What's your favourite commentary track on a DVD/BD?

TheIrishGrover

And, to avoid this just being another list of films, why?

There are a few very good commentaries (The actors and the writers/director commentaries on Lord Of The Rings for one). But my own favourite probably comes from the director's cut of Almost Famous ("Untitled") with Cameron Crowe and his mam. It's interesting to hear how the various scenes corresponded with actual events in Crowe's own life. His mother's own inputs into various scenes are nice too (As, for example, her comments on Philip Seymour Hoffman's performance of Lester Bangs). It's not a technical deconstruction of the film (Which the LoTR commentaries do so well) but it's just a nice expansion of the actual film in my opinion.

The King of Moo

Anything by Martin Scorsese: he goes into so much detail about his method, and there's never a quiet moment.

John Carpenter and Kurt Russell on The Thing: Very relaxed and chummy, with some nice insights into the filming. I now really appreciate the lengthy shot where the dogs walks down the hall and past the camera without looking at it!

Ridley Scott's on Alien: Again, very informative about the making of the film, and with no lulls.

Penn

Jackass 1. Just the whole crew ripping the p*ss out of each other while drinking. Not like you need a lot of sound for the film itself anyway, so it works great.

krudler

Deep Blue Sea is hilarious, after Samuel L Jackons reveals he only took the role as the location was near some golf courses, and once his character dies he fecks off to play golf leaving the recording booth.

anything by John Carpenter and Kurt Russell, especially The Thing and Big Trouble In Little China, just listening to two good mates having a laugh.

Superman, Richard Donner and Tom Manke...Mankiew...ah the other guy, very informative and funny.

worst? Tim Burton, looooong pauses and boring stories.

AnonoBoy

Spinal Tap. They do the commentary in character, looking back on the film and complaining about how much they got stitched up by the director. Almost as funny as the film itself.

Sad Professor

Fincher does excellent commentaries. I just got Dragon Tattoo on Blu-ray today and looking forward to listening to the commentary later.

krudler

Sad Professor wrote: »

Fincher does excellent commentaries. I just got Dragon Tattoo on Blu-ray today and looking forward to listening to commentary later.

the one on Se7en is quite good, it jumps around between Pitt and Fincher and Freeman so its a bit cobbled together but there's some good info on it

bnt

Miss Congeniality has a great one, I thought, by Sandra Bullock with writer Marc Lawrence. She has a fairly twisted sense of humour about some of the stuff in that film e.g. doing all her own eating - "no stunt mouth was used" - and getting kicked in the boob by Benjamin Bratt. "Oh, that left breast of mine ..." :cool:

Francis Ford Coppola's commentaries on the Godfather films are great too - the guy can Talk for America, though. He hardly takes a breath between films.

Skinfull

Dr Horrible Sing - along blog. They dont do the commentary in character but its still a parody and its done like a radio play, complete with sound effects and of course its musical! LOVE IT!!

The Recliner

krudler wrote: »

the one on Se7en is quite good, it jumps around between Pitt and Fincher and Freeman so its a bit cobbled together but there's some good info on it

The Fight Club one is excellent too

You can tell Fincher, Pitt and Norton get on really well, unfortunately Helena Bonham Carter's bits were recorded seperately and it shows but still worth a listen

NotorietyH

I can't remember specifics, but I really enjoyed the commentary on Out of Sight with Steven Sodsrbergh and the screenwriter Scott Frank. I remember them having great banter between each other and were constantly mocking George Clooney. It was very informative too. It's what all commentaries should be like.

krudler

This is way up there :pac:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WTQVKGvu2Bc

and anything with Kurt Russell and his infectious laugh

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDPjHetAG1M

Mickeroo

The Fight CLub one is great yeah.

Absolutely love the Evil Dead II commentary, nearly as funny as the film itself.

sweetie

AnonoBoy wrote: »

Spinal Tap. They do the commentary in character, looking back on the film and complaining about how much they got stitched up by the director. Almost as funny as the film itself.

great commentary - 'you had me at hello'

niallon

All three Evil Dead commentaries are pure gold, though the first one iirc is best as it has Campbell on one and Raimi on another and listening to Raimi laugh at torturing Campbell then listening to Campbell complain about being tortured is hilarious!

Worst has got to be Halloween. Waited ages to finally get Carpenter's input after The Thing and others being so good...... And they go and make a split commentary with him, Curtis and Hill. Terrible

Morlar

I remember 'Dog Soldiers' commentary as being hilarious. From what I remember (been a few years since I heard it) Sean Pertwee and Liam Cunningham were ripping the piss out of each other bigtime.

johnny_ultimate

Would say I've watched two commentaries in my life, maybe. Only one I remember was Donnie Darko when the DVD first came out like a decade ago.

Just don't necessarily think commentaries are for me, even though I love hearing director's talk about their work. Couldn't justify rewatching a film with commentary on when there's so many other films that demand a watch: I'm just weird like that.

Would probably prefer to listen to a commentary in podcast form rather than over a film.

Mickeroo

Morlar wrote: »

I remember 'Dog Soldiers' commentary as being hilarious. From what I remember (been a few years since I heard it) Sean Pertwee and Liam Cunningham were ripping the piss out of each other bigtime.

Yea Dog Soldiers commentary is pretty funny. "Short Controlled Bursts!!"

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

Would say I've watched two commentaries in my life, maybe. Only one I remember was Donnie Darko when the DVD first came out like a decade ago.

Just don't necessarily think commentaries are for me, even though I love hearing director's talk about their work. Couldn't justify rewatching a film with commentary on when there's so many other films that demand a watch: I'm just weird like that.

Would probably prefer to listen to a commentary in podcast form rather than over a film.

I remember listening to the Donnie Darko commentary, it did a good job of pointing out exactly what was going on.

I enjoyed the Lord of the Rings commentaries too, the ones with Peter Jackson, Philipa Boyens and the other girl. THere's a commentary with most of the cast too but I never got around to listening to it.

armitage_skanks

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

Just don't necessarily think commentaries are for me, even though I love hearing director's talk about their work. Couldn't justify rewatching a film with commentary on when there's so many other films that demand a watch: I'm just weird like that.

I would be the same; I would prefer to just watch a new movie that I hadnt seen rather than rewatch an old movie with someone talking over it.

delbertgrady

I agree with earlier posts that This Is Spinal Tap is excellent. Harry Shearer remarked during an appearance in Dublin a few years ago that they recorded a "straight" commentary for the laserdisc edition, and then, rather than do the same thing again, when it came to do the DVD, they did it in character.
Brian Blessed's Flash Gordon commentary is legendary.
Peter Bogdanovich's commentary on What's Up, Doc? is excellent - like Scorsese and Coppola, very informative.

Halloween is woeful. Having a bloody administrator doesn't help: any time the person changes, you get voiceover man saying "John Carpenter..." or whoever. Yeah, we f***ing KNOW it's John Carpenter!
The Back to the Future one was really disappointing. Just an audio track of a public interview with Zemeckis. Terrible.
As I recall, Billy Bob Thornton has to leave the recording of the Monster's Ball one early, to make a TV appearance, so he's not there for the last twenty or thirty minutes. Nonsense.

Am I correct in saying that the first ever full-length commentary track was for The Usual Suspects? I bought it when it was issued as a limited edition double-video set, with one tape having just the film, and the other containing the film with the commentary. This was pre-DVD, of course.

Phony Scott

I like commentaries with a bit of camaraderie, as they tend to be the most memorable. To that end I'd recommend; Donnie Darko (directors cut with Kevin Smith) Road House (again with Smith!) actually any film with Kevin Smith commentary is good! Also The Evil Dead Trilogy, The Thing and Starship Toopers.

The commentary for Superman IV is very good as the screenwriter details all that went horribly wrong. I'd like to hear more commentaries like that, so if you do now ones like that, please list them.

delbertgrady

Phony Scott wrote: »

The commentary for Superman IV is very good as the screenwriter details all that went horribly wrong.

He must be talking non-stop throughout the entire film if that's the case. One of the worst films ever made. Didn't it have most of its funding pulled at the eleventh hour, which is why the effects are so bad? Not to mention the ludicrous storyline and the ill-advised "comedy" episodes. Even Christopher Reeve just gave it one sentence in his autobiography: "The less said about Superman IV, the better".

kitakyushu

Not a movie but my favourite comm is on the DVD of Brass Eye.

For it Chris Morris just recruits some homeless wino's off the street to sit down and watch an episode of the show. They've no idea what they're watching and spend the 30mins insulting each other and criticising the sheer stupidity of what they're watching.

ziedth

Snatch has a great one too, Guy Ritchie goes into great detail. The Jackass one like mentioned is brilliant too.

tony1kenobi

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5h9ZPBuBEs

Batman the Movie.Because Adam West and Burt Ward are a pair of hilariously dirty bastards.

Chasing Amy.Because drunk Affleck.

OldeCinemaSoz

The track on from russia with love was so rich in info
that i had to listen in on couple of parts.

Definitive i think.

stealinhorses

When I first heard the commentary on Dodgeball I was really confused and thought it was real, so it's gotta be my favourite, it's quite hilarious.

The Recliner

The commentary on Cube is interesting, gives a good idea of how you can make something relatively cheap and keep it interesting