Friday, September 30, 2022

A comment on audio commentaries

As a movie buff and home video collector, I heartily welcomed the laserdisc format. It was a bit unwieldy (phonograph record-size discs that had to be flipped over manually every hour—or half-hour, depending on the format) and expensive (at a time when VHS tapes were in the 20-30 dollar range, laserdiscs were 40-100, depending on the number of discs). But practically every laserdisc release of a widescreen movie was presented in letterboxed widescreen format, whereas VHS versions were still often panned-and-scanned to fit into a square screen format—widescreen TVs were not the standard yet. And laserdiscs could fit extra audio tracks on them, which allowed for the inclusion of audio commentaries on the movies that could be accessed while you were watching the movie. DVDs and Blu-Rays, basically more consumer-friendly versions of laserdiscs, are the standard for home video now. Most releases contain some "bonus features," ranging from short making-of featurettes to full-length documentaries, and audio commentaries continue to be included on many discs.

In my eyes, however, we are long past the golden age, if you will, of commentaries. When newer movies are released, usually the commentary is by one or more of the filmmakers; those may still be relevant and interesting, but I rarely listen to those. My focus is on the classic movie commentaries for films made long enough ago that most of the people involved are no longer with us. I have been a fan of commentaries ever since I started buying DVDs. For me, a good commentary should have the following elements: 1) it should be given in tandem with the movie as it plays so the commentator can talk about specific scenes or actors as we watch them; 2) the commentator should have some knowledge or expertise that the average movie fan may not have; 3) some description of the plot as it unfolds may be necessary, but most of the commentary should fill us in on the background of the production, the career of the actors, and relevant notes about the movie’s reception and influence; 4) while occasionally some humor and criticism are welcome, generally a respectful tone should predominate—in other words, the commentator should actually like the movie we're watching; 5) the best commentaries are ones that have been well planned in advance, with the person reading from a script of sorts or at least an outline.

These days, with the shrinking of the home video market, more classic movie releases include commentaries to attract the fans who may already own the movie on an earlier, bare-bones release. But the commentators are too often amateurs, or self-styled experts with blogs and podcasts, or academics with a narrow field of interest. My gold standard for commentaries are the ones done for the classic Universal horror films of the 30s and 40s by people like David J. Skal, Rudy Behlmer, Steve Hoberman, Tom Weaver, Richard Harland Smith, and Paul Jensen, authors and historians who knew what they were talking about and were enthusiastic about sharing their knowledge. Many of them also did commentaries for non-horror films as well; the late Behlmer spoke on discs of Casablanca, Gone with the Wind, and Laura, and always held my attention. Famous critic Roger Ebert did a couple, and his track for Citizen Kane is considered by some to be the best one ever. Tim Lucas, of the late lamented magazine Video Watchdog, also gives excellent commentary.

Lately, however, classic movie commentaries have taken a big dive in quality, with Kino Lorber being the worst offender. God bless them for continuing to issue new releases of classic films, sometimes long ignored ones, in very good restored prints. But the accompanying commentaries are often quite bad, mostly given by people who are amateurs (at least compared to people like Ebert, Behlmer and Skal, who all were published authors). They usually have little to no background information about the movies they discuss except what's available online at the Internet Movie Database—sometimes you can actually sense them pause as they consult their computer. Often losing track of what they are commenting on, they wind up drifting off topic for long minutes at a time. The track on the recent Blu-Ray of the Peter Ustinov Death on the Nile, by three "historians," is perhaps the worst I’ve ever heard, as they wind up hijacking the commentary to talk at tedious length about the film’s director, John Guillermin and let long, long stretches pass during which they ignore the film completely. I’ve read some complaints about commentators being anti-intellectual (which is true), but even actual academics can give poor commentary. I'm a fan of Jeanine Basinger as a writer, but her commentary on The Philadelphia Story is dry and boring. Emily Carman, on the Back Page disc, spends way too much time on social context, repeating the same points, and keeps getting the name of one the main actors wrong (it’s Claude Gillingwater, not Claude Gillingworth). An occasional snarky comment is OK, bur too much makes me wonder why the person is even interested in talking about the movie (even a pro like Tom Weaver is guilty of this). In the past couple of years, the only commentary I remember fondly is Alan K. Rode's for the WWII movie A Walk in the Sun, which is not a Kino Lorber disc. Even Criterion, a brand which can boast of many good commentaries, has moved away from them in favor of interviews and short featurettes. Kino Lorber should definitely take a lesson from them. Or they should start commissioning commentaries from professionals.

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