|
 Movie
B- |
Video A | Audio B+
| Extras B+ | Defective
DVD
Gene Hackman, Anjelica Huston, Ben Stiller, Gwyneth
Paltrow,
Luke Wilson, Owen Wilson, Bill Murray, and Danny Glover
director Wes Anderson | Touchstone Pictures (Buena Vista)
2001 | Family Drama | R | 110 minutes
Region 1 | DVD-9
|
anamorphic
widescreen 2.40:1 aspect ratio
DTS 5.1 |
Dolby Digital 5.1
Summary: The Royal Tenenbaums is,
shall I say, a unique family drama. Gene Hackman plays Royal
Tenebaum, the head of household who is kicked out by his wife Etheline (Anjelica
Huston) when their children were still very young. They have three
children: older son Chas (Ben Stiller), adopted daughter Margot (Gwyneth
Paltrow), and younger son Richie (Luke Wilson). Etheline devotes her
life to raising their children and is very successful in doing so.
All three become very successful professionally: Chas is a successful
inventor and businessman, Margot is an inventive playwright, and Richie is
a top-seed tennis player. Years later, when Royal becomes broke and
is evicted from his hotel, he becomes the estranged patriarch who wants to
move back into the family home and re-build his relationships with his
children and grandchildren. As a family drama, The Royal
Tenenbaums has a quite unique storyline and is frequently weird.
The characters are very well developed and quite a few are
eccentric. To my delight, the ending is quite satisfying. If
you're into family dramas, and eccentric ones at that, you may find this
movie quite enjoyable. But if you like "mainstream" family
dramas, Tenenbaums is probably not for you, even with this star-studded
cast.
Technically, the picture quality of this DVD is
superb. The sound quality is probably very good, though it's
difficult to tell with the conservative sound design. Case in point:
though this DVD features a
DTS soundtrack option, this is one of few DVDs where the DTS
soundtrack made virtually no difference. I also had some difficulty
viewing the feature film DVD (disc 1) on my Sony DVP-S7700 reference DVD
player. The playback rudely froze twice,
near the end of Chapter 1 and at the beginning of Chapter 12.
This also occurred when I used the Panasonic
DVD-RV32.
Special Features: audio commentary by
director Wes Anderson; cut scenes (deleted scenes); outtakes; interviews
with Gene Hackman, Anjelica Huston, Ben Stiller, Gwyneth Paltrow, Luke
Wilson, Owen Wilson, Bill Marray, and Danny Glover; "The Peter
Bradley Show" featuring interviews with supporting cast members;
"With the Filmmaker: Portraits by Albert Maysles"; "The Art
of the Movie: Young Riche's murals and paintings, still photos by set
photographer James Hamilton, book and magazine covers, Studio 360 radio
segment on painter Miguel Calderon; storyboards; theatrical trailers;
14-page fold-out booklet
DVD released on 7/9/2002 | Reviewed 9/20/2002
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Additional Notes: Unless we specify otherwise, the
video and audio quality are very good when their grades are "A-"
or better. Only the highest number of channels of surround sound
format is listed (e.g., Dolby Digital 5.1). If there are both Dolby
Digital 5.1 and DTS 5.1 soundtracks, then both are listed. All
DVD-Video discs are backwards compatible with stereo-only playback
systems.
Let us know what you think about this DVD review, write to us at
Staff@TimeForDVD.com.
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Associated equipment used in evaluation: Sony
DVP-S7700 reference DVD player, Sony
KP-61V45 61" rear projection TV (4:3 screen aspect ratio), Sony ES STR-V444ES A/V receiver, four
B&W CDM 9NTs as left/right main speakers
and left/right surrounds, B&W CDM CNT center channel speaker, Monster Cable M-series S-Video cable MSV-500, Monster
Cable Interlink LightSpeed 100 (Toslink) optical cable, Monster Cable
Interlink 400 MKII interconnects, Monster Cable
Original speaker cables in bi-wire configuration with Monster Cable twist-on gold-plated banana plug
connectors, Lovan Sovereign T HiFi audio
rack, and Sony MDR-V600 studio monitor headphones. Our home theater equipment was calibrated
with the Video
Essentials DVD.
Be sure to check out our Top 10 DVDs of the year
2001 and our list of this year's Oscar winners on DVD.
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