Austin cinephiles, grab your smelling salts.
Swoon-worthy news today from the Criterion Collection: They’re rolling their mobile version of the Criterion Closet into town for SXSW, and if you’re lucky enough to enter this sacred space, you can get up to three deeply discounted discs of damn fine cinema.
The Criterion Closet has hosted scads of faces famous to arthouse fans. Everybody from rising stars Mikey Madison (Anora) and Harris Dickinson (Babygirl) to directing heavyweights Bong Joon Ho (Parasite) and Barry Jenkins (Moonlight) have nerded out on camera, combing through the collection and waxing rhapsodic about their favorite filmmakers. (You can watch the whole “Closet Picks” playlist on YouTube.)
Criterion debuted a mobile version of the closet at the New York Film Festival, and that’s the Cineaste’s-Nirvana-on-Wheels that’s rolling into town for SXSW. Open to the public and parked for four days in front of the Paramount Theatre, the closet comes stocked with more than 1,000 films: “every in-print edition from the Criterion Collection, including box sets, as well as all in-print releases from [the] Eclipse and Janus Contemporaries lines.” If you make it into the closet, you’ll have the chance to buy up to three items at 40% off, in honor of Criterion’s 40th anniversary. Purchase isn’t required, but hot damn, that’s a good deal. Oh, and cameras will be rolling, so if you want to sound extra smart, better start workshopping your Mizoguchi takes now.
The mobile closet’s operational window is pretty small – Friday, March 7, 3-7pm; Saturday-Sunday, March 8-9, 11am-7pm; and Monday, March 10 at 11-5pm – and you’ll only have three minutes in the closet, which is why Criterion is encouraging you to make the trip with up to five friends. There are no advance reservations or time slots, so get ready to stand in line. At least you know you’ll be in good company.
Read more about the Criterion Mobile Closet’s visit to Austin.
This article appears in February 14 • 2025.
