License to Wed (2007)

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General		Extras
Category	Comedy	Main Menu Audio Deleted Scenes Featurette-Ask Choir Boy
Rating
Year Of Production	2007
Running Time	87:37
RSDL / Flipper	No/No	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Ads Then Menu
Region Coding	4	Directed By	Ken Kwapis
Studio Distributor	Roadshow Home Entertainment	Starring	Robin Williams Mandy Moore John Krasinski Eric Christian Olsen Christine Taylor Josh Flitter DeRay Davis Peter Strauss Grace Zabriskie Roxanne Hart Mindy Kaling Angela Kinsey Rachael Harris
Case	?
RPI	?	Music	Christophe Beck

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s) English Descriptive Audio Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	2.35:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	2.35:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	English English for the Hearing Impaired	Smoking	No
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	Yes

    Robin Williams has been very busy lately, appearing in lots of films and this is his latest project to hit DVD. It was released at the box office earlier in the year doing fairly well in the US but not setting the world on fire. Personally, I had a pretty similar reaction myself, enjoyable enough but not very memorable. The basic concept of this film is actually pretty good; a young man, Ben (John Krasinski) asks his girlfriend, Sadie (Mandy Moore) to marry him and she agrees but wants to be married by her family's pastor, in the area where her parents live. He agrees before meeting the local pastor, Reverend Frank (Robin Williams). Rev. Frank agrees to marry them on the condition that they pass his marriage preparation course before the wedding. The first rule of this course is no sex before the wedding. Things start off OK but it soon becomes obvious to Ben that Frank is a little unorthodox in his methods and possibly completely mad. There is of course method in Frank's madness as he helps the couple to understand each other better before they commit to marriage.

    At one point in the film, Sadie's father refers to Ben as 'Sadie's affable boyfriend' and that description is probably fair for this movie as a whole. This film will play well with most audiences and is unlikely to offend. It's M rating is for moderate sexual references. There are some amusing sequences, usually involving Williams, but there are also some average to poor elements such as a character called Choir Boy who is a 'Minister of Tomorrow'. He is a young boy of about 10 who follows Rev. Frank around everywhere. His presence is unamusing and I found it annoying. Other elements which were not overly successful were Sadie's best friend, Carlisle (a badly under-developed character) and the casting of the main couple (a comedian and a teen queen). There were also some really creepy animatronic babies which formed part of the course and the ending was somewhat corny (but not unexpectedly so).

    Despite this film's shortcomings, it is entertaining for its short run time and will provide a decent night's viewing for the less demanding rom-com fan.

Video

    The video quality is very good.

    The feature is presented in a 2.35:1 aspect ratio, 16x9 enhanced, which is the original aspect ratio. It is slightly surprising to see a film of this ilk in this aspect ratio.

    The picture was clear and sharp throughout, with no evidence of low level noise and only some very light background grain. The shadow detail was excellent.

    The colour was very good as you would expect with a film of this age, however, there was some bleeding from light colours.

    I did not notice any artefacts.

    There are subtitles in English and English for the Hearing Impaired. They were clear, easy to read and very close to the spoken word.

    There is no layer change during the main feature.
    

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    The audio quality is perfectly suited to the film and has no issues to mention.

    This DVD contains two audio options; an English Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack encoded at 384 Kb/s and an English Audio Descriptive Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo soundtrack encoded at 192 Kb/s. By the way, for those who aren't aware, an audio descriptive track includes the original sound plus a commentator telling you what is going on. It is designed for those with vision impairments. The lower than full bitrate on the 5.1 track does not make a big difference as this is a front-focused soundtrack.

    Dialogue was very clear and easy to understand and there was no problem with audio sync.

    The score of this film by Christophe Beck suits the film but is not overly memorable.

    The surround speakers were really only used for atmosphere and some very mild effects.

    The subwoofer was not noticeably used.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

    Not much here worth mentioning.

Menu

    The menu design is very simple with a promotional still from the film and music.

Additional Scenes (12:11)

    A number of scenes are included, some of which are reasonably interesting. They are presented in non-16x9 enhanced widescreen. An optional director's commentary is included. A subplot involving bachelor/bachelorette parties in included.

Ask Choir Boy

    This must have been an abandoned concept where the Choir Boy character has a talkback radio show giving people life advice. Monstrously unfunny. Twelve different calls are included.

    The Region 4 version of this disc misses out on;

• French & Spanish 5.1 soundtracks

    The Region 1 version of this disc misses out on;

• Nothing

    On this basis lets just call it a draw. It has also been released in the US on both Blu-ray and HD DVD which seems a little excessive.

    The video quality is very good.

    The audio quality is suited to the film but hardly a workout for your home theatre.

    The disc has a couple of average extras.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall