7.6 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 4.5 | |
Overall | 4.5 |
A San Francisco public-relations hotshot is a "social" drinker...who never stops socializing. His vivacious wife starts drinking to keep him company. They live for good times. But eventually good times turn bad.
Starring: Jack Lemmon, Lee Remick, Charles Bickford, Jack Klugman, Alan HewittDrama | Insignificant |
Romance | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.85:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 Mono (48kHz, 24-bit)
English SDH
Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region free
Movie | 4.0 | |
Video | 5.0 | |
Audio | 4.5 | |
Extras | 3.0 | |
Overall | 4.5 |
Blake Edwards is usually remembered as a skilled coordinator of slapstick mayhem in his Pink
Panther movies, but Edwards' range as a director was far broader than pratfalls. He guided
Audrey Hepburn through her whimsically romantic performance in Breakfast at Tiffany's;
brought film noir to television with Peter Gunn;
cannily satirized gender stereotypes in Victor/Victoria and Switch; and provided oddball
takes on spy movies in The
Tamarind Seed and Darling Lili (the
failure of the latter inspiring his vicious Hollywood satire, S.O.B.). And in 1962, Edwards helmed the filmed adaptation of a prestige TV drama
about alcoholism that was as far from comedic as a film could go.
Star Jack Lemmon, who had replaced original TV lead Cliff Robertson (unfairly, in the opinion
of many), requested that Edwards be brought in to give the bleak tale a touch of lightness, but
Edwards didn't compromise on the script's grim account. He and Lemmon would later
collaborate on a full-out, pedal-to-the-metal comic masterpiece in The Great Race, but with Wine
and Roses they produced an uncompromising classic of kitchen sink realism. The film changed
the industry's perception of Lemmon, who had already won an Oscar for his funnyman skills in
Mister Roberts but was not considered a
serious dramatic actor. Wine and Roses established
Lemmon's versatility, and when he won his second Oscar, it was for a serious lead in the darkly
cynical Save the Tiger. Wine and
Roses paved the actor's way to that victory, and it remains a highlight among many in Lemmon's filmography.
Wine and Roses has now been brought to Blu-ray by the Warner Archive Collection, adding to a
growing collection of Blake Edwards' films that includes Victor/Victoria, The Great Race and
S.O.B. As usual, WAC has produced a superb Blu-ray, here derived from a new 4K scan from the
original camera negative.
Days of Wine and Roses was shot by a poet of black-and-white photography, Philip Lathrop,
whose résumé includes The Americanization of Emily, Lonely Are the Brave and the famous
crane shot that opens Touch of
Evil. (Lathrop was equally at home in color, as demonstrated by
Point Blank, Breakfast at Tiffany's and
his Oscar-nominated work on Earthquake.) For this 1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray, the Warner Archive Collection has returned
to the original camera
negative, which has been scanned by Warner's MPI facility at 4K, followed by MPI's customary
meticulous color-correction and WAC's equally customary thorough clean-up. The Blu-ray
image is fantastic, with stable densities, deep blacks, finely delineated shades of gray and white,
and a naturally rendered grain pattern that reveals fine detail in every shot. Blake Edwards'
choice to shoot in black-and-white at a time when Hollywood films had largely switched to color
reflected his desire to give Wine and Roses a documentary sensibility, but the frames are as
carefully composed as the most deliberate of art films, juxtaposing Joe and Karen in alternating
patterns of dominance as their relationship shifts in and out of focus, fueled by their addiction.
WAC's Blu-ray reproduces every nuance of Edwards' and Lathrop's compositions, and the
results are stunning.
The average bitrate is WAC's usual 35 Mbps, and Wine and Roses continues WAC's recent
retention of the original 1.85:1 aspect ratio for films originally shot in that format. The tiny black
bars at top and bottom may not be visible on most monitors, but they are readily observable in
screenshots and (I suspect) on projector screens.
The film's original mono soundtrack has been taken from the magnetic master, cleaned of any age-related damage and encoded as lossless DTS-HD MA 2.0. It's an effective mix, aptly conveying the noisiness of big scenes (like Joe trashing the greenhouse) and supporting quieter moments with discreetly placed effects like the clink of glasses. The dialogue is clearly rendered, and the entire film is elevated by the powerful score from Blake Edwards' reliable collaborator, Henry Mancini, who won a total of four Oscars for his work on Edwards' films, including one for Wine and Roses' title song (shared with Johnny Mercer for the lyrics).
The extras have been ported over from Warner's 2004 DVD of Days of Wine and Roses. The
trailer has been remastered in 1080p.
Days of Wine and Roses is not the kind of film that one watches for a casual evening's diversion.
It demands your full attention and rewards it with the sort of horror story in which the monsters
are all too real and all too human. The film comes from a different era of movie-making, when
studios were willing to make dramas about everyday people and the public was willing to see
them in theaters. But in a country where opioid abuse has multiplied the toll taken by alcoholism,
Wine and Roses remains a powerful and relevant statement. Highly recommended.
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Limited Edition to 3000
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