And Starring Pancho Villa as Himself (2003)

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General		Extras
Category	Drama	Featurette-Behind The Scenes
Rating
Year Of Production	2003
Running Time	107:09
RSDL / Flipper	RSDL (59:55)	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	4	Directed By	Bruce Beresford
Studio Distributor	Warner Home Video	Starring	Antonio Banderas Eion Bailey Alan Arkin Jim Broadbent Matt Day Michael McKean Colm Feore Alexa Davalos Anthony Head Kyle Chandler Saul Rubinek Cosme Alberto Damián Alcázar
Case	?
RPI	$24.95	Music	Joseph Vitarelli

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s) English Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) French Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.78:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	1.78:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	English French Dutch Croatian Czech Danish Finnish Greek Hebrew Hungarian Norwegian Portuguese Slovenian Swedish Turkish English for the Hearing Impaired	Smoking	Yes
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    This is a big budget Home Box Office production, made for cable television about a particular part of the life of Mexican Revolutionary, Pancho Villa (Antonio Banderas). The story focuses on Villa's relationship with an American film company, the Mutual Movie Company during 1914 and the following years. In early 1914, Villa's revolution in Mexico was not going particularly well because he was struggling for funds and the US had placed an arms embargo on Mexico. He decided to raise funds by offering film companies access to film his revolutionaries in the heat of battle in return for $25,000 and a share of the profits. The Mutual Film Company (which actually existed) was owned by Harry Aitken (Jim Broadbent) & the famous director D.W. Griffith. They decided to take up Pancho Villa on his offer and as D.W. Griffith was busy filming his famous Birth of a Nation, they dispatched Harry's nephew Frank Thayer (Eion Bailey) to do the job.

    He arrives in Mexico and meets up with Villa. They sign a contract and shooting begins during a battle for a small town. At this time, Thayer also meets John Reed (Matt Day), a journalist who sympathises with Villa, unlike most American journalists of the day. He also meets my favourite character in the film, Sam Drebben, a mercenary from the Bronx who fights alongside Pancho Villa. He is played with great relish by Alan Arkin. Thayer finishes shooting the first film, which is basically a documentary and returns to the US. The film is received with great derision by the critics and journalists. Thayer eventually convinces his uncle that they should make a longer film about Villa, with a script which will include some fiction and some reality. Despite Villa's reticence to appear in something which is not true, he is swayed by the money and the fact that it portrays him in a positive light. The rest of the film follows the making of the second film, directed by William Christy Cabanne (Michael McKean) and starring a number of Hollywood actors and actresses including one who plays the young Pancho Villa. This film became The Life of General Villa which is listed in the IMDB, so it actually existed.

    This is pretty much a true story, or is at least based on one. The production is large and features many extras and some quite reasonable battle scenes. It was directed by well known Australian director Bruce Beresford. Despite the big name cast and director and scads of Emmy nominations, this film left me fairly cold. I felt that it focussed too much on the most uninteresting character, Frank Thayer (who seems to be made up), rather than on the real character, Pancho Villa. Also, it was a film which was hard to get emotionally involved in. It was entertaining in a low key sort of way but I really find it difficult to recommend too highly.

    People interested in the life of Pancho Villa may find this worthwhile but I would recommend a rental rather than a purchase.

Video

    The video quality is very good.

    The feature is presented in a 1.78:1 aspect ratio 16x9 enhanced which is the original aspect ratio.

    The picture was clear and sharp throughout, with no evidence of low level noise. The shadow detail was excellent.

    The colour was generally good, however it did seem a little under-saturated, although this may have been an artistic choice.

    There were no noticeable artefacts of any kind.

    There are subtitles in 16 languages including English & English for the hearing impaired. The English subtitles were clear and easy to read. There were also burned-in subtitles in English for Spanish dialogue. Quite a lot of Pancho Villa's dialogue was in Spanish.

    The layer change occurs at 59:55 and caused a slight pause.
    

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    The audio quality is very good but certainly nothing spectacular.

    This DVD contains three audio options, an English Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack encoded at 384 Kb/s, an English Dolby Digital 2.0 stereo soundtrack encoded at 192 Kb/s and the same in French.

    Dialogue was clear and easy to understand and there was no problem with audio sync, although the subtitles occasionally came in handy.

    The score of this film by Joseph Viterelli fits the piece well, including as it does some quite Latin sounding music.

    The surround speakers added some mild directional effects and atmosphere to the music. Considering the amount of action in the film, especially chaotic battle scenes, I thought more use could have been made of the surrounds.

     The subwoofer was nicely integrated and added bass to explosions and other such sound effects.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

Menu

    The menu included stills, and the ability to select scenes, languages and subtitles.

Behind the Scenes Featurette (4:43)

    A very short, promotional puff piece which is really just a glorified trailer. Includes interview snippets with Antonio Banderas and Bruce Beresford.

    The Region 4 version of this disc misses out on;

• Commentary by writer Larry Gelbart

    The Region 1 version of this disc misses out on;

• Nothing

    On this basis, the Region 1 version of the disc is the winner.

    The video quality is very good.

    The audio quality is very good but a little lacking in dynamism.

    The disc has only one short extra.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall