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Arthur DVD Review by Yanman |
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Arthur (Title character perfectly played by Dudley Moore) is the story of a multi-million dollar heir who enjoys women, having fun, and most of all, a bottle of scotch. He is so unhappy with his life, that he can only deal with it, completely inebriated. You see, his father and grandmother are going to cut him from his 750 million-dollar inheritance if he does not marry the woman they have chosen. His problem is that he just doesn't love her. In a classic scene outside of Bergdoff Goodman's in Manhattan, he meets the girl he has been waiting for. Linda Morolla (played by the unforgettable Liza Minnelli) is a loud-mouthed waitress from Queens who is "studying to be an actress". With the help of his best friend/father figure/manservant, Hobson, (Academy Award winning performance by Sir John Gielgud -- and well deserving of it) Arthur must decide: Love or money. The story is timeless. The performances are spectacular. It's good for regular folks like us to see, every once in a while, that even with $750 million, you may not necessarily be happy. I guess it equals us out, in that all people really want, is to be loved by someone they love. I was 14 years old when this movie was released in 1981. I have never seen this movie in a theater (and I have only seen the edited for TV version). Watching the movie on DVD proved to be quite surprising in many ways. (Of course, there were some scenes that I had never seen before.) The movie is offered in pan-and-scan only, no widescreen. The picture is very clear, although there are quite a bit of digital artifacts. Also, there were some scenes where you could see remnants of a bad transfer from the original. The biggest disappointment was in the sound. It is mono. This is no better than listening to the speakers on your TV. There's not much else I can say about that. The special features that are included make up for the lack of "room filling", 5.1 sound. The gallery offers you a myriad of "behind the scenes" information tidbits. They also include biographies of the movie's 3 stars, the writer/director Steve Gordon, and the composer, Burt Bacharach. You can chose to listen to the feature in English or French, and they offer English, French and Spanish subtitles. In the end, I'd have to say that I thoroughly enjoyed my 97 minutes (plus extras) of viewing time. (I had forgotten how much I really like this movie.) Everyone on our review staff is still singing Christopher Cross's Academy Award winning "Best That You Can Do". One helluva catchy tune!!
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Everyone on our review staff is still singing Christopher Cross's Academy Award winning "Best That You Can Do".
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