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  Directed by
  Starring
  Specs
  • Widescreen 2.55:1
  • 16:9 Enhanced
  Languages
  • English: Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround
  Subtitles
    Hebrew, Czech, Polish, Hungarian, Portuguese, English - Hearing Impaired, Icelandic, Danish, Swedish, Norwegian, Finnish
  Extras
  • Theatrical trailer
  • Cast/crew biographies
  • Production notes
  • 3 Karaoke
  • 2 Documentaries

The King and I

20th Century Fox/20th Century Fox . R4 . COLOR . 139 mins . G . PAL

  Feature
Contract

There is something I'm really enjoying about this reviewing caper, I get the opportunity to see films which you'd never catch me within a million miles of normally. With the possible exception of the utterly luvverly My Fair Lady, when it comes to traditional musicals such as The King and I I'd normally opt for most any alternative rather than giving two and a half hours of my life to something that I've predetermined I'm going to find a chore. I can be quite silly at times...

Herein lies a multi-Oscar winning tale based on the apparently true story of Anna Leonowen (Deborah Kerr), a rather proper British widow of the 1860's who, with child in tow, accepts a schoolteacher position in the royal court of Siam (if you are geographically challenged, Siam is now known as Thailand). Picked up from the dock by the Siamese Prime Minister, who has quite the bit of attitude for a half-naked fatty boombah wearing a bad skirt, the two English culture-shock victims are escorted to the King's castle for an even bigger dose of shock.

Here we meet the King (Yul Brynner), looking much like a cross between resident Thunderbirds bad-guy The Hood and a character from video game ouch-fest Street Fighter, basically a mean-bean bossy-boots camping it up to the hilt spouting more broken English than a factory full of unsold Marianne Faithfull albums. To say that Anna and the King don’t hit it off instantly would be redefining understatement - he with his petulance and don’t-get-me-started-on-the subject men rule the world, women are subservient and pretty much useless attitude, she with her haughtiness, absolutely HUGE gowns (almost as if the costumes were supplied by Tent City) and not unreasonable demands for promises to be kept (it would appear that the King takes that classic mega-frustrating attitude regarding promises of "I meant it when I said it, the fact that I didn’t follow through isn’t important").

So, Anna is introduced to her class, basically the innumerable (and gorgeous) offspring of the King and his harem of wives, and must feel much like Peanuts' Peppermint Patty in a roomful of Marcies, as the Siamese peoples' idea of respect for a teacher is to refer to her as "sir". Much play on language misunderstanding ensues, as Anna's affection grows for her charges, as does theirs for her. Things of great import are there to be learned by both sides, from the apparent fact that you can’t win wars without elephants and the rather sage-like advice that "when one does not know what to say it is a time to be silent" to the very questionable "a woman is designed for pleasing man and that is all" - I'll avoid my screaming urge to go into a rant about the latter, and at least take much pleasure in pointing out that Anna is quite the inspiring proto-Suffragette, often displaying the gumption to stand up to the peacock-like King and metaphorically bopping him about the head in regards to his rampant misogyny.

The tale spans a number of years, dealing with the shift from Anna and the King trying to change each other to their eventual attempts at actually understanding each other, and as such is quite the sweet, if not particularly typical, love story. Vague attempts at political intrigue are introduced where neighbouring Singapore send letters to Britain claiming the King is a barbarian, resulting in an invite being extended by the King to the British ambassador to prove otherwise, and the unveiling of the incredibly poignant (watch the film!), and rather cute reworking of classic novel Uncle Tom's Cabin by one of Anna's class members into the delightful tale of The Small House of Uncle Thomas. This scene is easily the longest of the film, but has plenty of twists and stunning choreography enough to captivate all but the stoniest of heart.

Yes, this is a musical remember, and a Rodgers and Hammerstein one at that. From the wonderfully Looney Tunes reminiscent three and a half minute overture, to the first "I just want to sing!" moment at around eight minutes, there's show tunes a plenty for those who are after them. Their arrival is generally rather obviously signposted, and kudos to the disc authors for including more chapters than War and Peace - if you must play skip-to-the-loo with the musical numbers you can, although you really won’t be left with much of a film if you do. As well as the original overture the intermission and exit music are presented intact, and add much to the wonderfully classic atmosphere The King and I presents.

"Etcetera, etcetera, etcetera."

  Video
Contract

Riddle me this Batman. Why is it that I can view a film on DVD that's only a year or two old, and be confronted with more speckles and spots than a collision between a busload of high school computer club members and a Hundreds and Thousands transporter, yet this film (at 45 years of age) is virtually pristine?

Sure, it isn’t without it's quibbles. At times the image tends to flicker light and dark ever so slightly, there is often noticeable edge enhancement and certain scenes with certain costumes do that weird flaring line thing, however I doubt anybody would expect a print of a film this old to be as utterly sumptuous as it indeed is.

Adding to the positives is the treatment of contrast and colour. Yes, the colour has that slightly old film feel (I'm sure you know what I mean), but that can be desirable in cases such as this where we are dealing with a classic film. It is also presented in glorious Cinemascope 55 (you can’t miss it, they got justifiably excited about this stuff way back then) - so is presented authentically in 2.55:1, and is 16x9 enhanced to boot.

  Audio
Contract

The entire soundtrack has been remastered in Dolby 5.1. Whilst sounding remarkably good taking factors such as age into account, it doesn’t exactly get the surrounds doing the Charles Atlas thing, as much of what takes place sonically is fairly central. At times things did sound a little on the tinny side, however once again I must point out how utterly ancient this film is.

As intimated earlier, the soundtrack is by Rodgers and Hammerstein. This is most likely enough to have you doing one of two things - either rubbing your hands with unabashed glee or running to the hills (but not ones with Julie Andrews bounding about them, naturally). Perhaps mercifully being spared from having an upbringing fuelled by a musical-loving mother, I must profess to not being particularly knowledgeable of the work of these two, but a quick peak at their curriculum vitae is enough to demonstrate that they, and previously Rodgers and Hart, had what was essentially a stranglehold on the musical medium. There were obviously reasons for this, as I even somehow knew some of the songs on offer here. I'm not saying I was captivated in rapt glory by them all, but of course your mileage may vary.

A warning for audio trainspotters though, scandal of scandals I did notice a little bit of crackle popping up between 97:43!!! and 98:08!!!. However I am sure that this ever so brief drop in quality will not worry anybody other than the most utterly anally retentive, desperately in need of anything resembling a life geeks out there. (wink!)

  Extras
Contract

Menus: Static and silent™. This is a crime usually, but in the case of a musical it is more so. There is so much scope for creativity and excitement to be infused into DVD menus, and sadly it appears many companies just aren’t up to the challenge. Please give me a nice speedy computer and a nice chubby pay packet and let me loose on them!

Trailer: In a ratio of 1.85:1, this two and a bit minute trailer is pretty standard for those of its time. It is still well worth a quick peek though.

Movietone news - "Premiere": Just under two minutes of wonderful black and white newsreel footage of the charity premiere of the film, including an appearance from the Thailand ambassador. Produced by Edward Reek no less, whom I mention for no other reason than he has a mildly amusing surname.

Movietone news - "Oscars": Just over two minutes of footage from the 29th Academy Awards (also black and white), including Yul's acceptance for Best Actor (presented by the gorgeous Liz Taylor). Whilst cleaning up quite well at the Awards, Around the World in 80 Days pipped The King and I for Best Film, and surprisingly Deborah Kerr got snubbed. The quality of both pieces of newsreel footage is quite reasonable considering.

Sing along: AAAARGHHHHHHHHHHHH!!! OK, I'm better now. Three static, and rather tacky, screens accompany three of the film's songs in karaoke mode (although it is assumed that you know the words). You too can screech along in the key of 'H' to I Whistle A Happy Tune, Hello Young Lovers and Getting to Know You. I have a friend who will adore this feature, which reminds me, I must pay her a visit at the home…

Cast and Crew biographies: Ranging from two quite uninformative pages for the likes of director Lang, to ten pages with a bit more information for the likes of composer Rodgers, these occasionally verge on interesting, but don’t contain filmographies. Others covered are screenwriter Ernest Lehman (who was also responsible for one of Hitchcock's most fabulously shiny moments, North by Northwest), Hammerstein, Kerr, Brynner (who we discover was once a trapeze artist!) and Rita Moreno. They were a little awkward to get around for rather than using the menu buttons as most discs do, these switch into still mode and get you to use the chapter search button.

Production notes: Five pages of basic information, probably the most interesting bit being that Yul Brynner did this role on stage for a rather impressive 1246 performances.

To sum up, an obvious effort has been made to scrounge whatever could be found lying about to give some extra value, sadly it would appear that there just wasn't that much available. Still, in all 20th Century Fox have managed to come up with some items of interest, especially for fans of the musical (and for those who believe that they can sing).

  Overall  
Contract

To once again state the glaringly obvious, you should know up front if this film is your cup of tea or not. In all it's actually a fairly enjoyable and remarkably quickly passing two and a half hours of classic entertainment that even the musical-phobic just may enjoy.

Yul is stunning in all his slapheaded, furrowed brow, over the top glory, and Kerr is simply captivating as Anna. The supporting cast are also excellent, from the tragic Tup Tim to those absolutely gorgeous little children (oops, raging hormone alert!)

The disc isn’t loaded to the hilt with extras, but fans of The King and I should find enough in the quality of audio, and especially the video, presented here to be more than happy.

Oh, and you may wish to be thankful that I saved the feminist rant for another day...


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      And I quote...
    "A fairly enjoyable and remarkably quickly passing two and a half hours of classic entertainment that even the musical-phobic just may enjoy..."
    - Amy Flower
      Review Equipment
    • DVD Player:
          Pioneer DV-535
    • TV:
          Sony 68cm
    • Speakers:
          Home Built
    • Surrounds:
          No Name
    • Audio Cables:
          Standard RCA
    • Video Cables:
          Standard Component RCA
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