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By
WAYNE KLEIN
Larger than life and with
twice as many brothers, "Wyatt Earp" struts onto
the DVD scene in a "Special Edition" that looks
stunning but is less filling than one might have
expected. This sprawling episodic tale begins with
Wyatt as a child preparing to run away from home
and join the Union army like his brothers Virgil
and James. His father (Gene Hackman in a brief but
powerful performance)catches him as he leaves and
returns him back home. While Wyatt clearly yearns
from the adventure he feels his brothers are
experiencing, his father knows the truth about war
and sets him straight. Later, James and Virgil
return home both exhausted and beat up from the
war. Their father has put on his traveling shoes
and announces that the family will be moving West
where there's opportunity for a lawyer and rich
land is ready to be farmed.
Wyatt after many trials and tribulations ends up
out west as a lawman. He manages to interest his
brothers in coming out to help clean up Dodge City
as well. We also get the thunderous conflict at
the OK Corral as part of the conclusion of the
film and witness a wonderful performance by Dennis
Quaid as Doc Holliday. While the narrative is a
bit too episodic and flawed, the film manages to
retain one's interest throughout its 190 minute
running time due to Costner's unassuming portrayal
as Wyatt. The real highlight, though, is Quaid as
Doc capturing the fragile gunfighter as he fights
the consumption that's eating him alive.
With the long wait for "Wyatt Earp" to appear on
DVD, one would have hoped to have a special
edition with a commentary from director Lawrence
Kasdan, star Costner and a look back at the film's
reception when it was first released a decade ago.
Unfortunately, the Warner Special Edition sticks
to the basics for the most part: we get the
original 190 minute theatrical cut of the film
(sans the extended scenes that were added to the
video version); two documentaries one "new" one
that includes vintage interviews and the other a
1994 TV special; "lifted scenes," i.e., the
footage included in the special video edition and
the theatrical trailer.
Let's stark with the good stuff first. The
stunning anamorphic widescreen transfer finely
does justice to Kasdan's epic vision for this
larger than life western biography. The remastered
5.1 sound captures just about every nuance from
the original theatrical exhibition 10 years ago.
Honestly, "Wyatt Earp" hasn't sounded this good
since it was first released in 1994.
The negatives are few but worth noting. The
documentaries are pretty good although a bit too
brief. Perhaps Kasdan preferred his original
theatrical cut to the extended version. That could
explain why these sequences show up on the second
disc and aren't integrated into the film. The lack
of a commentary track is a big minus for the disc,
though, as 1)Knowing how the film compared to the
life of Earp would have been fascinating and 2)
Kasdan's plans while shooting the film and
comments would have been welcome.
With the recent deluxe release of "Open Range," I
would have hoped for better from this release. On
the other hand, great care was used in
transferring this for DVD and the extras are
roughly what "Unforgiven" received when it was
re-released. Kudos to Warner for such a marvelous
looking DVD although, again, more extras should
have been included. |
