DVD Reviews
Bringing Up Baby Warner Home Video
Starring Katharine Hepburn and Cary Grant
Directed by Howard Hawks
The Philadelphia Story Warner Home Video
Starring Katharine Hepburn, James Steward and Cary Grant
Directed by George Cukor
Reviewed by Deborah Beckers
The first film I watched in this newly released double bill was Bringing Up Baby (1938). This is a great screwball comedy, possibly director Howard Hawks’ best, with the classic battle of the sexes thrown in. Cary Grant, as Dr. David Huxley, plays against type as an uptight nerdy palaeontologist who needs Katharine Hepburn’s daffy, scattered society heiress (Susan Vance) to give him a *ahem* bone (insert your own joke here). Absurd situations, cross dressing, a leopard named “baby,” mistaken identity, a drunken Irish gardener and humiliations galore, make this a movie you won’t soon forget. Another nice twist is that Hepburn’s character chases Grant, in order to liberate him from his boring life and his frigid fiancé.
Unfortunately in 1938 the movie tanked and Hepburn was labelled “Box Office Poison.” This sent her into the relative obscurity of the Broadway stage version of The Philadelphia Story (the play itself was a hit playing for over 400 performances) in a part that had been written with her in mind: High strung Heiress Tracy Lord. Hepburn’s close friend Howard Hughes bought the rights for her and Hepburn had complete creative control over the movie, right down to the casting. She did an absolutely brilliant job.
The Philadelphia Story (1940) is a nice complement to Bringing Up Baby. Their stories are parallel, but the characters are reversed. In The Philadelphia Story, Tracy is on the verge of her second marriage. Her Father has allegedly run off with a dancer, her ex-husband is back and is constantly in her face and the scandal sheets are watching her every move. What’s a headstrong woman to do? Take control. That’s exactly what Tracy does. Sort of. When love and responsibility rear their heads an heiress has just got to go with the flow and follow her heart.
Hepburn played up the public’s perception of her as a snooty society grand dame. This gave the public a chance to see her in a role that they already associated her with, but this time they got to see her be humbled by the power of love. The movie was a hit; garnering six Academy Award nominations (Jimmy Stewart won for best actor). All was forgiven.
I am going to sound like my father when I say this, but it’s so true that I must… They just don’t make movies like this anymore, and that is truly a crying shame. The dialogue is quick and fresh, even today. The underlying humour is subtle and smart. The acting is top notch. The actors’ ability to poke fun at their true public personas take the films to the next level.
Of the two films, The Philadelphia Story is my favourite. The cast is divine, their timing perfect. You will find yourself glued to the screen for each and every scene. I watched both films several times and every time I caught something new. Just amazing. Hepburn’s triumphant return indeed!
Both titles were released separately on March 1st, and include some extras for all you Grant and Hepburn fans. There are a couple of nice biographies, but there is nothing in them that would be new to most of their fans. They’re good bios, but they feel a bit tacked on. The movies are the main attraction of this pack; the extras are just filler, enjoyable but not required viewing. If you’re looking to expand your collection of classics you can’t go wrong with this duo.
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The Corporation Zeitgeist Video
Directed by Jennifer Abbot and Mark Achbar
Written by Joel Bakan and Harold Crooks
Reviewed by Adam D. Miller
The Corporation is the latest in a series of politically driven documentaries that have managed to find pop appeal in recent years. Featuring interviews with dozens of corporate figures, as well as usual sociopolitical critics like Michael Moore, Naomi Klein and Noam Chomsky, the film takes a look at the typical corporation and how it seems to be operating on a double standard.
On the one hand, corporations are legally offered the rights of a human being. On the other hand, they get away with much more than people do. As Samuel Epstein, Professor Emeritus of Environmental Medicine at U of Illinois says in the documentary, “If I take a gun and shoot you, that’s criminal. If I expose you to some chemicals which knowingly are going to kill you, what difference is there? The difference is that it takes longer to kill you.”
A large chunk of the film is devoted to a diagnostic checklist of a corporation, as if they were a mental patient. According to the film, some of the characteristics that many corporations seem to have are “callous unconcern for the feelings of others,” “incapacity to maintain enduring relationships,” “reckless disregard for the safety of others,” and “failure to conform to social norms with respect to lawful behaviors.” The verdict? According to Dr. Robert Hare, Ph.D., consultant to the FBI on psychopaths, “If we look at a corporation as a legal person, it may not that be difficult to actually draw the transition between psychopathy and the individual to psychopathy and the corporation.”
The Corporation is a convincing representation of the corporation as monster that could have only been made in Canada (or Europe). A winner of 23 international awards, including the Sundance audience award for Word Cinema-Documentary, and while relatively one-sided, should provide consumers some knowledge about the people whom we help make wealthy.
By showing us visual stimulants like old advertisements, information films and documentary footage, The Corporation is able to extend far beyond simply a collection of interviews. At times, the documentary reaches humorous levels and the pacing is one of its strong points.
For those who wanted more interviews, disc two of the DVD contains over five hours of additional interview footage with the film’s 40 interviewees. Bonus features also include video interviews with the filmmakers from a wide variety of sources, eight deleted scenes, not one, but two audio commentaries by the filmmakers, and an interview with writer Joel Bakan by Janeane Garofalo from Air America’s Majority Report; all making the DVD a worthy addition to the collection of anybody interested in sociopolitical documentaries.
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Dinner at Eight Warner Home Video
Starring Marie Dressler, John Barrymore, Billie Burke, Wallace Beery, Jean Harlow, Lionel Barrymore, etc.
Directed by George Cukor
Reviewed by Mark Pittman
Like To Be or Not To Be reviewed below, I had not seen this movie until its DVD release. Based on the film’s title, I thought this film would most likely be a lighthearted, 1930s comedy about New York’s high society. Dinner at Eight actually does concern New York’s elite, but this movie is not a comedy. It is most definitely a tragedy. I’m just not sure it’s as great a tragedy as other reviewers have claimed.
The only way I can think to describe what I found wrong with this film is to make an analogy to another genre: the horror genre. If you’re making a zombie picture and have one terrifying zombie chasing your movie’s protagonist, then that’s scary. If you have two or three terrifying zombies chasing your protagonist, even better. But if you have 8, 10, or a million zombies chasing your protagonist, then things start to get silly.
If Dinner at Eight were a horror flick, I would have it exterminate a few of its zombies.
The problem here is that every main character in the film is about to fail in life and it just so happens that they are all going to fail on the same night—the night of the dinner. Conveniently, everyone also has a slightly different way of failing. We get to witness all the different ways in which people fail, and even the peripheral characters in the lives of the main characters will soon have to suffer because of the main characters’ failures. Is it really possible that everything can go to pot for everyone on the very night of this important dinner? Why, that means even dinner is ruined!!
This film was made during the depression, and I suppose the movie (based on a successful play) held its appeal for audiences in demonstrating that even the very rich were then having trouble surviving. Jean Harlow, playing a peroxide blonde floozy, was at the height of her popularity when this movie was made. Having watched both this film and the documentary on her life that comes with this DVD, I still have a hard time understanding what the big deal was about her. But by playing a tramp, out to hustle some dough out of whoever was stupid enough to hook up with her, maybe she endeared herself to the average, disempowered moviegoer. Here’s a girl who’s not too bright and kind of trashy, but she knows how to survive and how to do it in style by using everything she’s got, physically and mentally. That kind of sass must have appealed to the majority of Americans looking for a way out.
The Dinner at Eight trailer that comes with this DVD compares its film favorably with the previous year’s Grand Hotel, a similarly star-studded drama. But the two actors common to both movies, Wallace Beery and Lionel Barrymore, were far better in Grand Hotel than in this movie. Among Dinner at Eight’s star actors, Billie Burke (known mainly as Glinda, the Good Witch of the North) is perfect as the super-refined hostess of the ill-fated dinner party; and Edmund Lowe is impressive as the kind doctor with an eye for Jean Harlow.
Strangely, though, the actors with the smallest roles impress the most—Hilda Vaughn as Jean Harlow’s outrageously surly maid and Grant Mitchell as the unimpressed husband who can’t stand that he’s missing the latest Garbo film for an important dinner party. Even the ever-annoying Lee Tracey delivers a blistering speech to John Barrymore’s character late in the film that makes me ashamed for ever doubting his acting ability.
If you’re already a fan of this film, you may find my earlier criticisms overly harsh. But I’m not the only one who thought this film took itself too seriously! Included on this DVD release is one of the funniest short comedies I have ever seen: a 22-minute satire on Dinner at Eight, made the same year (1933). A cast of lookalikes and soundalikes have a field day parodying every major scene in the movie. It’s as if Mel Brooks went back in time and put the Spaceballs treatment on Dinner at Eight. It’s really unbelievable how modern the humor is for 1933. For this hilarious short comedy alone, I would recommend this DVD edition of Dinner at Eight. But I would also recommend that you see the main attraction first: you might find it more compelling than I did.
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Edison: The Invention of the Movies Kino
Reviewed by Mark Pittman
Okay, I’m admitting it right now. My favorite show on television is “Antiques Roadshow.” If that makes me a geek, fine. But it has everything: history, geography, genealogy, art, money. No sex or violence, but you’ve got the rest of television for that.
The new Edison: The Invention of the Movies DVD box set from Kino is “Antiques Roadshow” for film geeks. With more than 16 hours of footage spread over 4 DVDs, it, too, has everything. Even sex and violence!
History? How about the first film ever made (1889)?
That’s a scary piece of footage. Even though still photography was a mature art form by the late 1800s, this first film demonstrates the difficulty of capturing a moving image at several frames per second. The resulting camera test of a man(?) moving his body in front of the camera looks like some indistinct nightmare David Lynch might dream up. Edison shot a second test film several days later. Like a recovering patient peering through an anesthetic haze, we can now make out human details: those are arms moving, it looks vaguely like a man, and he’s smiling.
So there is the fascination of seeing some the earliest and most primitive films ever made. There’s the first sound film (“Dickson’s Experimental Sound Film” - 1895) and a few early color films, for which each individual frame had to be hand-painted (the best example: “Three American Beauties” - 1906). These early films generally last only 15 seconds and often record simple scenes from life: a man sneezing, an athlete excising, blacksmiths hammering on an anvil, etc.
And while we usually think of commercialism in film as a phenomenon that happened much later, a few enterprising viewers, as early as 1894, began to recognize the commercial potential of the movies. That year Edison “commercials” begin to appear, starring such enterprising self-promoters as Sandow “The Strongest Man in the World,” Annie Oakley, the contortionist Louis Martinetty, and numerous other entertainers like the man who stages boxing matches between his two cats (gloves included). Edison himself even appears in a promotional film, pouring liquids into beakers and adjusting valves on a maze of tubes in a staged chemical laboratory. He may have been a great inventor, but he was also a great promoter and always kept his eye on the bottom line.
Even though Edison made films solely to sell film projectors (as we learn in the DVD commentary), his company produced an amazing variety of movies, including comedies, animation, news reportage, fairy tales, war propaganda, burlesque acts, disaster footage, fistfights, films on hygiene, films on magnetism, films on vigilante groups, westerns, amusement park scenes, travel films, Christmas films, morality plays, serials, social criticism…all of which are represented in this box set. There’s so much variety on each of the four DVDs, in fact, that it takes no effort at all to watch the contents of an entire DVD (4 hours) in one sitting.
Several of these films have appeared on DVD before, but here they appear to have been more meticulously remastered, which provides greater visual detail. For example, I had already seen 1907’s “The ‘Teddy’ Bears” on another excellent DVD compilation, More Treasures from American Film Archives. On that set, the people in bear suits reenacting the Goldilocks tale seemed uninteresting as a bear family working through all the normal (human) family problems. But on the Edison box set, the superior remastering reveals much greater detail in the bears’ faces which makes “Baby Bear getting spanked by Papa Bear” that much funnier.
In addition to the 140 films included in this box are over two hours of interviews with Edison film curators, as well as with college academics familiar with the Edison material. (The DVD conveniently includes options of either watching the films with specialist interviews interspersed or watching the films without the interviews.) Of particular interest is the professor of African American Studies from the College of New York who offers some surprising opinions about some of the more controversial films in this set, such as “Watermelon Eating Contest”.
Of course, not everyone will find all the films entertaining. In particular, animal lovers should be warned: silent filmmakers were notoriously indifferent to the feelings of animals, and a few films in this box set will make you want to run out and join PETA. In addition to the boxing match between two cats mentioned earlier, you get footage of a cockfight, and what is certainly the most revolting film in this collection, “Electrocuting an Elephant.” If you’ve seen the Errol Morris documentary Mr. Death, then you’ve already endured this excruciatingly unpleasant film. But as with all the films in this collection, helpful background information is always just a few menu clicks away. In this case, the film notes inform us that the unfortunate elephant had just killed his third human the previous day and, therefore, had to be “put down.” Don’t know why they had to make a film of it, but there it is…
On a more pleasant note, it’s fascinating to witness the Edison filmmakers learn how to tell a story on film. From the bizarre narrative technique of “Going to the Fire” (1896), we see them advance to the genuinely exciting first western “The Great Train Robbery” (1903), and on to the Edison Company’s late pastoral masterpiece, “One Touch of Nature” (1914). In just thirty years the Edison company graduated from capturing indistinct moving images on film to producing 90-minute features such as The Unbeliever (starring Erich von Stroheim), the film which ends this compilation.".
It is impossible to review this box set and do it justice. If you’ve seen these films before, this is the best they’ve ever looked. If you want to learn more about film history, or silent film specifically, this is the perfect place to start.
Give it a try. You’ll probably like it more than you think.
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Starring the voices of Craig T. Nelson, Holly Hunter, and Samuel L. Jackson
Directed by Brad Bird
Rating: PG
Reviewed by D.R. Scott
When a movie is great, it doesn’t matter what genre it “belongs” to. Usually, the only people who care whether a movie is a comedy, horror, western, science fiction, drama or whatever (and then judge it according to their prejudices) are either snobs who think they’re Roger Ebert or humorless Dilberts who are compelled to categorize everything.
However, even though Hollywood has rewarded us with classics like It Happened One Night, Unforgiven, North By Northwest, Singing In The Rain and 2001: A Space Odysessy, I sadly resigned myself to the fact that I probably would never see a great comic book movie about superheroes. It seemed to be a slippery and misunderstood genre that couldn’t make the successful jump from page to screen.
Happily, I’ve been proven wrong. The Incredibles, the latest masterpiece from those nutball geniuses at Pixar studios, is the great comic book movie that I’ve been waiting for. Written and directed by Brad Bird (who also did The Iron Giant, a gentle, eloquent and shamefully ignored movie), it honors and validates the mythology behind comic book superheroes. Unlike sneering assassins like Tim Burton (who could barely hide his contempt for Batman), Bird loves these heroic archetypes passionately. And he shows us why they’re important.
Our first look at Mr. Incredible is when he’s being interviewed on a TV news program and, sounding like an overworked housewife, complains that “no matter how many times you save the world, it doesn’t stay saved.” We see what he’s talking about when, in a single evening, Mr. Incredible battles a villainous, bomb-tossing Frenchman, stops a speeding subway train from plunging off the tracks and rescues a kitten stuck up a tree.
But Mr. Incredible's life irrevocably changes for the worse after he saves a man from committing suicide who later sues the dumbfounded superhero for “emotional distress.” A few hundred frivolous lawsuits later, the U.S. government creates a law declaring superheroes illegal (a sly “nudge nudge, wink wink” allusion to Alan Moore’s and Dave Gibbon’s Watchmen) and Mr. Incredible finds himself out of a job.
Years later, the former Mr. Incredible is now Bob Parr, an ordinary insurance claims adjuster trapped in a hateful job and bullied daily by a tyrannical boss. The only heroic deeds he does anymore is secretly whispering legal advice to clients his company is trying to cheat.
It isn’t any better after work either, where Bob comes home to an unhappy family that’s more like the Osbournes than the Brady Bunch. Like himself, they also have superpowers, but are forced to keep their special gifts hidden from a world that fears and distrusts people like “them.” And the personification of this 21st century witch hunt is Syndrome, an enemy from Mr. Incredible’s past.
The villain in this movie doesn’t want to rule the world. He’s a cruel, narrow-minded mediocrity who wants to steal the golden dreams of every visionary he sees and squeeze them into a lump of coal. His utopia is a place where “everybody is the same.”
Don’t worry; The Incredibles isn’t a mauldin, heavy-handed polemic babbling pretentiously about the evils of intolerance. No, Bird is too good to let that happen. (Who needs another X-Men anyway?) By cleverly integrating pulp culture touchstones like Stan Lee’s and Jack Kirby’s Fantastic Four comics, early James Bond movies, those glorious Saturday morning cartoons by Hanna-Barbara and Mad magazine, The Incredibles is transformed into that rare cinematic hybrid that both adults and children can enjoy.
For some people, at least. As I wrote earlier, there are those bigots who will dismiss The Incredibles simply because it’s a cartoon about superheroes. But their myopia is misguided and futile. Superheroes aren’t ever going away because they are essential mythological icons that our society needs.
Whether it’s Gotham City or Middle Earth, there have always been heroes protecting the innocent, fighting evildoers and trying to do the right thing: The Scarlet Pimpernel, Zorro, Tarzan, Philip Marlowe, Flash Gordon, The Three Musketees. As Frank Miller said, “It really doesn’t matter if the hero’s wearing a cape or a trenchcoat.”
And behind the mask, what we discover is that superheroes aren’t gods, they’re human. Their superpowers are just metaphors for the incredible things every man and woman can do if they believe in themselves. It is the heroism we see in the real world when a fireman runs inside a burning building, a schoolteacher buys textbooks using her own money or Rosa Parks sits down in the “white only” section of the bus.
Yes, there will always be a need for superheroes because, as Mr. Incredible said, “no matter how many times you save the world, it doesn’t stay saved.”
Extras: This two-disc set is loaded with more goodies than Batman’s utility belt. Two commentaries, over an hour of “making of” featurettes, deleted scenes and two short films (Jack-Jack Attack and Mr. Incredible and Pals).
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Starring Keanu Reeves & River Phoenix
Directed by Gus Van Sant
Rating: R
Reviewed by Malcolm Maclachlan
Who knew at the time that this would be River Phoenix’s Rebel Without a Cause? The eeriest thing about watching this 1991 film in 2005 is that so many of the scenes involve Phoenix looking longingly at Keanu Reeves. In the movie it’s because his character (Mike) is in love with Reeves’ Scott. But in light of Phoenix’s death of a drug overdose on Halloween 1993—he would be 34 if he were alive today—it’s like watching him looking wistfully at the successful career Reeves went on to have with far less talent.
It’s not that I have anything against Reeves. In the right film—Bill & Ted, The Matrix, even this year’s comic book epic Constantine—he can be magnetic and entertaining. But the promise that Phoenix showed was that of a leading man with the depth that such actors had in previous generations—and that today’s Pitts and Cruises entirely lack. Like James Dean, Phoenix was becoming a vulnerable, decided unmacho heartthrob who could do more with a few gestures than most actors could do with a speech. Of course, given the farcical adult monstrosity that once brilliant preteen actor Leonardo Dicaprio has become, maybe more years on Earth would have only sullied Phoenix’s career.
It is almost impossible to view this film without the lens of what happened to its major players since. We all know what Reeves (now 40) has been up to. This two-disc set seems intent on proving the ongoing relevance of this Idaho today. It includes six deleted scenes, most of which explore the film’s Shakespearian themes in ways that don’t work. A final one ruins the perfect existential ending. There’s also a “making of” documentary and numerous interviews and discussions. The most interesting of these is with Jonathan Caouette, a gay former street kid who scored an underground hit last year with his experimental self-documentary Tarnation.
But none of this does as much to support the film’s importance as just watching it again. This release also brings home that Gus Van Sant, always a hit or miss director, hasn’t made anything this good since (with slight apologies to Good Will Hunting). This is one of those arty films that tries to do too much and by all rights should fail miserably. It’s a takeoff on Shakespeare’s Henry IV focusing on male prostitutes that mixes in elements of documentary and magic realism.
That is works at all is a testament to the chemistry between Reeves and Phoenix. In fact, many of the artier elements listed above are jarring, if not clumsy. It only truly shines when Phoenix is onscreen, particularly with Reeves. Mike is a narcoleptic hustler who can’t admit that he’s actually gay. Scott only hustles to scandalize his wealthy family. Unlike Mike, who’s basically an orphan, Scott could leave the life anytime he wants. The latter part of the film involves the two on the road ostensibly searching for Mike’s mother. But really it is Mike who is following Scott, culminating in a heart-wrenching scene in which Phoenix buries his Tiger Beat image for good. It’s too bad he buried himself so soon after.
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The Rutles 2: Can't Buy Me Lunch Warner Home Video
Starring Eric Idle
Written & Directed by Eric Idle
Rated: PG-13
Reviewed by Adam D. Miller
This straight-to-DVD release may be a sequel to a film with the title All You Need Is Cash, but while the original 1978 Rutles film served as a brilliant and hilarious satire of The Beatles, Rutles 2 is nothing more than a poorly edited and cameo-saturated version of the first; a cash-in if there ever was one.
In order to explain how Rutles 2 fails so miserably, one has to first examine what is so great about All You Need Is Cash. Hosted by the always-funny Eric Idle, who also plays the McCartney-based character Dirk McQuickly, the film perfectly summarized a sillier take on the Beatles career, from their early days in Hamburg to their appearance on the Ed Sullivan show, films, and their ultimate demise. They even went so far to have the illustrators of Yellow Submarine come up with some footage for the Rutles parody Yellow Submarine Sandwich. The Rutles were brilliantly played by Ricky Fataar (Stig O’Hara), John Halsey (Barry Wom), Idle, and most importantly, Neil Innes (Ron Nasty), a perfect parody of John Lennon, who also composed the songs in the film.
Rutles songs are not direct-parodies of Beatles songs in the “Weird Al” variety. That is, most of them are not Beatles songs the words changed. Instead, they are songs Innes composed in the Lennon/McCartney or Harrison mold. Some are derived for more obvious sources: “Hold My Hand” is clearly a take on “All My Loving,” “Love Life” is the Rutles’ “All You Need Is Love,” etc. Others, like “Between Us” are truly great songs, regardless of the silly circumstances in which they were written and recorded.
Jump ahead 25 years and we have Rutles 2, a poor retelling of the Rutles story. All that is new here is footage of an older Eric Idle playing his interview character (now named Monty), and a slew of mostly-obnoxious celebrity cameos. The names are much more exciting than what they offer. Rutles 2 tries to draw laughs from the same jokes as the first film, which results in more eye-rolling than laughter. For instance, in a cameo from Conan O’Brien, the late night talk show host comments about the tightness of The Rutles’ trousers, a joke that was much funnier in the original film when described by the woman playing manager Leggy Mountbatten’s mother. Considering anyone who would bother with Rutles 2 in the first place would have already seen the first one, this is a poor exercise. The celebrity cameos reach their most pathetic with the unfunny Jimmy Fallon, who attempts to steal Idle’s role as narrator several times throughout the film.
In 1996, Neil Innes penned an album’s worth of new Rutles songs and recorded them with the other Rutles. Although some of the songs are used as background music in the film, one wishes that Idle had taken the time to film new sequences around them. It would have been nice to see new footage of Innes, Fataar, and Halsey reuniting.
Eric Idle continues to be a funny presence in comedy, so it’s extra disappointing that Rutles 2 is such a disgrace. I can honestly say that there is nothing new to be gained from this film. Everything it tries to do is done much, much better in All You Need Is Cash, as good a mockumentary as This Is Spinal Tap.
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Sideways Fox Searchlight
Starring Paul Giamatti, Thomas Haden Church, Virginia Madsen, and Sandra Oh
Written & Directed by Alexander Payne (based on the novel by Rex Pickett)
Rating: R
Originally reviewed by Adam D. Miller in Being There’s October 2004 issue. DVD-specific editorial addendum provided by Adam D. Miller. Go figure.
“Are you chewing gum?”
Whether you’re a wine snob or not, Sideways makes for a great ‘buddy’ movie, with Paul Giamatti (American Splendor) and Thomas Haden Church (best known as Lowell on NBC’s Wings) displaying a great sense of chemistry onscreen. The two comic actors lead us through Sideways, the fourth film by Alexander Payne (Election, About Schmidt), and like the director’s previous films, they are well equipped with witty dialogue and bizarre scenarios.
The premise itself is unique enough. Miles Raymond (Giamatti), a failed writer, takes his best friend Jack (Church), a once-famous television actor, on a road trip to the wine regions of California. Jack is soon to be married, and the trip is his last opportunity to have a good time with Miles. Unfortunately, Miles is kind of a miserable guy to be around. He is recently divorced, lonely, and desperately attempting to have his book published. Yet he’s clearly excited to be on this trip, as he is quite the wine connoisseur. Jack, who seems to enjoy whatever wine he is served (regardless of Miles’ fussy palette), is clearly more interested in partying before he settles down with fiancée Christine, and sees this trip as his opportunity to do so.
On their trip, Miles and Jack meet Maya (Virginia Madsen) and Stephanie (Sandra Oh), two attractive and friendly women who share an interest in wine. Jack sees this as his opportunity to party, and proceeds to put the moves on Stephanie, a free-spirit who rides a motorcycle. Meanwhile, Miles, who had met Maya on his previous trips to the area, is sincerely in love with her but feels unable to express himself. His depression leads him to embarrass himself, and while Jack is happily dealing in infidelity, the perfectly single Miles is alone in a motel room. Tables soon turn as word of Jack’s forthcoming marriage comes to light, just as things are looking promising with Miles and Maya. Miles and Jack do their best to remedy the situation and attempt to find their way home without a scar to show for it.
Much of what makes the film work is the chemistry between the two main characters. The relationship between Miles and Jack is so convincing and hilarious that the characters’ more heinous traits (lying and dishonesty) are forgivable, and almost welcome. We laugh and feel sorry for them at the same time, because we understand their sorrow and realize their sheer stupidity in making decisions. And yet, we also identify with Maya and Stephanie, two very different women who are appealing in their own, different ways.
For those who found Election too sugary and About Schmidt too depressing, Sideways should prove to be Payne’s best film yet. He has delivered a film that is both a love song to wine, as well as to friendships and the bizarre circumstances that test them, complete with a unique group of characters that we fall in love with and loathe simultaneously.
DVD Addendum:
I originally reviewed this film in our October issue, having seen it at the Toronto International Film Festival. Alexander Payne was in attendance, along with Paul Giamatti, Sandra Oh, Virginia Madsen, and Thomas Haden-Church. I’m still reeling from the fact that I was lucky enough to be there. Most of the people I would go on to tell Sideways about had no idea what I was talking about. That is, until the film was nominated for some Golden Globes, and then some Oscars. Although I loved the film from the moment I saw it, I had no idea it would have the effect it ultimately did. Who would have thought that a fictional character played by Paul Giammati could affect the sales of Merlot and Pinot Noir.
The DVD, while lacking many of the bonus features one would hope for, allows us to enjoy this wonderful film at home. And there are some worthwhile features. The full-length audio commentary by Paul Giamatti and Thomas-Haden Church is a delight, although one wonders why the articulate Payne did not contribute. There are also seven deleted scenes, most of which would have added nothing to the film (as always, the sign of a great directorial job). My only complaint is that the Behind-The-Scenes featurette is quite short and not nearly as thorough as I had hoped for. Still, it shows you just how rewarding an experience it must have been for the cast and crew involved, and points to why Sideways went on to become not only the surprise hit of 2004, but also one of the year’s best films.
To Be Or Not To Be Warner Home Video
Starring Carole Lombard & Jack Benny
Directed by Ernst Lubitsch
Reviewed by Mark Pittman
Before watching this DVD edition of To Be or Not to Be, I had never seen this film. I had read other reviews which gave the movie 5 out of 5 stars and called it a comedic masterpiece. Sometimes these unknown (to me) masterpieces end up being better, more natural, more artistic films than I expect. But with this film, I’m left wondering what on earth those other critics are thinking.
To Be or Not to Be, simply described, is a screwball comedy about the Nazi invasion of Poland, specifically Warsaw. A troupe of local actors attempt to put on a play about Hitler just as the Nazis take control of their capital. When the local government prohibits them from staging the play, these sometimes vain, sometimes shallow, and occasionally untested actors decide to use their combined dramatic skills to undermine the Nazis’ rule.
Based on the above description you could conceivably picture a Mel Brooks styled movie where the Nazis are constantly portrayed as ridiculous morons while the Warsaw underground are shown as wily, intelligent subversives. And that would have been fine by me. (Note: While writing this review I had no idea Mel Brooks had remade this movie. Shows what I know about film…).
But To Be or Not to Be is a movie pulling itself in all directions. Watching it, I had the nagging sense that the studio had no idea what to do with its comedic stars, Carole Lombard and Jack Benny, in support of the war. It feels like it was written by five or six writers, as most films admittedly were in the studio system. Part comedy, part drama, part B-grade war movie, part sentimental fluff, this movie’s tone never established itself for me.
However, I’m sure with an audience present to laugh in the right places, this films works just fine. Actually, there are several very good scenes—both comedic and dramatic—and some great acting in parts (Jack Benny’s acting, in particular, is surprisingly subtle). But what’s strange is that the good parts of this movie actually ended up annoying me. I would be lulled by the four-square acting and the manic delivery of lines into expecting very little, when all of a sudden some great piece of business or some interesting plot twist would occur. Only it happened so seldom, I could only think “Wow, that was actually good. What’s that doing in this movie?”
The look of the film, too, is nothing special. Like most 1940s black and white films, everything is overlit so that any visual mystery goes missing and all 3-dimensional objects look flat. Being a silent film fan, I was horrified to discover that this was directed by Ernst Lubitsch. His famous “Lubitsch Touch” of visual artistry is nowhere to be found. Anyone could have directed this film.
Additionally, the print used for this DVD version of the film (the original nitrate negative?) has some severe corrosion problems—especially at the beginning—that compromises the viewer’s experience. There isn’t any information about remastering issues, either, on the DVD, as there would be on DVDs by other companies, such as Criterion. Warner Home Video definitely just threw this DVD out there, not acknowledging the importance of granting this highly-rated film a respectable release.
The DVD does come with two short films, however, which for me were more enjoyable than the main feature. One is an early short comedy starring a very young—and almost unrecognizable—Jack Benny as a drunk smart-ass who steals into a woman’s apartment in search of booze. It’s fairly obvious that this short comedy is simply comprised of two standard vaudeville acts glued together—one being a “drunk with a dumb cop” act; the other a “playboy with a rich lady” act.
But the film quickly makes it obvious why Jack Benny became a star. His—what shall I call it—“subtle cockiness” is completely different from any other comedian’s act from that time. He almost reminds me of Chevy Chase, watching him interact with other, lesser actors, smirking with self-assuredness. The quality of the print used for this DVD is pretty poor, but Benny’s performance and the novelty of seeing him so young makes up for the muddy image.
The second short has value for historic and nostalgic reasons. It's a two-minute film starring Jack Benny and an exceedingly cute dark-haired girl who cajoles the comedian into buying War Stamps for America’s kids. Benny looks both amused and amazed as this very young girl delivers paragraphs of lines about the importance of supporting the war effort.
Overall, this DVD is probably worth a rental. I would invite over some friends to watch it with you, to raise the energy level a bit and to generate more laughs. Also, be sure to avoid the Mel Brooks version of To Be or Not to Be—I hear it isn’t any good…
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