7.8 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 4.0 | |
Overall | 4.0 |
Blaine, Missouri may be small, but Corky St. Clair always dreams big. Determined to get back to the lights of Broadway, he's created "Red, White and Blaine", a musical celebration of the burg's 150th anniversary. Stagestruck townsfolk pin their hopes of being discovered on Corky's hilariously hapless theater production...and on reports that big-time talent scout Mort Guffman will be in the audience.
Starring: Lewis Arquette, Bob Balaban, Christopher Guest, Matt Keeslar, Eugene LevyComedy | 100% |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.85:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 (48kHz, 24-bit)
English SDH
Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region free
Movie | 4.0 | |
Video | 4.5 | |
Audio | 4.0 | |
Extras | 2.5 | |
Overall | 4.0 |
The Warner Archive Collection has added Waiting for Guffman to the studio's anthology of
Christopher Guest's mockumentaries on Blu-ray, which already contains Best in Show and A
Mighty Wind (the former issued by Warner's main video division). Guffman, released in
1996, was Guest's first experiment with the format, in which he and co-writer Eugene Levy
develop a detailed story outline but leave the cast to improvise their dialogue. Guest then spends
months in the editing room shaping the movie. Because Guffman was his inaugural effort with
this approach, the editing process was unusually prolonged; in the disc commentary, Guest says it
took eighteen months.
Guffman is unique in this canon—which also includes For Your Consideration (2006) and
Mascots (2016)—because it revolves around a central character, Corky
St. Clair, who is played
by Guest himself. In his later efforts, Guest decentralized the narrative, spreading it evenly
among the array of eccentrics with which he typically populates these films. According to Guest,
he explored a similar approach in Guffman, removing most of his scenes in editing because he
got tired of himself. One of the film's producers persuaded him to put Corky back at the center of
the story, and we're better off for it. While an alternate version with minimal participation by
Corky might be entertaining in its own right, it wouldn't be the same Guffman that has
accumulated a devoted following over the years. The would-be theater impresario with a bad
toupee is one of Guest's most memorable creations and Corky is the reason why Guffman
remains a fan favorite among Guest's films.
Until Mascots, which was shot digitally, Guest photographed his improv creations in Super16,
both to contain costs and to reinforce the documentary aesthetic. WAC has already demonstrated
with A Mighty Wind that a good 16mm source can yield a superb Blu-ray image, and it has done
so again with Waiting for Guffman.
Waiting for Guffman was shot by Roberto Schaefer, who would reunite with Guest for Best in Show and For Your Consideration. The film was photographed in Super16, which was then blown up to 35mm to create release prints. For this 1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray from the Warner Archive Collection, Warner's Motion Picture Imaging facility scanned (at 2K) a 35mm interpositive made from the original camera negative, followed by appropriate color correction and WAC's customary cleanup to remove dirt and print damage. The results are every bit as good as MPI's and WAC's efforts on Best in Show, with excellent detail and sharpness, given the nature of the source, and a colorful palette, especially during the performance of Red, White and Blaine. The resolution is so good that it's easy to read the mock theater posters in Corky's shrine to his New York past and to appreciate the numerous satirical touches in the establishment where we find him at the end of the film (I'm deliberately being vague to avoid spoilers). The Texas locations that stood in for Blaine, Missouri, are vividly rendered, as is the wide variety of outfits worn by the film's characters. Because it was photographed on 16mm, Guffman's grain is more pronounced than on the typical Nineties film, but MPI has treated it carefully and respectfully. Guffman has been mastered on Blu-ray at WAC's usual high average bitrate, here just a fraction under 35 Mbps, and the encode is proficient.
Waiting for Guffman was released in stereo, which WAC has taken from the original magnetic master and encoded in lossless DTS-HD MA 2.0. Consistent with the film's documentary aesthetic, the bulk of the soundtrack remains front and center, with an emphasis on the dialogue and interviews, which are always clearly rendered. Stereo separation is most evident during the climactic performance of Red, White and Blaine, but even here it's relatively limited. There's no music, except for the show tunes composed by Guest, McKean and Shearer, and they sound just amateurish as they should.
The extras have been ported over from New Line's 2001 DVD of Waiting for Guffman. The
trailer has been remastered in 1080p.
Corky St. Clair has acquired such a following that Guest brought him back in a supporting role in
Mascots, where he is introduced as "Mentor" and serves as a dramatic coach to one of the
contestants in a competitive mascot match (played by Guffman alum Parker Posey). He looks
older, and his latest toupee is even more obvious, but he bears the same self-certainty he
displayed when we first met him in Guffman and the same unshakeable belief in his artistic
judgment. Mascots is currently streaming on Netflix, and I encourage all of Corky's admirers to
pair it on a double bill with WAC's new Blu-ray of Guffman, which is excellent and highly
recommended.
Warner Archive Collection
2003
2000
1969
1990
1956
1992-1998
1977
1984
2020
Flip Out
1983
2014
1993
1968
1996
1974
2009
Warner Archive Collection
1982
1972-1978
2002
1967