"With its exquisite packaging, reminiscent of old rock posters with a subtle Hatch Show Print letterpress homage (even using a textured paper), this boxed set is a treasure. I was especially thrilled to find extra footage of songs and bands that were left out of the original film. This footage is a time capsule of California (and American) culture in the sixties, that as a Californian, I find warmly nostalgic. There is so much gritty footage of the crowd, and of the various bands in preparation for the event—it humanizes them and makes these often idolized figures, seem real and accessible."

"I love L.A. Confidential. If it’s on for even a second, I just watch it to the end. I almost want to call my cable service provider and ask them not to show it any more, because it has overwhelmed my life. It’s because I’m from California, from Los Angeles, because the idea of police corruption, of political ambition, of logic and defying expectations. Really, Bud White is Rudy, in the thug cop questing for detective greatness. [laughs] There’s something about that. Also, the way that it commingles all of the ideas of pornography and politics and financial development and mob power and drugs. You know, I studied history and English at UCLA, and one of the big themes in a bunch of our history classes had to do with, “How is it that Los Angeles and Hollywood and California present themselves to the world as both this destination place of palm trees and glitter and gold and your future, and also corruption and deceit?” There’s this duality to it, and I just think that Curtis Hanson’s way of delivering that… And the performances! I mean, David Strathairn and Russell Crowe and Kim Basinger and Kevin Spacey and James Cromwell… Police corruption, and justice, vigilante justice, and it’s just got everything. It’s just a perfect movie."