Lonely Hearts (Filmmakers Collection) (1982)

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General		Extras
Category	Drama	Featurette-Making Of-The Making of Lonely Hearts Theatrical Trailer-Lonely Hearts Trailer-4 x Umbrella Titles
Rating
Year Of Production	1982
Running Time	91:28
RSDL / Flipper	Dual Layered	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	1,2,3,4,5,6	Directed By	Paul Cox
Studio Distributor	Umbrella Entertainment	Starring	Wendy Hughes Norman Kaye Jon Finlayson Julia Blake Jonathan Hardy Irene Inescort Vic Gordon Ted Grove-Rogers Ron Falk Chris Haywood Diana Greentree Margaret Steven Kris McQuade
Case	Amaray-Transparent-Secure Clip
RPI	$24.95	Music	Norman Kaye

     Dutch born, Australian filmmaker Paul Cox  has avoided being drawn into the realms of mainstream cinema by maintaining a passion for the films he makes best. His films are generally low-budget productions that explore the many facets and complexities of human relationships. Most Paul Cox films also have a distinctive "European" influence, whilst still remaining faithful to their local origins.

    In the early eighties Cox made three consecutive feature films that significantly elevated his filmmaking reputation. These films were Lonely Hearts (1982), Man of Flowers (1983) and My First Wife (1984). While each of these superb films deals with aspects of human frailty, one of them also exudes genuine warmth with subtle humour - that film is Lonely Hearts.

    Cox wrote the screenplay for Lonely Hearts based on his own experience of loneliness when he first arrived in Australia. Executive Producer, Philip Adams thought the screenplay was a little too dark, so he suggested that humorist, John Clarke be brought in to contribute to Cox's screenplay. Cox agreed and the collaboration added an element of humour, which lifted the overall ambience of the film.

    Originally Cox had trouble finding investors for Lonely Hearts, because of the films awkward theme and offbeat characters. However, investor fears were proved unfounded when the film won the praise of critics and received the Best Film award at the 1982 AFI Awards, against some quality opposition.

    After the death of his mother, fifty-year-old Peter Thompson (Norman Kaye) decides to use a dating agency to help him find a suitable lady partner. Peter works as a piano tuner and is also very keen on amateur theatre. He is matched up with Patricia (Wendy Hughes ), a much younger and shy lady, who has only just moved out of her parents house and into her own flat. Patricia is in her thirties, is very dowdy and as we later discover, has deep psychological fears about sex.

    Both Peter and Patricia have their lives somewhat complicated by intrusive family members. Peter's life is overseen by his sister Pamela (Julia Blake) and her husband, Bruce (Jonathan Hardy), while Patricia has the constant interference of her father and mother (Vic Gordon & Irene Inescort).

    Slowly Peter and Patricia develop an awkward relationship. Patricia gradually loses some of her inhibitions and learns to trust Peter. With his guidance, she also gets involved in the local theatre's production of Strindberg's, The Father. The plays very camp director, George (Jon Finlayson), thinks Patricia is a natural and welcomes her openly into the group.

    One night, Patricia's trust in Peter is shattered when he misinterprets her signals and pushes the sexual boundaries of their relationship. With their friendship now on the brink, Patricia must search deep within to finally stand up to her meddling father and also find the courage to pick up where she and Peter faulted.

Video

    The video transfer for Lonely Hearts is reasonably good.

    The film is presented in the fullframe ratio of 1.33:1, which is not 16x9 enhanced. The slick of this DVD edition claims this to be the original aspect ratio, however it has now been confirmed that the correct ratio is 1.85:1.

    The National Film & Sound Archive have recently restored Lonely Hearts as part of the Kodak/Atlab Cinema Collection and it is highly likely that this transfer has come from such a print. Although the transfer is by no means pristine, it is easily the best presentation of the film that I have seen to date. Sharpness levels vary throughout the film, but tend to more on the soft side. Blacks were very clean, showing no signs of low-level-noise. In general, I found shadow detail to be a little disappointing. Quite often the detail in these areas was murky and un-defined. All of these issues would no doubt, relate back to the source material, so I'm not being overly pedantic.

     The colour palette used in Lonely Hearts was deliberately very drab and subdued; this is certainly consistent on the DVD.

    I noticed no MPEG artefacts in this transfer. Film-to-video artefacts were insignificant and not much of a distraction. Film artefacts were negligible, consisting of infrequent and very minor scratches. A few reel change markings were also evident at regular intervals - these were in no way a distraction.

     Unfortunately, there are no subtitles on this DVD.

     This is a single sided, dual layer disc. The layer change is perfectly placed at the end of a scene at 87:02 and was very difficult to detect.

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    The audio transfer is basic, but faithful to the original mono audio source.

    There is only one audio track available on the DVD, English Dolby Digital 2.0 (224Kb/s).

    Dialogue quality was generally very good and audio sync appeared accurate throughout.

    The piano music in Lonely Hearts was arranged and performed by Norman Kaye , who was actually a music teacher before turning to acting.

    The surround channels and the subwoofer were not used.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

    While there isn't an abundance of extras, the "making of" doco is interesting and relevant.

Menu

    The main menu is static; 16x9 enhanced and features a music sample from the film.

Featurette  - The Making of Lonely Hearts  (55:39)

    This comprehensive look at the making of Lonely Hearts is divided into eleven chapters, each covering a different aspect of the production. Recently produced by Umbrella, the featurette is dedicated to the memory of Norman Kaye, who sadly passed away in May of this year, aged 80. Interviews and anecdotes are combined with footage from the film in an interesting and relevant manor. The contributors include Paul Cox, John Clarke, Philip Adams and Wendy Hughes. Recommended viewing.

Theatrical Trailer

   Lonely Hearts (2:23 )

Umbrella Trailers   

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall