1984

Rating:
Summary: Better than the Eurythmics version
Review: I'm glad it has the original music score put back in it. But the audio is in MONO only. MGM (as usual) has left out any books or photos that collectors might look for. I would have liked to have seen audio commentaries and "making of"'s included.

Rating:
Summary: A mangled movie
Review: I must say, first of all, that I simply adore this film. Filmed at the same time as Orwell placed his warning cry of a novel, and cast with the wonderfully talented John Hurt as Winston Smith, this movie is a lovely adaptation of a book which many would be wary to approach in film.

However--this DVD is absolute garbage. I was thrilled to see that 1984 was finally being rereleased on this format, and picked it up immediately, not aware that MGM would absolutely mangle it. First of all, this DVD is one of those ones released so simplisticly that you nearly suspect it's bootleg--no inner booklet, etc. That wouldn't be much protest, however, and if only that were the issue, I'd not be commenting. However, MGM decided to strip the film of the Eurythmics' score. Maybe someone up top thought that the Eurythmics were "too dated" or something--I don't know. But the film's REAL score suited the mood of a haunting future. And the score they imposed, while decent, was occasionally absent, leaving long stretches of silent time I hadn't noticed before.

If you haven't seen the movie before and can't get the previous VHS tape--go ahead and buy this one. Otherwise? Don't give MGM money for ripping up something beautiful.

Rating:
Summary: Great film, the DVD could have been better...
Review: This was the holy grail of DVDs for me. I loved the book and was blown away by the film. I am very disappointed by the soundtrack revisionism and have decided not to buy the DVD in protest (I rented it to check it out). If anyone in power is reading this please rerelease this DVD with the original Eurythmics soundtrack. I promise to buy a dozen copies.

Rating:
Summary: Missed opportunity
Review: 1984 film 1984 has long been in need of remastering and re-release, but sadly MGM only did it half right. For one, the compositions are too tightly letterboxed wacking some nice visual info off the top of some shots. The biggie is that they chose to dump all of the Eurythmics contributions to the music score in favor of Dominic Muldowney's compositions. Both scores are nice, but the film has lost a great deal of the distinction that the Eurythmics tracks lent to it. Muldowney's score is servicable, and was well utilized in the patriotic anthems of Oceania, but the Eurythmics portions lent a haunting beauty to many scenes, and are woefuly missed. MGM could have released both scores on alternate tracks, but they cheaped out. Too bad.

Rating:
Summary: Doubleplus Outstanding!!!
Review: "April 4th, 1984 ... I think"

I picked 'Nineteen Eighty-Four' as one of the books for a high school reading assignment in my junior year. I didn't actually read it then (1975), but read it just after high school. By the time I'd finished it was near the top of my list of favorite books ' and remains so. When '1984' came out in 1984 I, naturally, rented the video and fell in love with the film. It was one of the better-done film adaptations of a book that I'd seen. I was really taken with the martial music of Dominic Muldowney so I rushed out and bought ' 'The Soundtrack' ' by the Eurythmics. Well, no martial music, no nothing; just Eurythmics. When the Muldowney soundtrack became available a few years ago I purchased it and tried to envision the film with Mr. Radford's original choice attached. I even wrote the director to ask if it was going to be different than the '84 release (I never heard back from him).

So what's all this about soundtracks and the Eurythmics and Muldowney you ask? When my copy of this DVD came in March 2003 I was more than pleasantly surprised with a number of things. First, the picture quality is plusgood. Secondly, and even though they are credited, there is not a hint of the Eurythmics on this DVD! That's doubleplus-phenomenal! The film has a different 'feel' to it, almost a nostalgic feel, that the original didn't have and that I credit to the soundtrack changes. I know there are some that think the film should have been tampered with, but having followed the history of this film and the conflict Mr. Radford encountered with Virgin, I'm very pleased that it's been released in this format. I would have liked to have seen the Eurythmics soundtrack added as an option, but it was not.

As someone said earlier; this is not the book. It is a well-written, well-adapted, film that captures (for me) the essence of Orwell's work. I highly recommend it.

Rating:
Summary: Not totaly bad
Review: Movie adaptations of books are always a disappointment and this is no exception.

Rating:
Summary: Good DVD To Have for One's Collection
Review: 1984 was my sophomore year in high school, so I read the book, and made a point of seeing the film when it was originally released in theaters.

The film itself is very well done and it doesn't necessarily bother me that the Eurythmics score is missing, although Julia's theme was a haunting classic as I remember it. It was also interesting to look at Allan Cameron's production design years before he moved on to such features as Starship Troopers and Tomorrow Never Dies. My real complaint is the lack of supplemental features.

I remember a slew of television documentaries and news reports from the year 1984 that explored the anniversary of the novel and used it as a touchstone to examine whether or not our society, government, and technologies were leading us down a similar path. I'm sure a few of these or an original feature could have been added to the disc offering a snapshot of how things are in the 21st century compared to Orwell's vision. There wasn't even a booklet inside the DVD package. It also would have been nice if there had been a commentary. If Foxy Brown can contain a commentary from director Jack Hill, then Mr. Radford could have spent an afternoon making one for this disc!

An interesting comparison disc to view with 1984 might be Minority Report. That movie does offer a very forseeable future where technology has enabled not just the government, but advertisers to invade practially every aspect of our life.

Rating:
Summary: Missing Eurythmics Soundtrack
Review: Don't waste your money on this DVD. The wonderful soundtrack by the Eurythmics is missing even though the DVD box clearly states "Music: Eurythmics & Dominic Muldowney." This is false advertising and should not be tolerated. MGM should be stuck with every disc that they burned for this slap in the face.

Rating:
Summary: Positively Orwellian
Review: An excellent transfer of this out of print classic, and a must have for anyone still hoarding a battered VHS version. Director Radford's straight forward approach to the adaptation of Orwell's novel comes across cleanly and vividly in the widescreen DVD format.

A word of warning : In an incredibly Orwellian manipulation - any remaining vestige of the original Eurythmics film score [which had been severly edited for the theatrical release] has been eliminated. Extremely ironic in light of one of the underlying messages of the work "Who contols the past controls the future,who controls the present controls the past." The absence of the Eurythmics score ultimately deflates the scenes they had been initially included in - which now have no underscore at all.

Rating:
Summary: 1984 on MGM DVD? Not quite the masterpiece fondly remembered
Review: Well...given the fact that "Nineteen Eighty-Four" has probably been my all-time favorite film ever since I first rushed home from my parents' friends' house to catch it on Cinemax that fateful night of November 24, 1986, you can bet that I was the first in line to purchase this DVD the day after its long-awaited arrival at my local video retail outlet.

But when I finally popped this one into my DVD player, I found myself more than just a trifle bewildered and underwhelmed. To my dismay, this particular DVD doesn't exactly contain a definitive and improved rendering of the film as I had hoped. Instead, it offers a version of a beloved old chestnut that seems almost unrecognizable to me (OK, perhaps that's a bit of an exaggeration, but still....)

If I am not mistaken, this film was actually shot in a 1.66:1 aspect ratio on a 35mm film stock, rather than the 1.85:1 matte featured on this DVD. Hence, it seems that the top of the frame in the original composition is slightly cropped off. However, we do get to see a lot more detail in the width of the image -- and truth be told, the picture sharpness and clarity of the 16 X 9 enhancement cannot be beat. Still, I think the murky, panned-and-scanned image of the VHS gives the movie a more claustrophobic feeling of doom and decay.

Indeed, I saw several things that I have never noticed before in this film. For example, there are at least two revealing mistakes in the film -- both of them involve the actress Suzanna Hamilton, who plays the love interest, Julia.

One is when we see Suzanna emerging from the "Golden Country" of John Hurt's dreams in slow motion as she tears off her dark blue coveralls. In the first shot, you don't have to look very closely to see that, after her coveralls fall off her shoulders and gradually reveal her breasts, she appears to be wearing some kind of black underpants visible just below her navel. These underpants, of course, disappear in the subsequent matching shot, where these same coveralls languorously cascade off her body and reveal her to be completely nude underneath. Also, the white bandaging she was wearing around her right wrist at the beginning of the scene, but which disappeared in the shot of her running from the field, suddenly reappears again.

The second mistake occurs when we see Suzanna walking around in the secret room. Once again she is completely starkers, but the scene is more casual. She is munching on a piece of bread and jam. When she goes to set the bread on a stool behind her we see that her snack immediately tumbles onto the floor, although she doesn't seem to notice as she continues to nonchalantly pour herself a cup of coffee and walk back toward the camera. This unintentionally funny little goof (a common accident in the theater) was probably an oversight on the director's part. But who knows? Perhaps Radford was confident that we would be sufficiently distracted by such a frank and generous glimpse of dear Suzanna's lovely bare bod.... The error was discretely cropped out of the VHS panned-and-scanned version of the film.

There is a lot less shadow and the actors all look noticeably younger and healthier in the DVD than in the VHS version. John Hurt's complexion appears a bit less sallow and sandpapery, Richard Burton seems more physically relaxed and has fewer crevasse-like lines on his face, and Suzanna Hamilton's skin appears softer and her pubic hair looks a lighter, more natural brownish color and not quite as thick. I suppose it is rather churlish to mention such silly, clinical details about actors' bodies in a DVD review, but nevertheless these altered qualities of visual texture do affect one's visceral response to the film.

The Eurythmics contributions to the soundtrack (which are still credited in the opening and closing titles) have been meticulously removed and the original Dominic Muldowney score has been restored in its entirety -- talk about an Orwellian cleansing of history! Apparently, this was in accordance with Michael Radford's original intentions for the film (although even Radford has begrudgingly acknowledged -- long after the fact, of course -- the advantages of the Eurythmics soundtrack).

Alas, I am disappointed. Sure, Muldowney's music is fine in it's own right -- you can enjoy the independent-release soundtrack CD, "Music of Oceania", as pleasant easy-listening -- but in the context of this film it just doesn't sit right at all.

Granted, the bombastic Stalinistic national anthem ("Oceania 'tis for thee") which opens the film is rich and stirring. In comparison, the quieter stuff (a touch of Kurt Weill in a more subdued and wistful mode, perhaps?) sounds drab, listless, and undifferentiated -- not to mention, curiously quaint and old-fashioned. As a consequence, many of the more powerful, disturbing scenes -- particularly the Room 101 climax -- simply come across as flat, pedestrian, and under-dramatized. And this is a real drag!

In spite of its being a last-minute addition, the Eurythmics score was strange, hypnotic, eerie, suspenseful AND melodramatic in the best sense; and it imbued the film with a genuinely lurid and creepy atmosphere of dread, ecstasy, and primal terror.

Why could the Eurythmics score not have been featured on an ALTERNATE audio track??? This IS a DVD after all!...

And while we are on the topic, where is the director's commentary track? Come to think of it, how about a featurette with behind-the-scenes footage and cast and crew interviews, as well as a supplement documentary about Orwell and his novel? At least the trailer provides us with some added perspective -- however precious little of it. The DVD menus are handsomely designed, but only 20 chapters stops is just a bit paltry. Perhaps, there may still be hope yet for a twentieth- or silver-anniversary collector's edition DVD, containing all of the bells and whistles that I have just mentioned.