{"id":6918,"date":"2013-08-26T18:39:29","date_gmt":"2013-08-26T22:39:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/?p=6918"},"modified":"2013-08-26T18:39:29","modified_gmt":"2013-08-26T22:39:29","slug":"br-philadelphia-1993","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/?p=6918","title":{"rendered":"BR: Philadelphia (1993)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Return to: <\/strong>Home <\/a>\/\u00a0Blu-ray, DVD, Film Reviews<\/a> \/ <\/em>P to R<\/a><\/p>\n

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\"\"<\/a>Film: Excellent\/ BR Transfer: Excellent\/ BR Extras: Excellent<\/p>\n

Label: Twilight Time\/ Region: All \/\u00a0Released: May 14, 2013<\/p>\n

Genre: Drama<\/p>\n

Synopsis: A gay lawyer struggling with AIDS launches a lawsuit against the firm that wrongully dumped him on the grounds of incompetence.<\/p>\n

Special Features: Audio Commentary by director Jonathan Demme and writer Ron Nyswaner \/ Isolated Stereo Score Track \/ 1993 making-of featurette (5:59) \/ Deleted Scenes (11:20) \/ Courthouse Protest Footage & Interviews (4:24) \/ Theatical Trailer \/ 8-page colour booklet with liner notes by film Historian Julie Kirgo \/ Limited to 3000 copies \/ Available exclusively from Screen Archives Entertainment<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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Review:<\/p>\n

Even during its theatrical release, Philadelphia<\/strong> was viewed by supporters as the first if not the most important American film to address the warped view of AIDS being a gay disease, and one potentially communicable by means not yet discovered by baffled scientists. The more sober critical pokes \u2013 those not branding the film as pro-gay propaganda – accused the filmmakers of essentially making a message film specifically catered to average urban populations, using a familiar template of a wronged innocent man fighting against a behemoth in court to get justice rather than the millions typically associated with nasty legal battles.<\/p>\n

Philadelphia<\/strong> is manipulative \u2013 there are scenes that while earnest stop the film cold to hammer a message already established by Tom Hanks\u2019 deservedly Oscar-winning performance<\/a> \u2013 but it still works as an effective drama about wrongful dismissal and latent \/ persistent prejudices. Director Jonathan Demme consistently emphasizes the reactions of his cast with huge close-ups, sometimes tracking in fast for sustained reaction shots, but the technique doesn\u2019t weaken the film\u2019s dramatic arcs because the performances and character arcs are so solid.<\/p>\n

The storyline is somewhat fragmented \u2013 date stamps allow the filmmakers to jump ahead to further highlights, thereby avoiding scene redundancies \u2013 and the delivery of small morsels of Andrew Beckett\u2019s (Hanks) sudden dismissal sustain a modest mystery as to whether the star litigator was dismissed due to a genuine blunder or clever set-up, but it also allows for the partial moral growth of Beckett\u2019s homophobic lawyer Joe Miller (Denzel Washington), who takes on the case on the principle of a corporation breaking the law, and becomes more humanistic.<\/p>\n

In the commentary track, Demme and screenwriter Ron Nyswaner (Swing Shift<\/strong>, Gross Anatomy<\/strong>) explain the film\u2019s development from an idea to a full concept, with scenes crafted from real-life events as well as experiences from some of the cast & crew \u2013 an amalgam of material which made Philadelphia<\/strong> a personal crusade fort many \u2013 and according to Nyswaner, it breaks tradition and stereotypes by showing Beckett as a gay man with a wholly supportive family. Critical reaction a family reunion prior to Beckett\u2019s trial in particular probably stemmed from a sense of familiar melodrama extended by Demme and Nyswaner.<\/p>\n

One subsequent scene is especially overwrought: Beckett plays Miller an opera, and explains the high-pitched emotions of the singer, which Demme covers in buoyant crane shots that swoop above & around Hanks to emphasize the link between his hunger to live and remain true to himself and the opera. The film\u2019s closing scene also labours the loss and victimization of Beckett with a lengthy montage of home videos, yet the melodrama is significantly tempered by Neil Young\u2019s extraordinary song, \u201cPhiladelphia,\u201d which presents in its hushed tones and subtle lyrics the same message as the opera scene.<\/p>\n

Perhaps because it retains a classical structure \u2013 a Washington Post pull-quote reads \u201cLike the best of Frank Capra\u201d \u2013 Philadelphia<\/strong> will continue to age gracefully; its sentiment and manipulative sections may feel a little more heavy-handed, but Demme and Nyswaner\u2019s message is elegantly crafted, and hugely aided by the cast\u2019s affecting reactions. Hanks\u2019 pale eyes probably convinced fence-sitters he deserved the Oscar in 1993, a year which also brought forth the TV drama And the Band Played On <\/strong>(chronicling the birth of AIDS), and a little-remembered HBO AIDS allegory Daybreak<\/strong>. (AIDS had made its way into films, but through stealth references and cautious characters: the makers of The Living Daylights<\/strong> in 1987 curtailed James Bond\u2019s sleeping around by having him chase after one woman.)<\/p>\n

Twilight Time\u2019s DVD ports over most of the extras from Sony\u2019s 2-disc 2004 Anniversary Edition (itself replacing a single disc 2002 DVD), including a steady commentary track by director Demme and writer Nyswaner who go through every aspect of the film\u2019s production, especially the superior cast of veteran and newcomers (like Grey\u2019s Anatomy<\/strong>\u2019s Chandra Wilson).<\/p>\n

A vintage making-of featurette from 1993, mostly scored deleted scenes (all variable in levels of redundancy, extraneous material, and speechifying), and the news footage of the courthouse protestors being interviewed by a local news crew are also included, plus theatrical trailer. TT\u2019s new extras are an isolated stereo score of Howard Shore\u2019s music score, and booklet liner notes by Julie Kirgo.<\/p>\n

The remaining differences between TT\u2019s BR and Sony\u2019s DVD are multilingual subtitles, separately titled and indexed deleted scenes, the Bruce Springsteen music video for the Oscar-winning song \u201cStreets of Philadelphia,\u201d the original Joe Miller TV ad performed by Washington, text filmographies, and more interestingly, two separate documentaries.<\/p>\n

The first, \u201c\u201dPeople Like Us: Making Philadelphia\u201d (57 mins.) consists of 9 indexed sections which offer more behind-the-scenes footage and interviews, and One Foot on a Banana Peel, the Other Foot in the Grave: Secrets from the Dolly Madison Room<\/strong> (18:33) is the short AIDS patient directed by Juan Botas and Lucas Platt which led Demme hiring Daniel Chapman, one of the patients, as a consultant and bit part prior to his passing of AIDS in 1994.<\/p>\n

Fans of the film will certainly scratch their heads as to why Sony chose to release a 2-disc 10th anniversary special edition in 2003, but regard Philadelphia<\/strong> as pass\u00e9 on its 20th anniversary and allow the 2-disc edition to go out of print. Kudos to Twilight Time for recognizing the importance of the film, made when, as mentioned in the commentary track, Hollywood was developing 10 scripts where only heterosexual characters were at the epicenter of the contrived dramas.<\/p>\n

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\u00a9 2013 Mark R. Hasan<\/p>\n

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External References<\/em>:<\/p>\n

IMDB <\/a>— Soundtrack Album<\/a> — Composer Filmography<\/a><\/p>\n

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Vendor Search Links:<\/em><\/p>\n

Amazon.ca<\/a>\"\" \"\" —<\/span> Amazon.com<\/a>\"\" \"\" —<\/span> Amazon.co.uk<\/a>\"\" \"\"—New movie releases on iTunes<\/a>\"\"
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Return to<\/strong>:\u00a0Home <\/a>\/\u00a0Blu-ray, DVD, Film Reviews<\/a> <\/em>\/\u00a0P to R<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Return to: Home \/\u00a0Blu-ray, DVD, Film Reviews \/ P to R . Film: Excellent\/ BR Transfer: Excellent\/ BR Extras: Excellent Label: Twilight Time\/ Region: All \/\u00a0Released: May 14, 2013 Genre: Drama Synopsis: A gay lawyer struggling with AIDS launches a lawsuit against the firm that wrongully dumped him on the grounds of incompetence. Special Features: […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[18],"tags":[2170,1025,691,2171,2172,2173,2169],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8nuyW-1NA","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6918"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6918"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6918\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6921,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6918\/revisions\/6921"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6918"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6918"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6918"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}