Rating: 
Summary: Something of a disappointment
Review: Viewers expecting a "Behind the Music" style documentary with "The Winner Takes It All: The ABBA story" will undoubtedly come away disappointed. "The Winner Takes it All," in fact, seems to be more of a tie-in to the musical "Mamma Mia" with just a dash of ABBA history thrown in. ABBA fans will, of course, already know the band's history; "The Winner Takes it All" adds nothing to this history.However, the DVD is worth the purchase for the incredible footage of Agnetha, Benny, Bjorn and Frida, from the 1960s to 1999. ABBA fans will be familiar with Bjorn's early band, The Hootenanny Singers, and Benny's band, The Hep Stars; "The Winner Takes it All" has footage of both bands performing, in addition to early appearances of both Frida and Agnetha. In addition to the incredible footage of the band, present-day interviews are conducted with Benny, Bjorn and Frida; the publicity-shy Agnetha is heard in voiceovers and seen in some very brief footage, but she does not appear on camera in an interview. Perhaps 90 minutes is not long enough to do the ABBA story justice. As I noted earlier, anyone who knows the band's back-story will not find anything new here. Despite a decade's worth of potential material to draw from, there isn't much "story" to the history. ABBA's success in the United States and elsewhere is barely mentioned; instead, the focus is on ABBA's popularity in Australia. In addition to the interviews with the group, there are interviews with ABBA's inner circle. U2's Bono is interviewed; curiously, no one else in popular music is interviewed about the band. We hear from director Lasse Hallstrom, who directed many of ABBA's early, ground-breaking "promo clips," but, again, learn nothing of the history behind the clips. A lot of time is spent on the production of the musical "Mamma Mia." Again, "The Winner Takes it All" feels more like a tie-in to the musical, rather than an in-depth biography of the band. It is worth the purchase price for the great footage and the present-day interviews.
Rating:
Summary: Something of a disappointment
Review: Viewers expecting a "Behind the Music" style documentary with "The Winner Takes It All: The ABBA story" will undoubtedly come away disappointed. "The Winner Takes it All," in fact, seems to be more of a tie-in to the musical "Mamma Mia" with just a dash of ABBA history thrown in. ABBA fans will, of course, already know the band's history; "The Winner Takes it All" adds nothing to this history. However, the DVD is worth the purchase for the incredible footage of Agnetha, Benny, Bjorn and Frida, from the 1960s to 1999. ABBA fans will be familiar with Bjorn's early band, The Hootenanny Singers, and Benny's band, The Hep Stars; "The Winner Takes it All" has footage of both bands performing, in addition to early appearances of both Frida and Agnetha. In addition to the incredible footage of the band, present-day interviews are conducted with Benny, Bjorn and Frida; the publicity-shy Agnetha is heard in voiceovers and seen in some very brief footage, but she does not appear on camera in an interview. Perhaps 90 minutes is not long enough to do the ABBA story justice. As I noted earlier, anyone who knows the band's back-story will not find anything new here. Despite a decade's worth of potential material to draw from, there isn't much "story" to the history. ABBA's success in the United States and elsewhere is barely mentioned; instead, the focus is on ABBA's popularity in Australia. In addition to the interviews with the group, there are interviews with ABBA's inner circle. U2's Bono is interviewed; curiously, no one else in popular music is interviewed about the band. We hear from director Lasse Hallstrom, who directed many of ABBA's early, ground-breaking "promo clips," but, again, learn nothing of the history behind the clips. A lot of time is spent on the production of the musical "Mamma Mia." Again, "The Winner Takes it All" feels more like a tie-in to the musical, rather than an in-depth biography of the band. It is worth the purchase price for the great footage and the present-day interviews.
Rating: 
Summary: Great DVD!
Review: Well, this was very informative. All members participated in this one, even the elusive Agnetha, although she will not speak directly at the camera, she does speak candidly and did allow recent footage of her walking along in a park. But Bjorn, Benny, and my favorite, Frida, do speak lengthily and it is great to see them do so!! This is a quite in-depth DVD which covers their beginnings to the present and any ABBA fan would really enjoy this. The only part that made me wince was when they were discussing the play "Mamma Mia" and the group "Bjorn Again". Obviously, those people do sing ABBA songs....and well, I always wince when people sing ABBA songs because NOBODY can or ever will do them justice, so in my humble opinion, they are best left ALONE. Other than that small bit, the rest of the DVD is fantastic and I'd highly recommend it to any fan of the Swedish Foursome we all love so well!!
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