Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		4.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		2.5
Overall		3.5

Greetings Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman December 2, 2018

Note: This film is available as part of De Palma & De Niro: The Early Films.

Brian De Palma and Robert De Niro share a lot more than just that “De” in their last names. The two forged their early film careers at least partially in tandem, and both have of course gone on to become rather monolithic characters in the world of modern cinema. Perhaps precisely because of their outsized reputations, it may be hard to think of either of them as “beginners”, but the appealing if sometimes kind of unexpectedly provocative movies gathered together in this intriguing new set by Arrow show them in the process of learning their craft(s), and as such there’s a perhaps more intimate, visceral feeling attending these early efforts than in some of either of these artist’s later, glossier, outings. While The Wedding Party bears a 1969 release date, putatively dating it after 1968’s Greetings, from a production standpoint it actually predates the other two films in this set by several years, since it was evidently actually shot in 1963 but languished unreleased for several years. It was in fact the unexpected (if “minor” by today’s standards) success of Greetings that helped, at least in part, to garner attention for The Wedding Party. Hi, Mom! is actually a direct sequel to Greetings, and features De Niro reprising his role as troubled Vietnam vet Jon Rubin, in a film one talking head in a supplement included in this set likens to “Taxi Driver light”.

Wow. Times have changed, and what may have seemed charming in one era may now strike some as hopelessly old fashioned and quite possibly objectionable. Greetings deals with three buddies dealing with the exigencies of a late sixties phenomenon that tended to terrorize young males: the draft. “Greetings” is in fact the first word of the standard issue form letter sent to inductees telling them their lives were about to change in some very big ways. But among the first vignettes detailed in Greetings are attempts by Paul Shaw (Jonathan Warden) to not get drafted, and the first of these is him marauding into a New York bar and dropping the “n word” in an attempt to get the you know what beaten out of him. Unsurprisingly, it works, but not to the degree Paul needs, which is when the next questionable element arises, as Paul’s buddies Jon Rubin (Robert De Niro) and Lloyd Clay (Gerritt Graham) attempt to give him lessons in “acting gay”, except the word they use for “gay” is another three letter epithet which has most definitely fallen out of “favor” (if you can call it that). If you can get past all of that, there’s a very interesting film here, one that ricochets from raucous comedy to what might be termed a rather prescient paranoia that would ultimately inform any number of slightly later films, including everything from The Conversation to The Parallax View. If as a supplement mentions, Greetings’ follow up Hi, Mom! could potentially be seen as a kind of “Taxi Driver light”, perhaps Greetings itself might be seen as a kind of “The Deer Hunter light,” especially with regard to its depictions of friendships rent asunder by the vagaries of war (even if the aftereffects of the war are really detailed more thoroughly in Hi, Mom!). But there’s also a whole other subplot here involving Jon’s nascent attempts as a filmmaker (something that also shows up even more in Hi, Mom!), in an element that hints at De Palma’s long cinematic flirtations with voyeurism.

Greetings Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Greetings is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Arrow Video with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.85:1. Arrow's insert booklet lumps two of the three films together for its verbiage on the restorations:

The Wedding Party and Greetings have been exclusively restored by Arrow Films for this release.

The Wedding Party is presented in its original aspect ratio of 1.37:1 [sic] with mono audio. The original 35mm camera negative element was scaneed in 2K resolution on a 4K Arriscan at OCN Labs, CT. The film was graded on Digital Vision's Nucoda Film Master and restored at R3Store Studios in London. The original mono mix was remastered from the optical negative reels at OCN Labs.

All materials for this restoration were made available by Troma Entertainment Inc.

Greetings is presented in its origina aspect ratio of 1.85:1 with mono audio. An original 35mm camera internegative element was scanned in 2K resolution on a Lasergraphics Director at EFilm, Burbank. The film was graded on Digital Vision's Nucoda Film Master and restored at R3Store Studios in London. The original mono mix was remastered from the optical negative reels at Deluxe Audio Services, Hollywood.

All materials for this restoration were made available by Charles Hirsch and Academy Film Service.

As befits the source element utilized, Greetings' presentation is just slightly gritty looking, though that may actually tend to help the verité aspects of De Palma's style. That style includes a lot disjunctive edits and at least a few opticals, and grain can be just slightly variable as a result, but to my eyes never looked artificial or poorly resolved. The palette is generally fairly vivid, though slightly anemic contrast can tend to make some interior scenes look a bit dark and murky. Detail levels are fine, with an understanding that De Palma tends to favor midrange shots a lot of the time. My score is 3.75.

Greetings Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Greetings features an LPCM Mono track which capably supports the dialogue and the rock inflected score (commentator Glenn Kenny kind of throws one of the composers under the bus, saying he was too busy to talk to Kenny for the commentary track). Greetings utilizes the same kind of quick cutting within scenes that is seen in The Wedding Party especially, giving slightly different "takes" and/or angles on the material, and as such there can be very slight differences in ambience even in scenes ostensibly occurring at the same time and place. Fidelity is fine throughout, with no signs of major age related wear and tear.

Greetings Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

Arrow has packaged this set with Greetings and The Wedding Party sharing a disc, and with Hi, Mom! on its own disc. Supplements on each disc are therefore not necessarily devoted solely to any given film (this includes the interviews with Charles Hirsch, which can momentarily veer off into tangential information), and so I'm providing a list of all supplements on both discs in this set on all three reviews of the films included in the set:

Disc One contains The Wedding Party and Greetings and the following supplements:

• Greetings Audio Commentary by Glenn Kenny


• Brian De Palma: Early Years (1080p; 11:41) is a new appreciation of De Palma (and De Niro) by Howard S. Berger.


• Charles Hirsch on Greetings (1080p; 11:47) is an engaging interview with the producer.


• Greetings Press Book (1080p)

Disc Two contains Hi, Mom! and the following supplements:

• Charles Hirsch on Hi, Mom! (1080p; 11:47) continues the interview with the producer.


• Theatrical Trailer (1080p; 1:54)

Greetings Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Greetings has some elements that may make it objectionable and even offensive to some viewers, but it's certainly a product of its time in more ways than one. The film has a certain shambling charm, even as it begins to address some rather "heavy" material. Technical merits are generally first rate, and with caveats noted (especially for those who demand political correctness 100% of the time), Greetings comes Recommended.