This low-key, unassuming film stays fairly close to the novel as it tells the simple story of a simple man who wanted to be more.
Nothing happens in the film as gradually as it did in the novel, so that a simple story becomes even less complex. I remember feeling like a boozy gumshoe when I managed to pick up clues that signaled a change in Charly's intellect. But there are fewer personality indicators in the film version, with the result being that the compression can make the storyline feel like a summary at times.
Yet, director Nelson spends ample time capturing the atmosphere at the Kasnof's Rye Bread where Charly has found employment as a clean-up man. The bakery workers, led by Gimpy (Skipper McNally), lead Charly to believe that they're friends while all the time playing elaborate jokes on him: stuffing a pail of dough into his locker and leaving it there to rise, getting a bartender to unplug and plug in a juke box while they instruct Charly to talk to it, or telling him to stand on a corner where snow always begins and call the men to tell them when the blizzard has started. Mean. Plain mean—but that's also why this modest little novel connected with young readers. It appealed to anyone who was ever teased and tormented, or felt somehow dumber—or smarter—than the class average, either way qualifying for "freak" status in school. And it's appealing as well for its story of the impossible dream, or the inaccessible love.
As Charly becomes Charlie—aware of his former self and painfully aware, now, that his so-called friends at the bakery were really very cruel—he experiences an awareness that makes life come alive for him, finally. But when Charlie notices that there's something wrong with Algernon, he begins to suspect that he's looking at his own future.
Video: The DVD comes with 1.33:1 pan and scan on one side, and anamorphic widescreen on the other. Though the official aspect ratio on the widescreen is listed as 2.35:1, it fills out more of the screen than that, coming closer to 1.89:1. And it has that look that color films have from the late Sixties and early Seventies: slightly muted colors and a graininess throughout.
Audio: I'm not an audio expert, but I can describe the frustration I had with the mix on this soundtrack. The dialogue isn't at a high enough volume, compared to background noises and music, and sometimes the volume of dialogue seems to vary—and not at explainable moments, either. The soundtrack is Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono, with some of the sound matrixed into the main speakers, but mostly emanating from the front center speaker. Subtitles are in English, French, and Spanish.
Extras: There are no extras.
Bottom Line: This low-key, unassuming film stays fairly close to the novel as it tells the simple story of a simple man who wanted to be more. It would be easy to think of "Charly" as a bummer of a film, a "life's not fair" story about a severely disadvantaged man who falls in love—with a woman, and with life—only to have it appear to seem all too brief. But "Charly," like "Flowers for Algernon," is a perfect metaphor for the transitory nature of life—whatever your station or situation.
Yet, director Nelson spends ample time capturing the atmosphere at the Kasnof's Rye Bread where Charly has found employment as a clean-up man. The bakery workers, led by Gimpy (Skipper McNally), lead Charly to believe that they're friends while all the time playing elaborate jokes on him: stuffing a pail of dough into his locker and leaving it there to rise, getting a bartender to unplug and plug in a juke box while they instruct Charly to talk to it, or telling him to stand on a corner where snow always begins and call the men to tell them when the blizzard has started. Mean. Plain mean—but that's also why this modest little novel connected with young readers. It appealed to anyone who was ever teased and tormented, or felt somehow dumber—or smarter—than the class average, either way qualifying for "freak" status in school. And it's appealing as well for its story of the impossible dream, or the inaccessible love.
As Charly becomes Charlie—aware of his former self and painfully aware, now, that his so-called friends at the bakery were really very cruel—he experiences an awareness that makes life come alive for him, finally. But when Charlie notices that there's something wrong with Algernon, he begins to suspect that he's looking at his own future.
Video: The DVD comes with 1.33:1 pan and scan on one side, and anamorphic widescreen on the other. Though the official aspect ratio on the widescreen is listed as 2.35:1, it fills out more of the screen than that, coming closer to 1.89:1. And it has that look that color films have from the late Sixties and early Seventies: slightly muted colors and a graininess throughout.
Audio: I'm not an audio expert, but I can describe the frustration I had with the mix on this soundtrack. The dialogue isn't at a high enough volume, compared to background noises and music, and sometimes the volume of dialogue seems to vary—and not at explainable moments, either. The soundtrack is Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono, with some of the sound matrixed into the main speakers, but mostly emanating from the front center speaker. Subtitles are in English, French, and Spanish.
Extras: There are no extras.
Bottom Line: This low-key, unassuming film stays fairly close to the novel as it tells the simple story of a simple man who wanted to be more. It would be easy to think of "Charly" as a bummer of a film, a "life's not fair" story about a severely disadvantaged man who falls in love—with a woman, and with life—only to have it appear to seem all too brief. But "Charly," like "Flowers for Algernon," is a perfect metaphor for the transitory nature of life—whatever your station or situation.
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[release]15601[/release]