Miss Pettigrew Lives For A Day (Focus/Universal DVD)
Picture:
C+ Sound: C+ Extras: C- Feature: C
If you
wonder why a comedy with Frances McDormand like Bharat Nalluri’s Miss Pettigrew Lives For A Day did not
do well despite her good performance, it is simply because it was a lame film
that looks more like a package deal with the Lifetime Network than a feature
film anyone would pay to see. As the
title character, she is drifting from job to job, sometimes because of her
behavior in a yesteryear with a caste system.
She lands
up trying to help out a young lady (Amy Adams) in need of a “social secretary”
and she is ready to help. Unfortunately,
it is never funny, the David Magee/Simon Beaufoy script is too overly simple
and self-amused script never adds up and lives in the fantasy that the
characters can just laugh their way through oppression. It is a yawner and you can see that from a
mile away.
The anamorphically
enhanced 2.35 X 1 image is one the weak side and if it were any weaker would be
graded a letter lower, much like the pan & scan 1.33 X 1 side which is
highly unnecessary. The Dolby Digital
5.1 mix has a limited soundfield and is good for what it is, though it sounds
worse on the pan & scan side. Extras include deleted scenes and two making
of featurettes.
- Nicholas Sheffo
