7.2 | / 10 |
Users | 3.0 | |
Reviewer | 3.5 | |
Overall | 3.0 |
Agent has his only client pose as both a French chanteuse and Brazilian bombshell to fool the nightclub owner.
Starring: Groucho Marx, Carmen Miranda (I), Steve Cochran (I), Maxine Fife, Gloria JeanMusical | 100% |
Comedy | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.37:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.37:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio Mono
None
25GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region A (locked)
Movie | 3.0 | |
Video | 3.5 | |
Audio | 2.5 | |
Extras | 0.0 | |
Overall | 3.5 |
The days of vaudeville were rife with what were called “specialty acts”, performers who had their own little niche carved out that didn’t fit into the more easily categorized definitions of singer, actor, comedian and the like. The Marx Brothers kind of straddled the line between “specialty act” and comedy act, especially since they had elements like Harpo’s miming and harp playing. Carmen Miranda came along significantly after vaudeville had declined to a mere shadow of its former self, but had she been around during vaudeville’s heyday, there’s little doubt that the so-called “Brazilian Bombshell” would have been yet another “specialty act”. The kind of sad thing about Miranda is that she was capable of so much more than most of her American films ever allowed her to display, and whatever else you can say about 1947’s Copacabana, it at least gives Miranda the chance to show some decent comedy chops along with her more typical fruit laden hat wearing song and dance numbers. Few people probably realize how successful Miranda had already been before she matriculated to the United States in 1939, and in fact her long and distinguished career in Brazil had resulted in enormous popularity both in films and on records. She was in fact Brazil’s most popular musical export until Sergio Mendes appeared in the sixties and stormed the pop charts with Brasil ’66. (Interestingly, Miranda’s longtime musical director was the iconic Dorival Caymmi, whose son Dori Caymmi later worked with Mendes and wrote Mendes’ stunning early hit “Like a Lover”.) Copacabana has been unfairly maligned through the years as a second rate pairing of a past their prime Marx and Miranda, but the film is still enormously entertaining, often quite funny and if not the best film that either of its stars ever made, certainly an enjoyable enough romp to merit revisiting.
Copacabana is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Olive Films with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.37:1. While the video quality here is by and large excellent, it is widely variable at times which may or may not rise to the level of annoyance depending on the individual viewer's tolerance levels. The vast majority of this presentation features really crisp contrast with well delineated gray scale and nicely modulated whites and blacks. The overall image is also very sharp and well defined. However, there are several places where the image suddenly becomes quite a bit softer and grainier, as if this were cobbled together from different sources. As with most Olive releases, there's no sign of any artificial digital tweaking having been done to the image, either in terms of noise reduction or sharpening.
Unfortunately, Copacabana's lossless DTS-HD Master Audio Mono mix has to deal with some fairly damaged stems, including ubiquitous hiss and quite a bit of distortion throughout the film, especially in the midrange where it tends to especially affect the score, which often sounds "dirty" as a result. Perhaps surprisingly, dialogue fares at least a little better, though when there's no music, the hiss, as well as attendant scratches, pops and clicks become more noticeable. There's nothing here that makes the film actually unlistenable, but it's one of the more problematic tracks we've heard from Olive Films' Republic catalog releases lately.
No supplements are offered on this Blu-ray disc.
For those who have only heard of Copacabana, and probably in relatively disparaging terms at that, owe it to themselves to check it out at least once. The film is surprisingly funny, even if it's a little on the smarmy side at times given Groucho's leering presence. The musical elements here are fairly variable, but the film moves along at a blistering pace most of the time so that's little time to really dwell on any perceived shortcomings. This may not in fact be prime Marx or Miranda, but even second rate offerings by these beloved stars tend to outshine a lot of what else is out there available for mass consumption. This Blu-ray has occasionally problematic video and audio, but still (with caveats noted) comes Recommended.
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