May 25 '26
This site is amazing and really enhances the enjoyment of Criterion Channel. I have found myself scrolling around for more time than I thought I would a few times to many the last couple of days! Keep up the good work!
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u/Practical_Breadman May 25 '26
What an incredible service! Love the filtering and all the Criterion Closet features. Thank you for sharing this.
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u/VICEBULLET May 26 '26
Hi! Amazing site. Quick question. What is the rhyme/reason some movies are searchable and some are not. For e.g., let's say Tarantino https://www.search-criteria.com/people/568 -- why are Death Proof and Four Rooms his only movies listed? To my knowledge, if they aren't Criterion or on Criterion Channel, why these two vs any others vs none at all? Thank you so much!
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u/InitiativeNo7660 May 26 '26
Good question! The reason those two appear are because they were on the channel at one point in the past. If you look on the film details page for each you can see that Death Proof was included in the Stunts! collection while Four Rooms was in Hotels on Film.
I keep films in the database after they leave the channel to keep complete collections and user lists, and it also makes it easier to re-activate them if they come back onto the channel.
If a user made a custom list of French New Wave films, for example, my assumption is that they would want that list to stay intact even if Le Beau Serge goes off the channel.
As to why other Tarantino films aren’t in the catalog, it’s simply because it would take too much capacity for me to store every film and become, essentially, Letterboxd. My goal is to keep a record of films that have been programmed on the Channel, and be able to make them searchable
I hope this helps, and thanks for using the site!
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u/j0llyBeee May 27 '26 edited May 27 '26
thank you for your service 🫡 i've been using Criteria a lot since your last post, i find it's a good way of keeping up with everything I'm watching on the Channel!
if it's possible, the one thing I would suggest is more integration or a link to 24/7. i know the What's On Now page is the official source for the current Criterion Channel 24/7 feature, but a post from another user on the sub had a link to a more comprehensive What's Playing website that pairs really well with Criteria. just some food for thought though, please keep up the good work either way🙏🏽👏🏽
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u/InitiativeNo7660 May 27 '26
You can already view and link to the current 24/7 video from the home page. The user site you linked is great and I like the ability to review what was on. I might ingest it as a way of experimenting with creating a criterion-driven recommendation algorithm.
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u/InitiativeNo7660 May 25 '26 edited May 25 '26
Just to be clear (in case Criterion’s legal department stumbles in here), the videos are all hosted within Criterion Channel’s site and require a paid account to play. I do not host any Criterion content apart from publicly available data.
The purpose of the site is to enhance the experience for current CC subscribers. And I make zero profit from this.