The Man with Two Brains (1983) (NTSC)

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General		Extras
Category	Comedy	None
Rating
Year Of Production	1983
Running Time	89:41
RSDL / Flipper	No/No	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Programme
Region Coding	1,4	Directed By	Carl Reiner
Studio Distributor	Warner Home Video	Starring	Steve Martin Kathleen Turner David Warner
Case	Amaray-Transparent
RPI	$19.95	Music	Joel Goldsmith

    This movie was directed by and co-written with Carl Reiner, and this is another reason why it works so well. Carl Reiner is a long-time collaborator with Steve Martin, and previous to this film the two had already worked together on The Jerk (1979) and Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid (1982). The year after this film they went on to do All of Me. It is apparent that by the time they got to The Man With Two Brains, they knew and respected each other very well. They must have had an absolute ball writing this one, too. This movie contains just as much silliness as The Jerk, but a lot more polish  It is an excellent showcase for this type of comedy.

    Want the plot? OK, well just remember, you did ask for it!... Steve Martin plays Dr Michael Hfuhruhurr (yes, it's pronounced exactly the way it's spelt!). He loves brains. Dr Hfuhruhurr is a world famous brain surgeon and originator of the brilliant new zip-lock, screw-top brain surgery technique. Dr Hfuhruhurr is also a modest man, summing himself up to a journalist rather shyly but succinctly by saying that "My brilliant research in brain transplantation is unsurpassed and will make my name live beyond eternity"!  After our modest Doctor accidentally knocks over and almost kills Delores Benedict (a very young looking Kathleen Turner) in a car accident, he is forced to save her life with his own screw-top brain surgery technique and soon they are married. But the marriage is not a happy one. After meeting fellow eminent brain surgeon Dr Necessiter (David Warner) and visiting his rather spacious home laboratory (inside his condominium), Dr Hfuhruhurr meets and falls in love with the lovely Ann Uumellmahaye (not credited, but actually the voice of Sissy Spacek). Ann Uumellmahaye is the woman who could be everything for Dr Hfuhruhurr that Delores is not. That is, once they overcome the very small problem that Ann is just a brain in a jar!....

      I was very interested in reviewing this movie to see if it still held up for me and was still as funny as I last remembered it - about 15 years ago. I needn't have worried. After hearing the very first mention of the "Pointy Pointy Birds" poem, it cracked me up just the same. This film is still just as crazy, just as stupid, just as corny and just as uproariously funny as I remembered it last. Champagne comedy.

Video

    Oh dear, oh dear. Disappointment number one: the transfer is yet another Region 1 NTSC re-badge from Warner Home Video. That leads us on to disappointment number two; we have to suffer the same 1.33:1 Pan & Scan transfer as is (apparently) more acceptable in that market. If you want to skip ahead to disappointment number three now (the mother of all disappointments), then just read the first line under "Audio".

    If you've done that now, and you're anything like me, you've probably read everything you need to know to sum up this DVD without even watching it; i.e.. "this transfer is the very bottom of the quality chain in terms of both video and audio formats, and is not worth considering further, so I might as well move along to the next review." I can't blame you. Hardly worth treating as a serious DVD release at all, is it? (sigh). Oh well, for what it's worth.....

   The quality of the source from which this DVD has been mastered is rather dated and faded. This is probably not overly surprising when you think about it, as both the video and audio transfer specs imply to me that this must have been from an early sub-master originally used for the US television airing - and perhaps even the very first screening of this movie on US television as long ago as the mid 1980s. I'm not sure of its exact age, but certainly this transfer is an old one and therefore you can probably already think ahead and fill in the blanks about all the comments I'm about to make in respect of the transfer's luminance and chrominance - it's exactly what you would consider acceptable for a mid 1980s television screening, but not the quality you would consider acceptable for home theatre.

    The transfer is not what can be described as sharp at all, but OK, it is at least of a uniformly standard resolution quality. There is grain inherent in the image throughout, but I suppose it remains unobtrusive enough after you have been watching (and laughing) along for a while. Shadow detail is just average. There is no real low level noise to speak of.

    Colours are faded. This film did not employ spectacular cinematography or adopt any use of vibrant colours in the first place, but on this very old transfer it just comes over as plain old drab, drab, drab.

    There are no real MPEG artefacts to speak of. Film-to-video artefacts consist of some trivial aliasing and the odd telecine wobble (check out the closing credits). Film artefacts on the other hand are - again not unexpected for the age of this transfer - the problem. They consist of all number of odd film flecks, hairs and scratches throughout, most of which are none too distressing I should point out, but some areas (like Chapter 19) do suffer more than others. There is also the more noticeable distractions in the image caused by several negative film artefacts, like at 9:43 for instance.

    There are no subtitles on this disc and it is a single layer disc, so there is no layer change to note.

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    As an avid Steve Martin fan and someone who was desperately awaiting this movie's release on DVD, I think I would have actually preferred Warners not release it at all, if it meant having a favourite movie subjected to this quality video and audio transfer. It would have been better to wait for however long it took to get around to a decent quality transfer effort, or even for me to have gone without entirely, rather than having to suffer the indignation of hearing Steve Martin deliver his poignantly eloquent "Pointy Pointy Bird" poem in mono, for crying out loud!!...

    OK, I've calmed down a bit again now, so what can I tell you about the quality of the audio transfer? Well there's very little dynamic range to it for starters. Oh, and it's an extremely flat mix, as you may expect. But at least I can say the clarity of the dialogue is fine throughout. Well, apart from some isolated instances of minor audio distortion over a few of the lines during Chapter 2, anyway. Audio sync is fine.

    The music is by Joel Goldsmith. There's only the odd music track and scoring here and there. It's music firmly rooted in the 1980s and is very deliberately over-the-top in its quirkiness, so it suits the movie very well and has a charm of its own.

    My subwoofer, along with four of my other speakers, stole away and were off playing cards somewhere while this movie was running.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

    For those who haven't experienced this film before and for those like myself keen to relive the silliness, you will all be sorely annoyed with the shoddy treatment the film receives on DVD. It's hard to even summon up the enthusiasm to bother in the first place, when you are dished up the very bottom end of the food chain in terms of both video and audio formats. It would probably have been better not to release it in the first place, if this is all that could be mustered up. Warners, go and hide in a corner somewhere. Or perhaps those responsible should be dealt with as Dr Hfuhruhurr would have dealt with them; by injecting their buttocks with window cleaner (it causes their brains to die last!).....

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall