Analyze This

Six years since its inception, with many on and off directors and a script that went through some constructional changes up until two years ago, Analyze This didn't seem like it was ever going to see the light of day, until Harold Ramis of Ghostbusters fame came onboard as the final director and brought Billy Crystal and Robert De Niro together for the first time to produce an hilarious comedy about a mafia boss seeking help from a psychiatrist.

Let's explain it with a little more detail. Ben Sobol (Billy Crystal) is a psychiatrist with a career that's not going as planned. His son spies on his patients, his parents don't want to attend his upcoming wedding and his patients are just way out there - "Doc, he wants me to call him names like my bucking bronco and wants me to ride him hard". Quotes like that would force many of us to cringe the words "I didn't need to know that".

Paul Vitti (Robert De Niro) is a mafioso boss with a few problems as well suffering from anxiety attacks, an inability to kill people and a lack of erective momentum when needed most. How do these two meet? Well, Dr Sobol crashes into one of Vitti's cars and the ensuing exchange of details/business cards means that Paul Vitti now has an excuse to seek 'help'. Don Paul wants to be free of the inner conflict before all the Mafia Dons meet.

Ben Sobol realises that he has to be on call whenever the Vitti clan chose to use him, which means postponing his wedding twice and almost driving himself mad in the process.

This is an entertaining comedy and a change of pace for De Niro. This could almost be a new direction for him and is a great start in the interim.

Now onto the disc, and what a disc this is. This could almost be the perfect disc coming out of Village Roadshow bar a few minor details that shouldn't even be worth mentioning...

The video is first rate. Every frame is greeted by a great looking image throughout the entire movie. There is a richness in the image that brings one word to mind - 'potential'. Given the movie is not going to win any awards for cinematography nor provides us with dazzling special effects, the transfer quality has the potential to be the best in the business. I know that's a bold statement, but I have confidence that VR will produce some titles that will back me up come December.

An immediate difference from the last two reviews I did was that the black levels were blacker. Shadow detail is still there, but we are treated to a much more striking black which helps give depth to the image. The colors in many scenes are very rich and really show off what DVD is capable of, particularly the scene in the Mermaid Bar where the orange and red foreground colors are clearly distringuishable from the blues of the aquarium in the background.

Detail within the image is excellent and there is nary a slight hint of edge enhancement, which may only be attributed to the source material. The only qualm I have is that in opening scenes there seems to be a noticeable amount of noise in the image that lends itself to very, very, very slight MPEG artefacting. Maybe it's just the noise that I was seeing, so I'll leave this as a debatable issue for other reviews that are sure to surface. All in all, an excellent transfer.

Ok, here's what you've all been waiting to hear about the VR discs. Are you ready? OK, here goes: This disc has NO audio synch problems whatsoever. Gone, not apparent, not even on my Pioneer player. Trust me, I was looking real hard to find it and at times I think I was looking so hard that I almost imagined it, but my wife clarified it for me as she couldn't see it at all.

Phew, now that's out of the way, the rest of the soundtrack is not really your fully immersed surround experience. It still does the job the director intended, which is why I have given the audio a high rating. Dialogue is always intelligible, even if there is intentional mumbling at times. The musical soundtrack opens up the sound stage as it reaches your speakers and whatever surround you hear directly accentuates the onscreen imagery.

There are only really four extras on this disc...

• Commentary
  This commentary is provided by Billy Crystal and Robert De Niro. It's a little different to your normal commentary in that it doesn't seem like they are directly referencing the scene, yet they are still discussing the scene. There are many silent pauses throughout the commentary, whether it be a scene change or the other actor is about to do his own explanation. This is another hint in that they both don't talk at the same time. Each actor has his own personal say and Billy Crystal’s is the much funnier of the two. He has a charming wit about him that he can create a joke out of any situation he is in. An interesting commentary, for the mere fact that De Niro was doing one, yet still needed a little more actor-actor-scene interaction.
• Cast & Crew
  A text based filmography of just De Niro, Crystal and Harold Ramis.
• Gag Reel
  Just under five minutes of outtakes picturing the two main actors bursting into minor hysterics during their scenes. The funniest by far is De Niro in bed with a broad going hammer and tongs on his wedding tackle.
• Theatrical Trailer
  A 1.85 ratio anamorphic trailer of the movie - standard stuff.

At the cinemas, Analyze was a laugh, but once the jokes get tired it's a little hard to enjoy this movie again and again. Personally, I liked it. I liked seeing a different character for De Niro, still a mobster but one that cries. An enjoyable movie with a damn good transfer.