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Available for Region 1 as a two-disc
set carrying either a fullscreen version or the original widescreen
picture. For Region 2, Universal has released a single-disc release
carrying only some minor extras (and the film in widescreen), and
a two-disc edition, also with a widescreen transfer and the same
extras as the Region 1 set. The widescreen two-disc set served as
a basis for this review.
The anamorphic widescreen image
is framed at an aspect ratio of approx. 1.85:1. Drawn from a pristine
source print, the transfer presented here is just about flawless.
The first half hour, set in the 1940s, has a rich, golden hue that
has been rendered beautifully on this DVD. The film's later sections
are very dark and shadowy, but never does this prove problematic
for the transfer, which has excellent shadow detail and deep, solid
blacks.
The Dolby
Digital 5.1 sound mix is also outstanding, with a strong bass
foundation on which the orchestral score can truly shine, and a
well-chosen subtle sense of ambience that makes fine use of the
surround channels.
Coming as a fully laden two-disc 'Awards Edition',
this is a solid effort albeit one that is more celebratory in nature than anything else.
Disc one carries two solid
audio commentaries: one by director Ron Howard and one by screenwriter Akiva Goldsman, who adapted the
book by Sylvia Nasar. Howard's affable nature is all but legendary, making it virtually
impossible not to warm to the self-effacing, open-hearted director as he walks us through
the major decisions and situations. Goldsman's comments are more specific to the relationships between
the characters, but lacking the breadth of scope of Howard's track, he often lapses into
recounting what's happening on-screen.
The Deleted Scenes section is unusually also located on disc one, where a menu screen offers the choice
of 18 scenes with or without director's commentary. Director Ron Howard is heard in an audio introduction, which
plays the first time you access the deleted scenes area, explaining why he decided to include
a deleted scenes section for this particular release. They play sequentially in non-anamorphic widescreen
video, with a combined running time just shy of half an hour, also conveniently organized as individual
chapters. Each is engaging and well played,
but had to be cut for pace and overall length. Only the last example
demonstrates an entirely different approach that was deemed unnecessarily
over the top. As the film sometimes seems overly truncated, this selection of deleted
footage helps enrich the experience of the film and clearly adds value.
Most other extras are found on disc two. There are no less
than twelve featurettes to choose from. A Beautiful Partnership:
Ron Howard & Brian Grazer is the unsurprising entry from
the Mutual Admiration Society, with Howard and producer Grazer patting each
other backs for founding Imagine
Entertainment, creating a series of popular, successful movies and generally
just being swell guys. In Development of the Screenplay,
Akiva Goldsman describes the
process of preparing the script. The screenwriter was present most of the time
during shooting, enabling a higher than usual amount of interaction
between writer, director and star.
Meeting John Nash is a conversation between Ron
Howard and the actual Dr. Nash in the director's effort to understand
the work that earned Nash the Nobel Prize. More interesting as an inclusion
that offers a close-up view of the recovered Nash than a clarifying lecture on
theoretical practice, it's a valuable inclusion if only for being offered
a glimpse of the man himself.
Accepting the Nobel Prize in Economics is
a very brief clip of Dr. Nash accepting the prize, which is in reality
such an austerely formal affair that it somewhat embarassingly contrasts
with the hugely sentimental, overblown acceptance speech climax featured
in the film itself. The five-minute featurette Casting
Russell Crowe & Jennifer Connelly hardly holds any surprises: as one might expect, casting
is described as a painful process that ultimately leads to an
artistic value judgment that everyone hopes will prove to be the
right decision. The Process of Age Progression
shows how make-up artists attempted to transform young
actors into the more mature figures we see as the
film progresses. Make-up designer Greg Cannom reveals all the different
configurations that were necessary for
Russell Crowe alone,
and he shows us some of the special appliances used to
accomplish the aging process. He clearly uses some sophisticated tricks, but the end
result is never truly successful.
Creation of the Special Effects
is a ten-minute featurette that introduces us to Kevin Mack of Digital Domain.
There are many obvious digital effects that run through the film;
Several examples of visual effects from the film are analyzed and explained, some of which are
clearly effects and others are more transparent. Scoring the
Film, introduced by Ron Howard, is a solid discussion by James Horner of the scoring process. He describes
his approach to the film and his selection of Charlotte Church
to perform the vocals. Horner may be one of the more overblown and least innovative major Hollywood composers working
today, but his comments are lucid and the featurette provides an interesting look at what's always a fascinating process.
Inside A Beautiful Mind is the longest
of the featurettes and is also the most vapid. It was produced for promotional purposes,
and is barely anything more than an extended trailer that reveals an inordinate amount of plot.
It also offers brief glimpses of John Nash
and his wife. Academy Awards
is a separate section that includes the moment of Grazer and Howard accepting the Best Picture
award on-stage, and backstage interview snippets with the other three Oscar winners. Storyboard
Comparisons offers
three scenes from the film and two deleted scenes for which the
completed scene runs in a letterboxed window at the top of the
screen while the storyboard is displayed at he bottom. Howard offers a short introduction, explaining
the way he uses storyboards during production. The theatrical trailer is shown in 1.85:1 non-anamorphic
widescreen, and A Beautiful Mind Soundtrack is a 30-second
commercial for the score CD. Twelve pages of Production Notes,
which are a redundant in light of the other material found on-board and Cast and Filmmaker
filmographies round out the supplements on this well-loaded but still somewhat
superficial DVD. The
animated menu screens have a stylish design, most incorporating
either clips or still images from the film.
Dan
Hassler-Forest
Reviewed:
October 9, 2002
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Every
year it seems like the Academy Awards reveal more clearly how vapid
and politically controlled the Oscar ceremonies truly are. More
likely than not, the Academy's voters end up selecting the winners
out of guilt, loyalty or a prevailing fashion, giving top honors
for the most sedate, conventional audience-pleaser of the preceding
year. The result is that actors and directors somehow rarely - if
ever - win an award for what is universally considered their best
work, and one Best Picture award after another is bestowed upon
films hardly likely to be remembered fondly - if at all - two decades
hence. Who could possibly say for instance that Denzel Washington
delivered his finest performance in last year's risible Training
Day and keep a straight face? 
