Beethoven/Beethoven's 2nd (1992)

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    As a collector's pack, Beethoven and Beethoven's 2nd make an obvious coupling. In many respects, the two films are fairly similar and certainly have a decent connectedness about them - far more so than the lamentable Beethoven's 3rd and the upcoming Beethoven's 4th. With the advent of the long summer holidays, it is an appropriately-timed release, too. This is the sort of thing that will keep the kids out of your hair for a couple of hours.

    Two similar films they may be, but with slightly dissimilar quality DVDs. Nonetheless, the overall package is quite decent and the kids probably aren't going to complain too much.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall

Beethoven (1991)

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General		Extras
Category	Comedy	None
Rating
Year Of Production	1991
Running Time	83:20
RSDL / Flipper	No/No	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Programme
Region Coding	2,4	Directed By	Brian Levant
Studio Distributor	Sony Pictures Home Entertain	Starring	Charles Grodin Bonnie Hunt Dean Jones Oliver Platt Stanley Tucci
Case	Soft Brackley-Transp-Dual v2
RPI	Box	Music	Randy Edelman

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) German Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) French 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	English French Portuguese Danish Finnish Swedish Norwegian German Dutch Czech Polish	Smoking	No
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    So, you want to make a family comedy? Name the essential ingredients thereof. Well, those ingredients are here in abundance - cute kids; poor, suffering, but basically clueless father; strong-as-a-rock mother; and a big, cute, fluffy animal. It might sound somewhat formulaic, but the mixture known as Beethoven works pretty well. It grossed pretty well at the box office (sufficient to spawn a sequel - we will forget the third effort), and sold well on VHS. So it seemed almost inevitable that the film would appear on DVD at some point of time - even if it did so after the lamentable third effort in the franchise. Basically, stick your feet up and enjoy the predictable, but still funny, ride that is the rather large Saint Bernard called Beethoven.

    The broad story of the film is pretty much the life and times of Beethoven. A cute-as-cute-can-be resident of the local pet shop, Beethoven falls into the clutches of the dastardly local vet Dr Hermann Varnick (Dean Jones), who has a little side line that requires the use of puppies, courtesy of the bungling work of rent-a-criminals Harvey (Oliver Platt) and Vernon (Stanley Tucci). But the clutches of Dr Varnick are not that long and Beethoven soon manages to escape into the open world - a world that he is not really accustomed to live in quite yet. His street wanderings find him eventually at the residence of one George Newton (Charles Grodin), where he inveigles his way into the household by sneaking in and locating the youngest member of the household. George has no option but to say yeah to keeping the little puppy, with the usual consequences of such a course of action - namely, much hilarity as well as destruction of house and home. As Beethoven becomes an integral part of the Newton household, he becomes something of a protector as well as a mobile gourmand. But all is not well and our lovable hulk finds himself in a predicament courtesy of the dastardly vet - a predicament that is resolved in a happy-ever-after-ending type of way.

    As you perhaps have guessed, this is a largely successful attempt by Universal to out-Disney Disney. In many ways harking back to some of those great (and not so great) Disney family features of the 1960s and 1970s, this makes the casting of the quintessential Disney nice guy, Dean Jones, as the dastardly vet even more amusing than it would otherwise be. Naturally the story is not that brilliant, but does provide enough opportunity to showcase the big lovable hulk doing the usual sort of cutesy dog things. The fact that I still find some amusement here indicates that this is not a bad thing at all. Charles Grodin plays the somewhat downtrodden notional male head of the household as well as he normally does, and is well-matched by Bonnie Hunt. The kids are the usual collection of cuties, with the only real notable being Nicholle Tom who of course went onto a role in the television series The Nanny. None of the performances are likely to be confused with something close to Oscar-winning stuff, but that is not really the point here at all. Like everything to do with the film, the aim is a broadly entertaining family comedy suitable for all ages that does not need the brain to be engaged for eighty odd minutes, which of course indicates that the directing, cinematography and art direction are pretty much in the average to good area. The unkind will of course suggest that this is very typical of the sort of film that executive producer Ivan Reitman has based his career around.

   Despite the fact that there is nothing here that is really stand-out, the result is quite an enduring and generally endearing family comedy. Just the sort of stuff that can be thrown on to keep the kids happy over the long summer holidays. It's fun, it's harmless and you get to see some age-old gags rehashed. As such, there is a lot to commend it, even if it does not quite compete in the same league as some other recent family releases.

Video

    Just as the film contains nothing really of a stand-out nature, so too the transfer is decent without being spectacular. I guess a good way of describing it is "solid".

    The transfer is presented in an aspect ratio of 1.85:1 and it is 16x9 enhanced.

    The solidity is demonstrated by the fact that the transfer is decently sharp, without approaching anything like razor sharpness. Everything looks okay without really standing out. Detail is pretty decent in general, although a lack of depth of field is noticed here and there - such as at 61:20, where the background really is most indistinct. Shadow detail is okay, with no real problems other than the fact that a ten year old film would perhaps be expected to have a bit more on offer than is the case here. There is a consistent, albeit slightly, grainy appearance throughout the transfer: it is there but it is really not that much of an issue. There does not appear to be any low level noise in the transfer.

    The colours are similarly of a solid nature - good if slightly flat-looking at times. There are no major issues with the palette that a good dollop of brightness would not fix, but really nothing too worrying at all. Obviously the slightly flat look means that the vibrancy level is fairly low and the saturation tends towards the under rather than the over end of the scale. Colour bleed is not an issue here.

    There are no significant MPEG artefacts in the transfer. There are not much in the way of film-to-video artefacts in the transfer, and certainly nothing that could be considered that bothersome. Some minor shimmer in the jacket at 19:52, some slight aliasing in the box edges at 23:26 and some slight wobble in the image at 54:03 are the sorts of minor issues that we are talking about here. The transfer does show its age in the film artefact department though, and at times these do get to be both plentiful and noticeable. A little disappointing for a film of this age.

    There is a nice collection of subtitle options on the DVD and the English efforts are very good. They miss very little, and certainly nothing of import, and are very legible.

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    There are five soundtracks on the DVD, all being Dolby Digital 2.0 surround encoded efforts. The choices are English, German, French, Italian and Spanish. I stuck with the English soundtrack for the review. Whilst being indicated as being surround encoded, the soundtrack barely sounds like it according to my ears.

    The dialogue comes up well in the transfer and is generally easy to understand. There does not appear to be any audio sync problems in the soundtrack at all.

    The original score comes from Randy Edelman naturally enough as this is the sort of stuff he can toss out with gay abandon without much thought. Hardly the most taxing of scores, but at least he manages a decent, and quite memorable, theme tune. Like so much about this DVD, good without being anything remarkable.

    Since we are talking about a family film, there is obviously not much required of the soundtrack. Convey the dialogue well and don't draw attention to itself. As such, the soundtrack does its job really well. Although lacking any real rear channel surround support, the overall soundscape is adequate enough. A bit frontal-sounding at times, which suits the dialogue quite well, and all-in-all, a wholly unremarkable soundtrack. It is completely free of any distortions or other blemishes.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

    Nothing at all - other than the obligatory menu that is barely used.

    In comparison with the Region 1 release, the Region 4 release misses out on nothing at all (okay, a Pan and Scan presentation aside). The Region 1 release however misses out on:

• Widescreen presentation
• 16x9 enhancement
• German and Italian soundtracks

    Just have to say that the preferred version would have to be Region 4.

    Beethoven is probably one of more enduring family comedies to come out of a studio other than Disney during the 1990s. It might not reach any great heights as an art form, but as a piece of family entertainment it is better than average. There might be better efforts around, but this is certainly a proven film that the big and little kids can return to often. If you are in the market for some family comedy, then you should check this one out.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall

Beethoven's 2nd (1993)

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General		Extras
Category	Family	Production Notes Biographies-Cast & Crew Theatrical Trailer-1.85:1, not 16x9, Dolby Digital 2.0 (1:00)
Rating
Year Of Production	1993
Running Time	84:49
RSDL / Flipper	RSDL	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Programme
Region Coding	2,4	Directed By	Rod Daniel
Studio Distributor	Sony Pictures Home Entertain	Starring	Charles Grodin Bonnie Hunt Debi Mazar Chris Penn
Case	Soft Brackley-Transp-Dual v2
RPI	Box	Music	Randy Edelman

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) German Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) French 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	English French Portuguese Danish Finnish Swedish Norwegian German Dutch Czech Polish Turkish Hungarian Bulgarian	Smoking	No
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    After taking a decent box office, it was fairly obvious that Universal would opt for a sequel to the successful Beethoven. Rather than push the frontiers of the sequel genre, it was equally obvious that Universal would pretty much push for more of the same, which is precisely what we get in Beethoven's 2nd - more of the same cute kids, more of the same poor suffering but basically clueless father, more of the same strong-as-a-rock mother and more of the big, cute, fluffy fellow. Just to ensure that there was not a complete rehash of the story, we actually get more in the way of cute dogs as there is not just the one dog but rather six of them, including four really cute little puppies. Yes, it still sounds formulaic, but if anything the mixture known as Beethoven's 2nd works pretty well, and certainly better than is usually the case with sequels.

    Since Beethoven pretty well eliminated all the possible variations of one dog creating absolute havoc, this story takes us down a slightly different path - namely love. Our big lovable hulk starts to realise that around him he is finding couples and starts to realise that he does not have a mate. So what is a large Saint Bernard to do but to go in search of one? Search he does and find he does. Her name is Missy and apart from a stupid bow that she wears, she is a smooth coat equivalent of our hero. Doggy love blossoms but is rudely interrupted when the scheming Regina (Debi Mazar) takes Missy from her doting owner in a ploy to gain $50,000 off him in a divorce settlement. But Regina does not count on our hero, who sets off in pursuit of his lost love. Once reunited, love really blooms and the appropriate number of months later four cute bundles of joy result. Discovered by the Newton kids, who overhear Regina say the pups should be drowned, the puppies are rescued and taken to the safety of the Newton's basement. Naturally this must be kept an absolute secret from the less-than-hinged George Newton (Charles Grodin), or else things might not work out so well. The kids save the puppies but eventually Dad is going to find out and then things might get a bit sticky. But just as usual, Dad cannot do much and the puppies have a home - at least temporarily. Pushed to the edge by the dogs and work, George takes the family and dogs on holiday, where the nasty little Regina seeks to recover what she now sees as valuable puppies that are rightly hers. Ever get the feeling that this is going to end on a bad note?

    After doing such a good job of matching the sort of stuff Disney puts out with Beethoven, Universal pretty well does the same job again with the sequel. The story is still nothing likely to be confused with a Pulitzer Prize winner, but it is again a nice way to showcase not one but six Saint Bernards. With much the same cast returning, with only the addition of Debi Mazar and Chris Penn in major roles, the film is very much in the same mold as its predecessor in just about every respect, and just as it predecessor does, this is a film that continues to provide some amusement, even if it is not quite as much. There is also the odd tendency to overstretch the bounds of reason (you will know when you see it). Even the change of director does not change things at all.

   As an almost seamless sequel, there is just as little in the way of stand-out stuff here as there was in Beethoven. This is a not quite so enduring or endearing effort as the earlier film but it is nonetheless a decent enough family comedy. There remains a lot to commend the film, just as there was in the earlier film.

Video

    The passage of two further years has seen a noticeable improvement in the quality of the transfer, although it still will not match the best around.

    The transfer is presented in an aspect ratio of 1.85:1 and is 16x9 enhanced.

    The noticeable improvement in the transfer is demonstrated in small ways in just about every area. The picture is noticeably sharper and more distinctive. Detail is improved and shows no sign of lapses in the depth of field. The only area where perhaps things have not improved markedly is in the shadow detail, but that may have more to do with the fact that there are more segments shot at night or low light in this film. Overall though, it is not at all bad. The slight grain problem also appears in this transfer, but is even less of an intrusive issue than in Beethoven. There does not appear to be any low level noise in the transfer.

    The colours are much improved here - distinctly more vibrant and distinctly more saturated. The result is a much better looking transfer that is also much more believable. There are no issues with oversaturation here at all, and colour bleed is similarly not a problem.

    There are no artefacts in the transfer of any noticeable kind, since my notes are completely devoid of any notations. The transfer is also much cleaner, with no really obvious film artefacts.

    The disc is RSDL formatted, but I was not able to locate the layer change.

    There is a nice collection of subtitle options on the DVD and the English efforts are very good. They miss very little, and certainly nothing of import, and are very legible.

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    There are five soundtracks on the DVD, all being Dolby Digital 2.0 surround-encoded efforts. The choices are English, German, French, Italian and Spanish. I again stuck with the English soundtrack for the review. Whilst being indicated as being surround-encoded, the soundtrack barely sounds like it according to my ears.

    The dialogue comes up well in the transfer and is generally easy to understand. There does not appear to be any audio sync problems in the soundtrack at all.

    The original score also comes from Randy Edelman and is another pretty good effort that is somewhat more memorable than the effort for the earlier film. The film, in another true out-Disney Disney style, also gets a hit song - The Day I Fall In Love from Dolly Parton and James Ingram.

    This is another family film that does not require much from the soundtrack. The dialogue again comes up well and the soundtrack does not draw much attention to itself, so overall the soundtrack does its job well. Nothing much is still coming through the rear surround channels, but the overall soundscape is a little more open and a little more pleasing. It is completely free of any distortions or other blemishes.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

    A rather mediocre package is on offer here, reflecting the fact that this is a family-oriented film I guess.

Menu

    Reasonable is the best way to describe this.

Production Notes

    Not exactly the greatest we have ever seen from this source, but at least providing ten pages of information about the making of the film.

Biographies - Cast and Crew

    Appearing to be slightly out-of-date, these are the typical expansive efforts we expect from Universal.

Theatrical Trailer (1:00)

    Considering its length, it is almost a teaser trailer rather than a theatrical trailer. Not a great example of the art of film promotion, but at least technically quite good. It is presented in an aspect ratio of 1.85:1, although not 16x9 enhanced and comes with Dolby Digital 2.0 sound.

    The Region 4 release misses out on nothing in comparison to the Region 1 release. The Region 1 release however misses out on:

• German and Italian soundtracks

    All things considered, there is no real preference either way, although the one review that I found for the DVD would suggest that the Region 1 transfer might be a little better.

    Beethoven's 2nd is a worthy sequel to Beethoven albeit one not quite so enduringly funny. The transfer is perfectly good in every way and at least some extras have been thrown onto the DVD. In those long weeks of summer holidays to come, you could do far worse than to check this out.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall