It’s been fifty years since the musical West Side Story first graced the big screen, and at the time it became more popular than the Broadway musical which birthed it (the show received mixed reviews and lost the Best Musical Tony to The Music Man). Thanks to the enduring popularity of the movie, the show has had a continuous life on stage with Broadway revivals, community theater performances, and it’s a perennial for high school productions (the kids are actually the right age!). And with the 50th Anniversary, MGM/20th Century Fox have put together a new home video edition in a standard and collectible format, remastered for Blu-ray, just in time for holiday gift-giving. You won’t find a review of the movie itself here, but let’s take a look at how the film fares in its sparkly new high-def edition …
Most people probably know the story by now … rival gangs in New York, a forbidden love, singing, dancing, tragedy. It’s basically the Romeo & Juliet story set in the mean streets of New York and the clashing cultures of the era. For a film of this vintage, the new high definition transfer on the Blu-ray is stunning. The opening overhead shots of the city are breathtaking, and the picture is so sharp that you can easily spot the transitions from actual locations to soundstage sets (most notable are the painted backdrops) and rear projection shots. If you’ve ever only seen a faded print of this movie on TV or VHS, the colors are also eye-popping, giving the movie a comic book aura. But even with all of the oddities the high definition reveals, they don’t detract from the movie as a whole. My only issue is with the new DTS 7.1 audio. It sounds great when the orchestra kicks in, but there’s just a little too much directionality for my taste, having voices of characters on screen spread across the entire front speaker spectrum. Someone’s on the left side of the screen, the voice comes from the left speaker. It’s weird. I like the on-screen voices to come from the center speaker unless they’re actually off-camera. But there is a Dolby Digital 4.0 track that you can switch to if the new mix isn’t to your liking.
Bonus material on Disk 1 –
Disk 2 –
Disk 3 contains a standard definition DVD of the movie mastered from the high definition elements, and the Music Machine feature
While I wasn’t impressed with some of the extras on the disks, especially for a 50th anniversary edition, there is also a box set that includes a tribute CD with eight songe performed by artists as varied as Julie Andrews and Gloria Estefan; a hardcover book with rare photos and a foreward by Walter Mirisch (the film’s producer); and ten collectible postacrds features movie poster artwork from around the world. If you’re a die-hard fan, you will definitely want the box set, and casual fans will be happy with the film’s presentation on the Blu-ray (the remastered DVD looks nice as well). This should make a perfect Christmas gift for the musical fan in your life!
This review is based on a commercially available Blu-ray provided to CliqueClack by 20th Century Fox Home Video for reviewing purposes.