Hand Made Films Comedy Wave (A Private
Function/Nuns On The Run/Withnail & I/Umbrella
Entertainment/Region Four/4/PAL DVDs)
Picture:
C+ Sound: C+/C+/B- Extras: C Films: C
PLEASE NOTE: These DVD editions of Hand Made
Film comedies can only be operated on machines capable of playing back DVDs
that can handle Region Four/4 PAL format software and can be ordered from our
friends at Umbrella Entertainment at the website address provided at the end of
the review.
Long after his amazing success with Concert For Bangladesh, former Beatle George Harrison formed a film
production company called Hand Made Films and it is a more successful company
than many realize, including hits like Time
Bandits (reviewed elsewhere on this site) and one common denominator
between the films tended to be the more eccentric and odd, the better an idea
for a film. Umbrella Entertainment in
Australia has issued three of these films on separate DVDs and two of them had success in the U.S. as
well.
A Private Function (1985) has Maggie Smith and
Michael Palin as a married couple in post-WWII Britain still suffering from
wartime rationing when they discover that an oversized pig is being fattened
more still to be slaughtered and fed to some rich people in the area. They decide to kidnap the pig and feed it to
their friends instead! Never as funny as
it sounds, though performances are not bad, but it is most interesting for its
time period, is hardly funny and even Denholm Elliott cannot save this.
Nuns On The Run (1990) has Robbie Coltrane and
Eric Idle dealing with cardboard gangsters who want them killed, so they decide
to avoid death by pretending to be nuns.
Makes TV’s Bosom Buddies seem
like a Billy Wilder classic and is also just
not that funny. Still, a weird high concept
typical of the company.
Withnail & I (1987) is the oddest of all as
Richard E. Grant and Paul McGann fill out the title characters as they drive
each other nuts in their misadventures in 1969 England, complete with
drug-induced delusions and an uncle (Richard Griffiths) who is also out of his
mind. Has potential at first, but gets
too impressed with itself and eventually implodes. Still, a cult item for a different generation
than the other two films has its following for better and worse, but overrated
overall.
All three
films are presented in an anamorphically enhanced 1.78 X 1 aspect ratio and are
from decent prints, but despite the advantages of the PAL format over NTSC, all
are a bit softer than expected in the detail department, suggesting older
transfers. Still, color can be rich and
they are not bad. Function and Nuns have Dolby
Digital 2.0 Stereo, but Nuns has monophonic Pro Logic-type surrounds that are
limited. Withnail has such a surround mix too, but also adds Dolby Digital
5.1 with limits and a much-preferred DTS 5.1 mix that is not great, but much
better than anything among the three releases here.
Extras do
not appear on Function, but Nuns has a trailer, stills and audio
commentary by director Johnathan Lynn, while Withnail has two DVDs and two audio commentary tracks on DVD 1,
while DVD 2 has trailers, still, a Swear-A-Thon, three featurettes and original
documentary on the film from 1999.
As noted above, you can order these PAL DVD imports exclusively
from Umbrella at:
http://www.umbrellaent.com.au/
- Nicholas Sheffo
