8 | / 10 |
Users | 4.5 | |
Reviewer | 4.5 | |
Overall | 4.5 |
What's Up, Doc? joyously recaptures the bubbly style of 1930's screwball comedies - and firmly establishes Barbra Streisand and Ryan O'Neal as a romantic duo uniquely endearing in screen history. Included are a daffy luggage mixup plot, dippy dialogue exchanges, a marvelous example of the art of hotel-room demolition and one of the funniest chase sequences ever, all over San Francisco.
Starring: Barbra Streisand, Ryan O'Neal, Madeline Kahn, Kenneth Mars, Austin PendletonRomance | 100% |
Comedy | Insignificant |
Video codec: VC-1
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.85:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio Mono (48kHz, 24-bit)
French: Dolby Digital Mono
Spanish: Dolby Digital Mono
German: Dolby Digital Mono
English SDH, French, Portuguese, Spanish, Dutch, Finnish, Greek, Norwegian
25GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region free
Movie | 4.5 | |
Video | 4.0 | |
Audio | 4.0 | |
Extras | 2.5 | |
Overall | 4.5 |
When screwball comedy became an identifiable genre in the 1930’s, the United States was still knee-deep in the throes of the Great Depression, and audiences flocked to movie houses in a desperate attempt to escape the grim realities of their everyday lives. Watching the madcap antics of glamorous movie stars doing patently silly things in completely outrageous situations helped alleviate the stresses and worries of the day, and screwball became one of the lasting cultural contributions of film of the 1930’s and, to a somewhat lesser extent, the 1940’s. By the time we entered the post-World War II era, and the bloated, largely comfortable 1950’s (despite the hysteria surrounding anti-Communism and the threat of nuclear annihilation), screwball had passed into the history books. Though screwball usually has some readily identifiable features (the strong willed woman, the harried and easily confused man), the idiom really can be a bit harder to define than you might imagine. In fact I was rather amazed several years to find an oversized, coffee table book on screwball which had a long segment devoted to an actress I’ve spent decades researching, Frances Farmer, and her work in the Howard Hawks co-directed (with William Wyler) Come and Get It. The author of that book actually made some cogent arguments about at least the first segment of this Edna Ferber cross-generational drama having classic screwball elements, something that never in a million years would have occurred to me. Hawks of course contributed at least one bona fide classic to the screwball genre, 1938’s Bringing Up Baby, and several of his other comedies bear strong consideration as screwball standouts. Baby is one of several films which obviously influenced screenwriters Buck Henry, David Newman and Robert Benton, as they attempted to resurrect the screwball genre in the early 1970’s with What’s Up, Doc?, one of the most fondly remembered comedies of its era. While some comedies deflate over time, losing a lot of their sparkle and insouciance, Doc has managed to weather the storms of the intervening decades since its original release, and in fact often seems funnier today than perhaps it did almost 40 years ago (can it really have been that long?).
Barbra Streisand as Bugs Bunny. . .er, Judy Maxwell.
What's Up, Doc? is a relic of its era, so I'm sure there will be critics who find this new Blu-ray release unappealing, expecting it to have a digital sharpness and clarity which is simply not inherent in the source elements. Like a lot of early-1970's films, this has an overall soft quality, with noticeable if not overwhelming grain, that somehow seems to drive a lot of videophiles crazy, despite the fact that this is exactly how the film looked upon its original theatrical release. Delivered via a VC-1 encode, in full 1080p and in a 1.78:1 aspect ratio, What's Up, Doc? may not in fact reveal eye popping new detail in this Blu-ray release, but there is a noticeable improvement in image sharpness and especially color saturation over the previously released SD-DVD. Several fanstastic sight gags which were muddy in previous home video releases now are at the very least visible, if not screaming out in high definition splendor. Look, for example, at the scuff marks left by Kahn's feet as she's dragged out of the ballroom. Or (without spoiling a great gag), the golf clubs after the fire alluded to above—a moment I never saw before in any home video release, which is now abundantly on display. Detail is sharpest of course in close-ups, where Streisand's luminous eyes flash with color, and every rumpled hair on O'Neal's head is discernable. Medium range and far shots do suffer more from softness, but overall this is a splendid presentation, if one takes the film's generational "look" into consideration.
Bogdanovich is a director who crafted at least the first part of his career on retro, nostalgically themed pieces like The Last Picture Show, Paper Moon (both famously black and white projects in a time when that was out of the ordinary, to say the least), and his own ode to silent film, Nickelodeon. Of course that trend also includes What's Up, Doc?, a film patently based on the famous 1930's idiom of screwball comedy. Why this brief overview of Bogdanovich's directorial proclivities? Because What's Up, Doc? contains only mono sound mixes, something equally unusual for a film from the early 1970's. I'm frankly not sure if Bogdanovich was attempting to recreate the aural experience of a 1930's film, along with the general zeitgeist of madcap comedy in general, but one way or the other, this Blu-ray offers a DTS-HD Master Audio Mono mix (as well as several foreign language Dolby Digital mono mixes) which is appealing and crisp, if obviously delivering a narrow and focused soundfield. This is a film of quicksilver dialogue, and it's all easy to hear, even in the Hawks-esque overlapping sequences. Sound effects and the often very subtly hilarious source cues (pay attention to little things like the Chinese Dragon music) are also mixed very well. This is in no way a socko aural experience, but everything from Barbra's lovely take on Cole Porter's "You're the Top," to her snippet of "As Time Goes By," to the film's laugh out loud dialogue, is on display with good fidelity and excellent clarity.
A pretty paltry array of SD supplements is included, all ported over from the previous Collector's Edition DVD. The best offering is the Commentary by Bogdanovich. While the director, in his "stylish" ascot and semi-snooty ambience, is a frequent, and often annoying, talking head on other directors' film's supplements, here he's pretty low key and informative. In fact, he may be a bit too low key at times, with long pauses in between some of his ruminations. Also on tap is a silly Scene Specific Commentary (12:13) by Babs herself, where she offers such scintillating insights as "Oh, my God!" several times. A vintage 1972 featurette called Screwball Comedies—Remember Them? (8:36) is also on tap, and features some mugging by Bogdanovich, Streisand and O'Neal. The Theatrical Trailer (including a fun snippet of Bogdanovich demonstrating to Streisand how to "sing") is also included.
What's Up, Doc? is that rare homage which actually rises to the same giddy heights of its forebears. Streisand, O'Neal, and an absolutely unmatched array of supporting talent all offer perfect screwball lunacy, and it's stylishly and unobtrusively directed by Bogdanovich. This Blu-ray looks soft (just like the original theatrical release), but is a noticeable improvement over the SD-DVD. Even with that softness, this film couldn't come more highly recommended.
1943
Warner Archive Collection
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Collector's Edition
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1978
Warner Archive Collection
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