How Do I Love Thee? Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		1.5
Video		3.0
Audio		3.0
Extras		1.0
Overall		3.0

How Do I Love Thee? Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Brian Orndorf June 10, 2018

Jackie Gleason made his fair share of duds, but as he aged, he lost his star power, growing increasingly reliant on his established persona to connect with potential audiences. 1970’s “How Do I Love Thee?” finds Gleason navigating the changing tides of American society and entertainment interests, starring in a dramedy that’s meant to play to both older and younger audiences, trying to build a bridge between the counterculture and senior citizens. It’s a big time whiff from the icon, who looks lost (and quite inebriated) during his performance, unsure how seriously he should take a movie where Shelly Winters is cast as a sex object. “How Do I Love Thee?” is a brutal sit at times, with nobody in the production particularly confident in the film they want to make, going soft in every direction.

Stanley (Jackie Gleason) is a seasoned mover married to Elsie (Maureen O’Hara), a devour Christian. Father to Tom (Rick Lenz), Stanley tries to keep his boy in the right track, but he’s a bad influence, finding a particular distraction in Lena (Shelley Winters), a client who welcomes a little more than the moving of a piano, but doesn’t give herself in full to the frustrated man. Years later, Tom is a college professor doing things his own way, including romancing Marion (Rosemary Forsyth), one of his students. Fighting the establishment and Marion over the course of his life, Tom’s world is brightened by a financial gift from his father, which comes with the potential for complete humiliation.

Stanley isn’t richly realized by Gleason, who portrays the character as an irritable old man who lives to escape his dreary routine. Such an opportunity is provided by Elsie, an apartment-dwelling woman who loves art, tight clothes, and worries about overpopulation. That “How Do I Love Thee?” would consider Winters appropriate for a come hither part is very odd, identifying a great miscasting that disrupts the midlife crisis situation Stanley finds himself in, trying to bed the stranger to avoid the demands of his home life, including parenthood. Gleason and Winters don’t share much chemistry either, making their scenes (and the movie as a whole) more about who can yell the loudest during their argumentative battles. The feature becomes very difficult to endure, especially when director Michael Gordon doesn’t break away from bickering to pay attention to larger themes concerning trust, honor, and individuality.

How Do I Love Thee? Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

The AVC encoded image (1.78:1 aspect ratio) presentation offers an aged look at the limited cinematographic range of "How Do I Love Thee?" It's a bright picture to begin with, giving colors an adequate liveliness that's not snuffed out here, helping vibrant costumes and set decoration, which utilizes varied hues to define differences in decoration between generations. Skintones are acceptable. Detail isn't prioritized, but softness remains, and clothing occasionally finds its intended sexuality, preserving sheerness. Delineation is acceptable, never challenged in full. Source is a bit ratty, with speckle storms and mild scratches detected throughout. Slight wobble is present during the main titles, along with brief chemical blotches.

How Do I Love Thee? Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The 2.0 DTS-HD MA mix is clear enough to pick up on strange items emphasized with loud sound effects, including a beaded curtain in Lena's kitchen that clicks together during scenes. ADR is also easy to spot. Dialogue exchanges are fine for this style of drama, with all the combative yelling registering clearly, and more subdued emotionality is comfortable. Music isn't confident but changes in mood are understood, hampered some by age, hitting a few crackly highs during the listening event.

How Do I Love Thee? Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

There is no supplementary material on this disc.

How Do I Love Thee? Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

"How Do I Love Thee?" is very banal stuff (adapting a book by Peter De Vries), laboring through basic domestic disturbance issues, while more tantalizing forays into religion and adultery are diluted along the way, with the production afraid of doing anything of interest out of fear of alienating its audience. A handful of moments are passably interesting, one featuring Stanley making friends with "the kids" during a college sit-in, but Gleason looks uncomfortable here, with physical limitations matching his mental check-out, wanting little to do with a movie that just doesn't work.