Man, this sucks. No, not the movie, but the commentary was the worst, longest, stupidest, most miserable two hours of my entire life.
I think mentioned that we bought an elliptical machine and turned our miniscule downstairs "bedroom" into a little gym, where I run on hour a day on the elliptical--and seem to get fatter and fatter as a result. Anyway, we bought a little TV and DVD and during that hour of excercize I rotate between Buffy DVDs and movie director's commentary. I watched Napoleon Dynamite most recently and, man, did that thing suck-ass.
Keep in mind, I liked the movie. Enough that both my roommate and I wanted to buy it. It's not as great on repeat viewings, but the commentary is just god-awful. It's got the star, and the director, and one other guy, with absolutely nothing to say. "Oh, this is my favorite scene.' "Oh, this is MY favorite scene." "This is my favorite scene." FOR TWO FREAKIN' HOURS. I'm no mathmatician, but it seems that three people cannot have a HUNDRED BILLION favorite scenes. The director also loved to point out his brothers, who seem like they were included in every scene. I swear, I would rather kill myself than watch another nanosecond of this commentary.
It's weird. I feel like the experience was so bad it brought down the entire movie. I'm not even sure I'd be able to watch Napoleon Dynamite again, my reaction to this commentary was so bad. You know, Neal Pozner, in one of his first postings, said Napoleon Dynamite was not "all that" (although he said it in more white-boy vernacular.) Anyway, looks like ol' Neal is getting the last laugh on this one.
Adding insult to injury is the fact I put in Alien next, with commentary by Ridley Scott, Sig Weaver, John Hurt, Harry Dean Stanton, Dan O'Bannon, and probably a few more. Incredible. In the first ten minutes I learned more about Alien than I did from two hours of stupid Napoleon Dynamite.
Here's a question for you. What the best director's commentary you've seen? And, conversely, the worst?
I gotta go. Batty is trying to drink out of a bowl of water that a bunch of dried figs are soaking in. Stoopid cat!
3 comments:
I highly recommend the dual commentaries of John Carpenter and Kurt Russell on "Big Trouble in Little China", "Escape from New York" and especially "The Thing", they really have a good friendship and it comes across in the commentary, lots of great anecdotes too.
Christian Slater and Patricia Arquettes commentary for True Romance didn't really impress me, just didn't really have anything interresting to say.
If they can't really bring anything to a commentary, people should just not do them.
P.S. This is the only Blog I visit each and every day. The material is just that powerful!
Cooper
You know I've not seen many Director Commentaries - heard a few :P
The Depp/Vidal commentary on Pirates is dreadful.
I have a soft spot for the Kevin Smith commentaries - particularly when they are insulting Affleck.
Mark P
I recommend the director's commentary on THE LIMEY. It has Steven Soderbergh and writer Lem Dobbs disagreeing about changed in the movie from the script constantly. It seems good natured enough, but the tension between the two keeps things interesting. And they discuss the changes made and WHY they were changed.
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