Plot: What’s it about?
While perusing cable and noticing the classic film cable channels, this viewer came across a clip reel of several films of the sixties and noticed a most interesting thing. There was one clip with a film that starred Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor in a wide letterboxing that I’ve seen only associated with Cinemascope and Ben Hur. Increasing my curiosity, I was set on finding the film until coming across it overnight gave me the answer. It didn’t just have those two but many others as a tale of being in one place and reflecting on situations past while stuck going through matters in the section reserved for The V.I.Ps.
Around one evening, first class passengers are awaiting flying out of Heathrow Airport to their destination. However, a dense fog hovers over the place grounding flights left and right until the fog disapates and is clear enough for takeoff. During the time of the fog, those passengers from all walks of life look back at what brought them there and what they hope will be their future in whatever means they have to correct their wrongs, better their rights or have a touch of humor now and then.
This film offers a blend of different stories with the different characters as if we’re seeing a few short movies rolled into one. Everyone has a situation and some are even on a time scale and each one looks back at what led them to flying out in the films almost two hour running time.
One great aspect of this film is the beautiful score of Miklos Rozsa who carries out each story with his blend of strings and horns which has a familiar sound to those who remember the seventies classic Time After Time being that it was one of his last works and different directions of this score are very similar.
The acting is mostly on an ensemble level and the all star cast does nicely in their stories. All of them have their situations and the flights provide a future for what the audience sees in front of them. We never get to see where they arrive or when everything clears out what the results would be but we don’t mind sticking around no matter how sappy or goofy the situations are.
The V.I.Ps is an interesting premise of one place, many people and a few stories that connect most of them together and make for an intriguing piece of widescreen cinema wider that this viewer expected in it’s presentation.
Video: How does it look?
The V.I.Ps is in its first DVD presentation and the 2.5:1 anamorphic widescreen keeps the colors and the look of the film intact. While there are many closeups and a wide shot here and there, the picture stays in its central spot and provides a very nice looking transfer for a film of the past. Granted, it doesn’t have the clear and pristine look of recent pictures but there was hardly any print flaws or debris noticable to this viewer deterring the overall look of the film with a visual result looking quite smashing.
Audio: How does it sound?
The Dolby Digital Mono track has clear dialogue which makes for the majority of the picture but there are some choppy points where certain actors in different background airs had to loop their lines in order to get it clearer in the film and this is evident in the beginning of the film and in the center channels with the dialogue. Effects and Miklos Rozsa’s score dominate the outer tracks and audibly are engaging with very little effects there are but the looping parts kind of have a barely edited feel to this viewer and take the points down a bit. This disc also has a French mono track along with English, French and Spanish subtitles.
Supplements: What are the extras?
Despite the outside back cover listing an extra “Now Boarding: The V.I.Ps” there are no extras on this release so a slight error on the part of the studio for listing and not providing this extra.
With all it’s intertwined stories and one place and many problems for those rich people, The V.I.Ps has a rich rewarding visual look on DVD that is only marred slightly by spotty sound in the beginning and the lack of one extra making for a decent release.
