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Underground > Film, TV & Theatre >

Commentary Tracks

13:54 / 12.06.02

So who else here is a fan of good DVD commentary tracks? What are some of your favorite? What makes a good commentary track? What can make a comentary track terrible? What movies would you love to have a commentary track for? And who would give it?

Personally, I really liked the commentary track on Fight Club that was Chuck (the guy who wrote the book, who's last name I'm not even going to try and spell) and the guy who wrote the screen play. A lot of little bits of trivia mixed in with motivations for certain scenes and things of that nature. Pretty informative.

Similiarly there's a guy who did the commentary for both Once Upon A Time In China 1 and Drunken Master (the first one, not Legends of...) who was pretty good. Giving a lot of little tid bits about actors and story.

Not sure what movies I'd like to see commentary tracks for. But, I think it'd be kind of a fun idea to create fan commentary tracks. Could be recorded on tape or CD, and then started at a certain part in the film so it syncs up.

14:37 / 12.06.02

The commentary on The Limey is great. It's by Soderbergh and screenwriter Lem Dobbs, and it highlights a lot of the changes that happen between page and screen. Both are laid back, but they argue a bit and there's a lot of information flying around.

I haven't seen the DVD version, but the old laserdisc track on El Mariachi was great. Rodriguez seems very happy to be doing the track and he details how quite a lot of his low-budget picture was done. Gilliam's commentaries are usually good - the laserdisc one for the Fisher King and the DVD 12 Monkeys tracks are very informative and the Brazil set can't be beat.

Another favorite of mine is the John Sturges commentary on his film Bad Day At Black Rock. It's very rare that a director from the old days of Hollywood is willing or able to do a track, and his is great, conversational and full of detail. Sadly, that's another Laserdisc track, with no DVD yet released.

Murray Hamhandler

14:53 / 12.06.02

Yeah, The Limey commentary and all four commentaries on Fight Club are great. I love P.T. Anderson's commentaries on the Hard Eight disc. He goes through a lot of the small details involved in getting a film made. Lars Von Trier's commentary on Dancer In The Dark is also quite nice, although I would have loved to have heard a Björk commentary on there, as well.

An example of a pointless commentary that immediately springs to mind is William Friedkin's commentary on the newer Exorcist disc. He doesn't seem to understand what the commentary track is there for. He uses it to explain the actions taking place on screen, for the most part, so it's more of a narration track (and a needless one at that, unless you're blind) than a commentary.

Matthew Fluxington

15:41 / 12.06.02

The commentary tracks on the new Mr. Show DVDs are hilarious, they don't really comment on the episodes, they are more like audio skits unto themselves. They are funny and add an extra 5 hours of entertainment to an already stuffed package.

Murray Hamhandler

16:14 / 12.06.02

Oh, yeah. Other funny tracks. The This Is Spinal Tap track is all done by the actors in character. And, while not technically a commentary, there is an alternate audio track on Wet Hot American Summer of fart noises being made throughout the entire movie for no discernable reason. Which is incredibly funny if your sense of humor is as juvenile as mine is.

Our Lady of The Two Towers

16:42 / 12.06.02

Watching 'Monty Python and the Holy Grail' on DVD, it makes sense to split the Pythons in to two groups so the loud ones like Cleese don't dominate over the 'quiet' ones like Palin, but Cleese so obviously didn't want to be involved with anything Pythonesque AGAIN, and both groups were more or less saying the same thing.

I enjoyed the Fight Club one with Fincher, Pitt, Norton and Bonham-Carter, I'm guessing she recorded hers seperately as there's no interaction between her and the others.

Years ago they released a video of 'Usual Suspects' with the director and writer talking over it (I think thats on the DVD special edition), occasionally interesting but mostly them giving big ups to places and people.

Apparently the new series DVDs for B5 will have JMS commentary on some of the arc-heavy episodes if he can find the time.

16:42 / 12.06.02

The Once Upon A Time In China guy does tell the funniest kung-fu movie joke, which I can't really render in text, about what a kung-fu fighter shaking hands sounds like.

The commentary for Waiting For Guffman is incredibly disappointing, though surreal in a way. Christopher Guest and maybe Eugene Levy it is, and about ten minutes into it they seem to get absorbed in the movie & stop talking.

The commentary for Election is very good, in addition to the movie being good. Actually I think this was the first movie I watched on DVD & so the first commentary track, and I thought they would all be this good (but they're not). Anyway the director talks a lot about the movie's visual composition, which I'm not usually conscious of when I watch a movie & now I notice it more in all movies.

The commentary for Main Street is utterly horrible. David Paymer and someone else and Sarah Jessica Parker basically just kissing David Mamet's ass for the public record.

Run Lola Run has great commentary. The director & the lead actress basically deconstruct the story and also some of the movie magic.

16:56 / 12.06.02

Dark City commentary by Roger Ebert is very good, offering a nice blend of info on the film and the film's context. Why no more commentaries by decent film critics?

Does Mystery Science Theater 3000 count as a feature commentary?

John Carpenter on Vampires is shit. He does nothing more than describe what's happening on screen. Although on The Thing he seems much more happy to be buddied up with Kurt Russell and their nostalgia trip makes for nice listening.

Why no commentary on Jaws?

I'd like to add my vote the the This Is Spinal Tap contingent. Almost as funny as the film itself.

Strangest commentary: Drugs episode of Brasseye - probably the only commentary track where someone keeps telling the others to be quiet because he's trying to watch the episode.

17:16 / 12.06.02

Persephone, thanks for the heads up on Run Lola Run. Been thinking about picking that up on DVD, but wasn't sure if it was worth it. Now with word of a good commentary track, I'll deffinetly pick it up.

The commentary tracks for Boogiepop Phantom go between very cool, to out right annoying. First major complaint is that they were recorded out of sequence over what was probably a long period of time. Combine this with people that don't want to give away spoilers and you have a lot of "I'll talk about that later" only to never have it mentioned again.

The most annoying part though was the final two or three episodes. Basically the episodes that start to pull everything together (well, as close as this series ever gets to doing so) and the whole thing could really benefit from someone who'd talked to the Japanese creators. And is familiar with the whole thing. But, what we get is the American director asking one of the voice actresses what it's like to do auditions and do voice acting, etc. They pay almost no attention to what's happening on the screen.

And speaking of anime. If anyone's interested in learning about how to realistically record voices, check out Spriggan. They go into great detail about that, as well as other things. Fun track though, nice behind the scenes kind of thing. Though I'd love to see an anime with a commentary track from the Japenese creators.

17:30 / 12.06.02

See, I thought the Election commentary was decent at best. Lots of dead space, and then the director going on about the motifs of geometric shapes in the film which was so subtle as to be, in reality, completely invisible. I don't remember him acknowledging that as something he wanted to do but couldn't pull off, just that there's all this meaning to the shapes in the film, when in fact, there isn't.

Spielberg seems quite uninterested in doing a commentary, which is fine. For the same reason, you'll never see Lynch doing one. I'm curious about the Man WHo Wasn't There commentary, as in previous interview appearances the Coens have been less than scinitllating, verbally. We'll see. Anyone watched that one?

I wasn't too excited by the Anderson/Wilson commentary on the Criterion Rushmore - more than anything else it led me to the suspicion that Rushmore is based so much upon their own experiences and serendipity whilst filming that they couldn't hope to repeat their success, a suspicion borne out by Tenenbaums.

The Tobe Hooper track on Texas Chainsaw is actually rpetty good, with a lot of detail and amusing interjections from Gunnar Hansen, the actor behind Leatherface.

17:57 / 12.06.02

I don't remember him acknowledging that as something he wanted to do but couldn't pull off, just that there's all this meaning to the shapes in the film, when in fact, there isn't.

Now that you mention it, I think he does say that the thing with the shapes was something that he was trying for & but that it didn't really work the way he wanted. And I remember that's what I liked about the commentary, that he points out the failed intentions.

19:33 / 12.06.02

Persephone: You may be right. Been a couple years. Will have to take another look at it, as the film is certainly worth revisiting.

01:50 / 13.06.02

Oh wait... it's not a kung-fu fighter shaking hands, it's a kung-fu fighter waving hello.

02:19 / 13.06.02

>>>I'm curious about the Man WHo Wasn't There commentary, as in previous interview appearances the Coens have been less than scinitllating, verbally. We'll see. Anyone watched that one?<<<

Yeah, and it's completely underwhelming. I was all excited to hear the Coen's first commentary track and it's one of those ones where they do little but narrate the onscreen action, when they're not just sitting silently watching the film (which happens often).

Far more entertaining is the commentary for the Special Edition of Blood Simple - very obviously written by the Coens, it's a parody of commentary tracks delivered by an alleged film historian, who lets us in on all sorts of fascinating behind-the-scenes information, including the use of animatronic puppetry and CGI animation, and the almost hour-long subplot that was excised from the orignal cut, in which we learn in extensive flashbacks that the man in the cowboy hat is a Bulgarian immigrant named Zifkof who is desperately trying to retrieve the lighter that was given to him as a child in Bulgaria by his father.

It's very funny stuff, but the one warning is that it might spoil any future attempts to watch the film. I can't take it seriously any more when I can remember the commentary - "Now it may not look like it, but this scene was actually filmed in reverse, with the actors learning their dialogue backwards so that it would appear normal when the film was played forwards..."

Solitaire Rose as Tom Servo

02:45 / 13.06.02

I thought the commentary tracks on Clerks The Animated Series were funnier than the actual episodes as they discussed their problems with ABC, getting the animation done and all the other weird stuff that went on.

Of course, I'm becoming such a snob that I DON'T want to buy a DVD that doesn't have a commentary track, just because it seems like the least the filmmakers could do if I like the movie enough to actually won it, rather than watch it on HBO.

Matthew Fluxington

02:59 / 13.06.02

See, I don't like that - I don't like that filmmakers should feel obligated to comment on their work, or that any or all of the secrets and behind-the-scenes details has to be made public knowledge. I think that the option of silence should be kept without the bullying of the audience for the magician to explain away all his tricks...

I know from my own experience that I'm loathe to explain away my own art, I can completely understand why a lot of filmmakers just want to have the audience see the film, and that's it.

03:29 / 13.06.02

I also dislike the fact that every piece of shit that gets released now has a director's commentary track, as though there's anything interesting whatsoever about the making of, say, Legally Blond or Rush Hour 2.

I think I'm the bigger snob when I say that commentary tracks should be reserved for directors who actually have something interesting and useful to say about films that are actually *significant*, where they can talk about the themes explored and techniques used - rather than some Hollywood hack who'll waste 90 minutes telling bland anecdotes and pointing out continuity errors.

03:45 / 13.06.02

See, as a filmmaker, I like the technical side of commentaries, so I'm very happy if a guy just goes throught the film talking about lenses and rigging and whatnot, as it's valuable info to me. If a director does that and never touches the thematic content I'm still happy. But I can imagine most not caring about that sort of thing. So a film like Legally Blonde (which I haven't seen and am not particulalrly interested in) might have a commentary that talks about the production's inability to shoot at Harvard, and the steps that were taken around that, etc. That would keep me happy, but prolly not much of the public would agree.

As far as commentaries being required, I agree with Flux. There should be no push to explain things away, and if nothing else when creating a commentary under duress you're likely to get crap product. It's also getting more expensive and complicated to do commentaries - the Writer's Guild has pushed for a mandate requiring credited screenwriters a commentary if the director gets same, increasing the money outlay for studios. Don't know what happened to that, but between the rights/business wrangling and the stars who ask exorbitant participation fees, there are some people already predicting the commentary's death.

Knodge - YOUR nemesis!

11:07 / 13.06.02

I thought the commentary track on Criterion's release of Kurosawa's Seven Samurai was well done. It provides a wealth of information about the film.

11:18 / 13.06.02

y'know *sigh* .. I really hate these goddamn things. Whenever I go over to watch one of my friend V's DVDs he insists we sit through all the commentaries and stuff, when all I want to do is watch the film, go away and form my own opinions about it, and then, maybe, if I'm thus inclined (which I'm usually not), look up some interviews with the filmmakers in order to learn more..

I just find watching quality pieces of cinema with somebody talking over the top to be incredibly frustrating..

Knodge - YOUR nemesis!

11:22 / 13.06.02

Well, to me that is the beauty of the commentary tracks. If you like them, turn them on... if not, leave them off.

Murray Hamhandler

19:29 / 13.06.02

Exactly. I like the option to be there if the people involved are willing to do the track. I respect those directors who choose not to do commentaries and I understand their reasons for not wanting to do them. That said, I appreciate the folks that do participate in commentaries, as I usually tend to want to know more about a given work and how it was created than is good for me.

I don't think that commentary tracks and other extras should be required, but I think that the film companies should get their shit together before they release a new DVD. I'm getting a little tired of all of these new, upgraded special editions coming out after I've already shelled out my cash for an older model.

19:58 / 13.06.02

new, upgraded special editions coming out after I've already shelled out my cash for an older model.

But from the studios' point of view, that's exactly the point. Bastards.