Mr Holland's Opus

Mr Holland’s a hep cat. He’s down wid it and funky. Or not.

Either way he’s a young buck who plays music for cool cats down at the clubs. Then the inevitable happens. He falls in love, gets married and the usual crushed dreams of a man are swept aside as he must take a dependable job teaching kids music.

After a while, it appears he sucks as a teacher and we are then taken through his life as he progresses through the years. He and his wife have a son, though an ironic twist of fate keeps the two at odds as he grows up. On top of this the slow and steady ticking of the clock just serves to remind Mr Holland that he never touches that great symphony he was once going to write. His son grows further away from him all the time while his wife seems destined to be the bridge between them forever.

"I think this is gonna be a lot rougher gig than I originally thought..."

This is one of those great films you always remember crying during the first time you saw it. And the second. And the third. At least, that’s what it’s like for me. Told with all the ingredients that exist in a life; comedy, tragedy, depression, temptation, joy, love, death – it’s all here, just like in your life. Maybe that’s why it’s so easy to relate to this film. We’re all familiar with school, so the first barrier is down. We’re all familiar with life, so that’s two. And we’re all familiar with simple urban family life (at least, most of us anyway). This is now one of those films relegated to the prestigious and luxurious Friday night timeslot on telly, but don’t let that fool you. This is one of those films you rarely look at your watch during and may even wish was longer as vast chunks of decades are missing from Mr Holland’s story.

One thing you may not even notice about this film is some of the incredible long shots through school corridors. Hundreds of student extras milling about while the camera manages to stay focussed on Mr Holland can easily slip by unnoticed because they’re so perfectly achieved. They look great in this transfer too, with minimal film artefacts lurking about the place and some nice colour saturations. Picture quality is nice and sharp with blacks looking true and shadows yielding detail cleanly. One other thing that stands out in this film is in the clever passage of time and the incredible detail of sets and props. Happily all make the transition to DVD looking great. Our only real flaw is in some minor aliasing occasionally, but nobody’s perfect, right?

This is a film about a man and his passion for music. The sound had wanna be good or this thing will be sitting on shelves for all time. Thankfully, this won’t be necessary as the sound is kickarse. Two choices, Dolby Digital stereo or 5.1 surround, are given and having listened to both I can safely reassure you they do sound great. All the fantastic music in this film sounds superb and overall very impressive. Some of the orchestral parts and street parade scenes flit around the surrounds to put us among the action, but even without these the stereo sounds fabbo.

Dialogue is nice and even and sometimes extremely easy to understand because people speak slower when signing deaf language. Apart from this, the rest of the dialogue still sounds clear anyway. Sound effects have been well edited and well synched and are subtly effective in garnering moods throughout. I won’t go into that, but when watching it and listening for it, you’ll know what I mean. A very nice overall sound package that truly works well for the film and enhances it greatly.

All we get is a simple little making of featurette. This only runs for 4:57 in 4:3 and is the usual TV advert filler material fare. Still, better than nothing I suppose. And just as a final note, the menu system is quite nice and well animated though I doubt anyone will spend much time there.

I still love this film and enjoy watching it every so often for its honesty and its integrity. While Mr Holland is the focus, obviously, the supporting cast are somehow more than that and contribute greatly toward telling their own stories as well as embellishing Mr Holland’s. For authenticity and great performances, and for a great picture and sound package I wholly recommend this film for anyone looking for a good story to really get immersed in. It runs for 127 minutes but, as I said, you may just find yourself wishing it were longer. The only real let down is in the omission of many extras, but the film is well strong enough to stand alone.

Get down.