The Cook, the Thief, His Wife, and Her Lover (Universal) (1989)

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General		Extras
Category	Drama	None
Rating
Year Of Production	1989
Running Time	119:08
RSDL / Flipper	RSDL (60:11)	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Language Select Then Menu
Region Coding	2,4	Directed By	Peter Greenaway
Studio Distributor	Universal Pictures Home Video	Starring	Richard Bohringer Michael Gambon Helen Mirren Alan Howard Tim Roth Ciarán Hinds Gary Olsen Ewan Stewart Roger Ashton-Griffiths Ron Cook Liz Smith Emer Gillespie Janet Henfrey
Case	?
RPI	$19.95	Music	Michael Nyman

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	Auto Pan & Scan Encoded	English Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) Italian Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) German Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) Spanish Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	2.35:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	2.40:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	English for the Hearing Impaired Italian German Spanish Swedish Finnish Norwegian Danish	Smoking	Yes
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    Peter Greenaway's The Cook, the Thief, his Wife, and her Lover (1989) is a disturbingly violent, shocking cult classic and art-house film.

    Peter Greenaway is one of the most original and controversial film directors of recent years. His work splits both critics and moviegoers alike. Is his work overblown arty crap, designed to shock and disgust? Or is it biting social commentary, obscurely presented through a series of artistic and visually explosive images that wash over the viewer? I believe it's more of the latter. With his own unmistakable style, Greenaway comfortably drags art-house film into mainstream cinemas.

    Born in Wales in 1942, Geenaway, a sculptor, writer, and painter studied art heavily before venturing into film as an editor. He is best known for writing and directing The Draughtsman's Contract (1983), Zed and Two Naughts (A.K.A ZOO) (1985), The Belly of an Architect (1987), The Cook, the Thief, his Wife, and her Lover (1989), Prospero's Books (1991), Baby of Macon (1993), and Darwin (1993).

    Greenaway's films have a bold visual style, and often are composed of a series of theatrical set-pieces featuring long tracking shots, operatic arias, and the obvious use of colour and composition (similar to 17th century European paintings). His films often feature characters with elaborate costumes that change colour as they move from room to room. One of Greenaway's famous quotes is: "Continuity is boring". His scripts are often non-linear stories, that like renaissance painting, tell a story through a series of images -- often violent and disturbing images. As he once remarked, "If you want to tell stories, be a writer, not a filmmaker . . . I don't think we've seen any cinema yet. I think we've seen 100 years of illustrated text." Like classic oil painting, the images of a Greenaway film often feature nudes, and violence, with stories of good and evil. Many of his films also feature time-lapse photography and images of decomposing or rotting flesh. To be honest, some of his disturbing scenes of violence are truly stomach turning. However he never idealises or glamorises violence. In a Greenaway film, violence is perpetrated by the evil characters (often bullies), and they, and their acts are seen as truly ugly.

    The Cook, the Thief, his Wife, and her Lover (1989) is undoubtedly Greenaway's most popular, or at least most commercial film. Despite getting an R Rating in both Australia and the US (it was originally given an X Rating in the US), audiences flocked to see it. I recall seeing it at the movies in my late teens, and being both repulsed and disgusted, as well as exhilarated and moved.

    The Cook, the Thief, his Wife, and her Lover tells the awful story of a Cook, Richard (Richard Bohringer), a thief, Albert Spica (Michael Gambon), his wife Georgina (Helen Mirren), and her lover, Michael (Alan Howard). The story is largely set in an elaborate restaurant, run by the kindly and talented chef, Richard. Richard and his staff have fallen victim to Spica. A cruel and crass man, with delusions of grandeur, Spica is a thug and bully who runs a protection racket. He is abusive and controlling of his long-suffering wife, Georgina. Georgina longs to leave Spica, but is frightened to do so, based on what he did to her the last time she escaped. In the restaurant, Georgina meets a quiet, kind and attentive man, Michael. Drawn to each other, they risk the danger of being caught by sharing stolen moments together. They know, however, that it is only a matter of time before they are discovered.

Video

    Overall, this transfer is quite good.

    The transfer is presented in an aspect ratio of 2.35:1, 16x9 enhanced. It is also encoded with Auto Pan & Scan information

    The sharpness is okay, but the shadow detail is a little poor, for example at 62:40. Fortunately the colour is good, which is important in this film. There are some wonderfully colourful costumes by Jean Paul Gaultier, and the skin tones are accurate.

    There are no problem with MPEG artefacts. Film-to-video artefacts appear as some slight aliasing, such as the slight shimmer on the books at 96:19. Film artefacts appear throughout. Most are small, but some are large, such as at 70:45, in which the original print looks to be damaged.

    There are eight sets of subtitles present, and the English ones are accurate. This is an RSDL disc, with the layer change placed at 60:11, which is in-between scenes.

Video Ratings Summary

Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    There are four audio options on this DVD: English Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s), Italian Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s), German Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s), and Spanish Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s).

    The dialogue quality and audio sync are excellent.

    The musical score is credited to Michael Nyman, and it contributes enormously to the rhythm of the film.

    While the surround flag is not set in the English Dolby Digital Stereo audio stream, I watched this movie in Dolby Surround. Minimal ambience and the score appear in the rears, more as incidental spill than any deliberate surround mixing. This is not really a problem, as the focus of this movie is on the dialogue. There is no LFE track.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

    There are no extras on this DVD.

Menu

    A very simple menu which is static and silent.

    The Cook, the Thief, his Wife, and her Lover was previously released on DVD in Region 4 in May, 2001.

    Compared to the previous release, this version misses out on:

• Main Menu Audio & Animation
• Peter Greenaway Biography
• Theatrical Trailer

    The Cook, the Thief, his Wife, and her Lover was released on DVD in Region 1 in March, 2001.

    The Region 4 DVD misses out on:

• two theatrical trailers
• a production notes booklet.

    The Region 1 DVD misses out on:

• Dual layered disc

    I would favour the R4 disc for its RSDL formatting.

    With its brutally raw and cold violence and cruelty, The Cook, the Thief, his Wife, and her Lover is not an easy film to watch, but is well worth the effort. While the visual imagery is astounding, the movie is confronting to say the least, with plenty of nudity, violence, torture, faeces, vulgar language, rotting food, and vomiting. The movie builds to a truly shocking climax that will never be forgotten by any viewer.

    The video quality is acceptable.

    The audio quality is very limited in its presence.

    There are no extras.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall