6.6 | / 10 |
Users | 3.5 | |
Reviewer | 4.0 | |
Overall | 3.7 |
Nightclub singer Joey Evans has big dreams of starting his own nightclub. Despite a meaningful connection with chorus girl Linda English, he begins seducing Vera Simpson, a wealthy widow and ex-burlesque dancer he hopes will provide financial backing for his club.
Starring: Rita Hayworth, Frank Sinatra, Kim Novak, Barbara Nichols, Bobby SherwoodRomance | 100% |
Drama | 62% |
Musical | 45% |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.85:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 (48kHz, 24-bit)
Music: DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0
English SDH
50GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region free
Movie | 4.0 | |
Video | 4.0 | |
Audio | 4.0 | |
Extras | 2.0 | |
Overall | 4.0 |
The film version of The Sound of Music has a lot of achievements to its credit. It pretty much single handedly
brought 20th Century Fox back from the brink of bankruptcy after the debacle that was Cleopatra. It was in
many ways the last big family musical blockbuster, capping an era that had been going strong since at least the Golden
Era of Hollywood. With five Oscar wins, countless tens of millions in box office receipts, ancillary profits that have
stretched from the long playing record to CD, from VHS to Blu-ray, also stuffing its coffers, The Sound of Music
has earned its joking alternate title of The Sound of Money. (We’ll set aside for a moment co-star
Christopher Plummer’s somewhat less monetarily themed alternate title for the film, The Sound of Mucous.) But
one sort of weird achievement that can be traced to The Sound of Music is that an entire couple of generations
has become so firmly imprinted with the musical’s iconic pairing of Rodgers and Hammerstein that many of them are
completely unaware that Richard Rodgers had had a long and extremely productive compositional life long before his
collaboration with Oscar Hammerstein II, including another iconic pairing with another legendary lyricist, Lorenz Hart.
Hart was in some ways a cleverer (which is not to say better) lyricist than Hammerstein, and if the
Rodgers and Hammerstein oeuvre was often kind of rural and folksy, the Rodgers and Hart oeuvre is
often decidedly more urban and sophisticated. Rodgers wasn’t the easiest man in the world to work with (as even his
family is on record stating), but his collaboration with Hart was especially tumultuous, something probably more
attributable to Hart’s drinking problem and erratic working habits than to any prickliness on Rodgers’ part. The team
was nearing the end of their incredibly fruitful and successful professional relationship when they adapted John
O’Hara’s Pal Joey for the stage in 1940, but the musical’s incipient cynicism may have been the biggest
impediment to it making it to the screen right away. It wasn’t until 1957 that a film version of Pal Joey
appeared, and even then it was not the original Rodgers and Hart conception, but instead a somewhat bowdlerized
and Hollywoodized amalgamation that played to star Frank Sinatra’s strengths while eschewing some of the salient
characteristics about Joey Evans that Sinatra was certainly capable of playing.
Pal Joey is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Twilight Time with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.85:1. As has been mentioned before in other Twilight Time reviews, the niche label is at the mercy of the studios from whom they license these titles, and this Columbia release, while incredibly colorful and vivid looking, also is one of the softest looking transfers released by the label in its short history. There's nothing bad here, certainly nothing to be overly concerned about, but a lot of this film is just slightly gauzy, something increased exponentially in the opticals, including (obviously) the credits sequence as well as the big fantasy sequence that caps the film. The pluses far outweigh the negatives here, with some incredibly lushly saturated color, and excellent fine detail which brings out every nuance in the stunning Jean Louis costumes.
Pal Joey's soundtrack is offered in two lossless mixes, a DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 surround mix and a DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 mix (limited separation probably processed stereo according to Twilight Time's Nick Redman). Fidelity here is quite good, but it must also be stated for the record that some of the dubbed singing sounds noticeably boxier than the bulk of the soundtrack (listen especially to the women in the opening "Rainbow" production number for a very good example). The 5.1 mix isn't overly immersive, but the music is opened up rather nicely in this mix, and occasionally some ambient environmental sound effects will dot the surrounds, adding a bit of spaciousness to the proceedings. The music sounds spectacular for the most part, and Sinatra's voice is magnificent, reproduced with all of its slightly aged luster.
For you "young 'uns" out in the reading audience who are only familiar with Rodgers and Hammerstein, you have a veritable universe of fantastic music to discover in the pairing of Rodgers and Hart. There's no finer filmic place to start than this colorful musical. No, this isn't "really" Pal Joey, and some of the changes seem a bit odd, especially since Sinatra could have easily pulled off a less likable character. But this 1957 musical is brash, well staged, and features three big "movie star" performances from Sinatra, Hayworth and Novak. With good quality video and audio, and a really appealing (if short) featurette, this release comes Highly recommended.
2009
2010
Warner Archive Collection
1936
2005
Reissue
1972
2014
1954
Warner Archive Collection
1949
1954
1953
50th Anniversary Edition
1961
2007
Limited Edition to 3000
1953
1940
Director's Cut
1977
2004
Warner Archive Collection
1941
Warner Archive Collection
1942
2006
50th Anniversary Edition | Remastered
1964