...a sweet, tender, sentimental tale, richly alive with old-fashioned humor and charm.
The movie covers several years in the lives of the characters. Among the incidents to cherish involve asking Uncle Chris for a dowry for Trina; an operation on the youngest daughter; Uncle Chris's teaching his nephew several swear words in Norwegian; the mother's bossy sisters; chloroforming the cat; Katrin's graduation and her graduation gift; Uncle Chris's passing; and, naturally, the development of Katrin as a writer.
The movie may be a little too long for its subject matter at 134 minutes (or perhaps too short for the many episodes), and the whole thing tends to sag a little in the middle. But there is always the compensation of the lovely location shots in San Francisco and the fine recreations of the old City on the studio lot.
Still and all, the movie's greatest compensation is its characters. "I'd like to be rich like I'd like to be ten-feet high," says mama. "Good for some things; bad for others." The movie made me smile and laugh a great deal, and yes, it put me on the edge of a tear more than once, as well. It is memorable moviemaking.
Video:
The black-and-white video quality may come as a minor disappointment to viewers now spoiled by some of Warner Bros.'s restored DVD transfers. This print was one that WB undoubtedly found in its vaults, a very good print, but one that does not appear to have been firmed up, sharpened, and cleaned by digital processing; at least, not to any great extent. So, what we have is a good but slightly soft, blurred picture, with B&W contrasts that are strong in the actual black and white fields but not in the many shades of gray in between. Darker areas of the screen can sometimes appear murky, admitting less than perfect detail; and a few age spots, apparently at the ends of reels, creep in from time to time. There is a small amount of grain here and there and a couple of instances of line shimmer. Overall, however, I doubt that most people will mind the film's small video imperfections, the story itself being so compelling.
Audio:
The sound is a typical monaural of the day, nicely refurbished via Dolby Digital 1.0 mono processing. The dialogue comes through clearly and cleanly, with almost no discernable background noise, so there is nothing much else to talk about. As expected, there is little of the frequency range or dynamic impact one comes to expect of modern audio, but, then, there is little need of anything more than a crisp mono soundtrack for dialogue, either.
Extras:
There is not much in the way of extra materials on the disc. The only two bonus items of note are a new introduction by the director's son, George Stevens, Jr., and a theatrical trailer. The intro crams a lot of affectionate information into three minutes, and it's best to wait until after the film to watch it. Beyond those two things, there are twenty-nine scene selections; English as the only spoken language; and English, French, and Spanish subtitles.
Parting Thoughts:
A best-selling novel, a hit Broadway show, and a popular and critically acclaimed motion picture were not the end of the story. Actors Irene Dunne, Barbara Bel Geddes, Oscar Homolka, and Ellen Corby, plus cinematographer Nicholas Musuraca all went on to earn Academy Award nominations for their work in the movie. And the stories of Mama and her family continued in a long-running television series from 1949-1957.
I'm a sucker for well-drawn character studies, especially when they have as much heart as this one does. "I Remember Mama" is a sweet, tender, sentimental tale, richly alive with old-fashioned humor and charm.
Write about what you know best, Katrin is advised, what you remember best. She does, telling us "first and foremost, I remember mama."
"Is good?" Yes.
The movie may be a little too long for its subject matter at 134 minutes (or perhaps too short for the many episodes), and the whole thing tends to sag a little in the middle. But there is always the compensation of the lovely location shots in San Francisco and the fine recreations of the old City on the studio lot.
Still and all, the movie's greatest compensation is its characters. "I'd like to be rich like I'd like to be ten-feet high," says mama. "Good for some things; bad for others." The movie made me smile and laugh a great deal, and yes, it put me on the edge of a tear more than once, as well. It is memorable moviemaking.
Video:
The black-and-white video quality may come as a minor disappointment to viewers now spoiled by some of Warner Bros.'s restored DVD transfers. This print was one that WB undoubtedly found in its vaults, a very good print, but one that does not appear to have been firmed up, sharpened, and cleaned by digital processing; at least, not to any great extent. So, what we have is a good but slightly soft, blurred picture, with B&W contrasts that are strong in the actual black and white fields but not in the many shades of gray in between. Darker areas of the screen can sometimes appear murky, admitting less than perfect detail; and a few age spots, apparently at the ends of reels, creep in from time to time. There is a small amount of grain here and there and a couple of instances of line shimmer. Overall, however, I doubt that most people will mind the film's small video imperfections, the story itself being so compelling.
Audio:
The sound is a typical monaural of the day, nicely refurbished via Dolby Digital 1.0 mono processing. The dialogue comes through clearly and cleanly, with almost no discernable background noise, so there is nothing much else to talk about. As expected, there is little of the frequency range or dynamic impact one comes to expect of modern audio, but, then, there is little need of anything more than a crisp mono soundtrack for dialogue, either.
Extras:
There is not much in the way of extra materials on the disc. The only two bonus items of note are a new introduction by the director's son, George Stevens, Jr., and a theatrical trailer. The intro crams a lot of affectionate information into three minutes, and it's best to wait until after the film to watch it. Beyond those two things, there are twenty-nine scene selections; English as the only spoken language; and English, French, and Spanish subtitles.
Parting Thoughts:
A best-selling novel, a hit Broadway show, and a popular and critically acclaimed motion picture were not the end of the story. Actors Irene Dunne, Barbara Bel Geddes, Oscar Homolka, and Ellen Corby, plus cinematographer Nicholas Musuraca all went on to earn Academy Award nominations for their work in the movie. And the stories of Mama and her family continued in a long-running television series from 1949-1957.
I'm a sucker for well-drawn character studies, especially when they have as much heart as this one does. "I Remember Mama" is a sweet, tender, sentimental tale, richly alive with old-fashioned humor and charm.
Write about what you know best, Katrin is advised, what you remember best. She does, telling us "first and foremost, I remember mama."
"Is good?" Yes.
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[release]14086[/release]