Building a DVD Library—the MGM way: Oscar winners, drama, comedy, westerns, and a handful of British films combine to delight movie buffs - Entertainment - Bibliography

USA Today (Society for the Advancement of Education), July, 2003 by Robert S. Rothenberg

When Harry Met Sally ... (96 minutes, $14.95) is vintage romantic comedy, as longtime platonic friends (Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan) suddenly realize, after years of being the shoulder each other could cry on when relationships went sour, that they are falling in love. Rob Reiner's direction and Nora Ephron's screenplay wring every laugh out of the possibilities, exploiting the foibles of courtship, commitment, and sex. The latter is hysterically sent up by Ryan's classic demonstration, in the middle of New York's venerable Katz's Delicatessen, of how women can fake an orgasm, the laughter-provoking scene topped by Estelle Reiner (the director's mother and wife of actor/director Carl Reiner), seated at the next table, telling the waiter taking her order, "I'll have whatever she's having!" The Special Edition DVD of the 1989 film features a "Making of ..." documentary; a Harry Connick, Jr., music video; audio commentary by Rob Reiner; and seven minutes of previously cut footage.

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (97 minutes, $14.95) brings Zero Mostel's Tony Award-winning musical comedy Broadway triumph to the screen under the helm of madcap British director Richard Lester, with brilliant results. Throw in a rib-tickling supporting cast--Phil Silvers, Jack Gilford, Buster Keaton, and a pre-"Phantom of the Opera" Michael Crawford--and the bawdy 1966 romp doesn't let up for a minute. Mostel fawns, grovels, mugs, and generally does a fine imitation of a licentious hippo as a slave willing to do anything to win his freedom. Ancient Rome has never been so much fun. There are no special features.

THE BRITISH ARE COMING

The Entertainer (104 minutes, $14.95) offers a typically stunning performance by Laurence Olivier, this time in the guise of Archie Rice, a seedy vaudevillian with a tired act and a rapidly disintegrating family life. The parallels between his fading fortunes and the decline of Great Britain as a world power are cleverly limned by screenwriters John Osborne and Nigel Kneale and deftly handled by director Tony Richardson. The supporting cast reads like a who's who of the British acting fraternity, including Albert Finney, Alan Bates, and Joan Plowright in their screen debuts. Olivier earned a 1960 best actor Oscar nomination, but lost to Burt Lancaster for "Elmer Ganty." There are no special features.

Equus (137 minutes, $19.98) opens up Peter Shaffer's Tony Award-winning play, with his screenplay trading the stylized dressing of men in horse's costumes for actual horses in this story of a troubled youth who blinds six animals in a stable. The effect is quite different--naturalistic vs. symbolic--but the impact remains as horrifying. Richard Burton gives a bravura performance as the psychiatrist seeking to unearth the motivation behind the attack, and Peter Firth more than holds his own as the disturbed stableboy. Naturally, there are strong supporting performances from a crop of fine English actors--in this case, Colin Blakely, Harry Andrews, Joan Plowright, Eileen Atkins, and Jenny Agutter--as most topflight British dramas seem to guarantee. Burton received a 1977 best actor Academy Award nomination, topped by Richard Dreyfuss in "The Goodbye Girl," and Firth was edged by Jason Robards Jr. for "Julia" as best supporting actor. There are no special features.