Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		3.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		1.0
Overall		3.0

Men at Work Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman January 16, 2023

Considering how "highbrow" Martin Sheen is often considered to be, one might be tempted to say that his particular apples fell very far from his particular tree, given some of the films and extracurricular activities that Sheen's sons Charlie Sheen and Emilio Estevez have been involved with over the course of many years. Sheen fils' escapades have become the stuff of legend, for better or worse, and therefore Charlie has probably come off as the "prodigal scion", so to speak, with Emilio kind of surprisingly ultimately deciding on limiting his on screen performances in favor of directing. One of Estevez's early helming efforts was in fact this decidedly lowbrow farce, which offers Estevez and his sibling "Two Stooges" parts as bumbling garbagemen who find themselves ensconced in a local conspiracy having to do with illegal dumping of toxic waste. The film has a certain goofy charm, but it probably tries way too hard to achieve whatever laughs it generates, and it often comes off as overly manic, perhaps a bit more on the "Charlie Sheen" side than the "Emilio Estevez" side, again so to speak.

Carl Taylor (Charlie Sheen) and James St. James (Emilio Estevez) are to bros who work together picking up trash, though "work" is a perhaps relative term, as is shown in some early vignettes documenting things like bowling in alleyways and, a bit later, pranking two of their co-workers with a pretty nasty "surprise". Carl also has a habit of going the Rear Window route at the apartment the two guys share, often peering out with binoculars at a pretty neighbor named Susan Wilkins (Leslie Hope), who lives across a courtyard. Susan is involved with local city councilman Jack Berger (Darrell Larson), who has suddenly had some pangs of conscience and is trying to extricate himself from a perilous deal he got involved in with local criminal mastermind (?) Maxwell Potterdam III (John Getz), who is dumping toxic waste into local waterways for no discernable reason other than that it makes him the villain of the story.

When Carl misinterprets a showdown of sorts between Jack and Susan, he decides to teach Jack a lesson by shooting him with a pellet gun, and while that projectile finds its target easily enough, while Carl and James are hiding and toasting their "success", two buffoonish goons working for Potterdam show up and actually kill Jack, (initially) unbeknownst to the trash collectors. The two bad guys stuff Jack's body into one of the barrels that would otherwise be holding toxic waste, but this being a farce and all, as they scurry away from the crime scene, the barrel falls out of their trunk and ends up in a pile of other garbage, where - well, guess.

What ensues is a crazy quilt of antics ultimately involving Carl, James, Susan (who seems kind of remarkably sanguine that Jack has disappeared), and a quasi-supervisor of the boys named Louis Fedders (Keith David). A number of relatively innocent bystanders get sucked into the maelstrom, and there also a bunch of near Keystone Cops police stumbling around the edges of the story. The film has a lot of energy, arguably too much at times, something that may ultimately work against the more genial bantering and schtick laden physical humor. Sheen and Estevez obviously have incredible rapport, and David in particular is kind of fun as an out of control guy just one step away from going Dirty Harry on various characters' keisters, but the film never builds to the lunatic frenzy that the best farces do, despite a surplus of busy-ness and a ton of sound and fury, which indeed probably ends up signifying, if not nothing, then not very much.

Note: Men at Work received a prior Blu-ray release from Shout! Factory as part of a double feature offering Easy Money / Men at Work. Martin Liebman's Men at Work Blu-ray review offers his thoughts on the film (he evidently didn't like it as much as I do), as well as providing a good resource for screenshot comparisons.

Men at Work Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Men at Work is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of the MVD Rewind Collection, an imprint of MVD Visual, with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.85:1. Going by the admittedly risky gambit of doing side by side screenshot comparisons (since I never owned the Shout! Factory double feature that offered this film), this really looks more or less interchangeable with the Shout! release, though as I so often state, different reviewers means different opinions, and my score just incrementally lower than Marty's was. There's minor but recurrent age related wear and tear, as Marty mentions in his review, and also things like noticeable wobble during the opening credits, all of which probably could have been ameliorated if not outright eliminated with a "new, improved" restoration gauntlet. The palette is very nicely suffused almost all of the time, benefiting immensely from the surplus of brightly lit sunshine suffused outdoor scenes. Grain can look a little splotchy and yellowish at times (see screenshot 10), but that in and of itself points to the fact this hasn't been filtered. My score is 3.75.

Men at Work Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

If my video score is just a tad lower than Marty's was, those who keep track of such things will note my audio score is just a tad higher than Marty's was. The LPCM 2.0 track on this disc offers capable support for a film that really doesn't have a ton of complexity to its sound design, but which does offer some fun source cues that sound nicely full bodied throughout. Occasional sound effects also resonate without any problems. While there is some of the loose sync that Marty mentions in his review, dialogue is rendered cleanly and clearly throughout. Optional English, French and Spanish subtitles are available.

Men at Work Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Trailers include Men at Work (HD; 1:45), along with trailers for other releases from MVD Visual. The keepcase insert features reversible artwork, and the keepcase houses a folded mini poster. Additionally, packaging features a slipcover.

Men at Work Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

The main problem with Men at Work is that it probably tries to stuff too much into what is essentially a paper thin enterprise hinging mostly on the interplay between the two Sheen/Estevez brothers. That ostensible focal element encounters repeated detours due to a glut of supporting characters hovering around the edges (and occasionally intruding into the center) of the story, including the goonish bad guys and the buffoonish cops, as well as Keith David's character and even a hapless food delivery guy who wanders into the fray. There's actually quite a bit to like in this film in my considered opinion, but like a comic who seems to be getting more and more desperate if his jokes don't provoke guffaws, you can feel this film's cast aiming for a level of lunacy that the writing just never fully supports. Fans of the cast will probably find this an agreeable enough time killer. Technical merits are generally solid for anyone who may be considering making a purchase.