Johnny Dangerously (1984)

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General		Extras
Category	Comedy	None
Rating
Year Of Production	1984
Running Time	90
RSDL / Flipper	Dual Layered	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	2,4	Directed By	Amy Heckerling
Studio Distributor	Twentieth Century Fox	Starring	Michael Keaton Joe Piscopo Marilu Henner Maureen Stapleton Peter Boyle Griffin Dunne Glynnis O'Connor Dom DeLuise Richard Dimitri Danny DeVito Ron Carey Ray Walston Dick Butkus
Case	Amaray-Transparent
RPI	$24.95	Music	John Morris 'Weird Al' Yankovic

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) French Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) German Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) Italian Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) Spanish Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.85:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	1.85:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	Dutch English for the Hearing Impaired French German Italian Spanish Swedish French Titling German Titling Italian Titling Spanish Titling	Smoking	Yes
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

   Amy Heckerling (Clueless) directs this extremely funny comedy homage to 1930s gangster films. Michael Keaton stars as the title character, a young man forced into a life of crime in order to pay for his mother's ongoing medical needs.

    Johnny Dangerously is a clever, witty, well-acted film that does for gangster films what The Naked Gun did for Police Dramas.

    Michael Keaton has an absolute talent for comedy, and it was this talent that propelled him to stardom in the early 1980s. Keaton is a delight to watch as the gangster with a heart of gold and he is more than ably supported by a stellar supporting cast that includes Danny Devito, Griffin Dunne, Peter Boyle, Maureen Stapleton, Malilu Henner and Joe Piscopo. Director Heckerling throws countless gags at the screen and the hit to miss ratio is unusually high. Of special note is any sequence featuring rival mobster Maroni, played by Richard Dimitri. His mispronunciation of the English language is a show-stopper. As a reviewer, I have no hesitation in recommending this wonderful little film to all those who care to listen.

Video

    Johnny Dangerously is presented in the film's original aspect ratio of 1:85:1 and is 16x9 enhanced.

    Picture sharpness is reasonable - only occasionally did I notice the odd soft image. There are no aliasing or edge enhancement issues.

    Grain is apparent on occasion, but is mostly absent. There are no low level noise problems.

    Colours are natural and make use of the film's time period to good effect.

    There are occasional film artefacts, but they are not distracting.

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    Five audio tracks are on offer, all presented as Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtracks in English, French, German, Italian and Spanish. The English track is reviewed here.

    Dialogue is always clear and there are no audio sync problems.

    The score by John Morris captures the feel of the era and has the occasional nod to classic scores of the genre.

    There is little surround channel usage to be heard, with most of the sound located centrally. The film relies mostly on dialogue and does not require a lot of directional effects.

    The subwoofer supports the soundtrack suitably, but could do with a little extra bass to enhance the more vigorous moments.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

   All versions currently available are identical.

  Johnny Dangerously is a comedy gem from 1984 that relies on wit in favour of gross-out gags, so popular in comedies of late. The disc has a reasonable transfer with no extras.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall