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Rat Race
Paramount // PG-13 // January 29, 2002
List Price: $29.99 [Buy now and save at Amazon]
The Movie:
One of the few bright spots of the late Summer season, "Rat Race" brings back "Airplane" director Jerry Zucker in fine form. It's another one of the usual Zucker efforts - throw everything at the audience and see what sticks - and actually, most of it works well. Sort of a remake of "It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World", the film starts off bringing all of the main characters in front of millionaire casino owner Donald Sinclair (John Cleese). After joking with them about being selected for being saved from the end of the world, he lets them in on the real deal: there's two million dollars in the locker of a train station in New Mexico; the first one there gets the cash - and, "there are no rules".
A few of the players pair off into teams, while others prefer to go their own way: Duane and Blaine Cody (Seth Green and Vince Vieluf), Vera and Merrill (Whoopi Goldberg and Lanei Chapman), Nick and Tracy (Breckin Meyer and Amy Smart), Randy Pear (Jon Lovitz) and his family, Owen Templeton (Cuba Gooding Jr.), Enrico (Rowan Atkinson). The group heads off towards their destination by train, helicopter, bus, feet and balloon.
I will admit that it didn't look good; the trailers showed little promise, but the movie actually comes up with some inspired comedic moments, especially revolving around Lovitz and family. One of the film's funniest running jokes focuses not on the racers, but those betting on them. We're shown that billionaires from around the world were brought together to bet on the winner. Along the way, the wealthy and bored individuals find many other things to bet on, including the first one of them to have air sickness.
The film doesn't start off particularly well; the tone seems a little off and things aren't moving along very well. About 15 minutes in, I was already looking at my watch, which was not a particularly good sign. Yet, when the race finally begins, the movie really hits an impressive stride. Although not completely consistent, the movie got funnier and funnier as it went along. The performers were not always that amusing, though - Goldberg and Chapman are really hardly given much to do, while Atkinson's bits were not all that funny. Meyer and Smart (who were both in "Road Trip") have good chemistry again here and Cleese, Lovitz and Green are quite entertaining.
The only piece of the film that doesn't quite come together is the ending; it's warm-hearted, but goes on too long and provides yet another appearance by rock band Smash Mouth, who's been on the soundtrack for far too many films at this point. Still, "Rat Race" works far better than it should have for the majority of the running time, a fun couple of hours of comedic chaos that generated some solid laughs.
The DVD
VIDEO: "Rat Race" is presented by Paramount in 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen. The presentation is quite good and would skip over into great if it wasn't for one considerable flaw. Sharpness and detail are strong, though - the picture appeared consistently well-defined and crisp, delivering Thomas Ackerman's widescreen photography quite well.
Everything would be terrific if it wasn't for one flaw - a mild amount of edge enhancement is visible rather frequently, which was dissapointing, considering the picture quality was fine otherwise. Print flaws were nearly absent, as only one or two minor specks were visible. Pixelation was also nowhere to be found. Colors remained bright, strong and nicely saturated throughout, with no smearing or other problems. While not perfect, this is still a very good effort.
SOUND: "Rat Race" is presented in Dolby Digital 5.1. The comedy doesn't exceed expectations when it comes to sound use - the audio really stays almost completely in the front three speakers. A few sequences of more intense action do have some sound effects distributed to the surrounds, but I doubt that many will find these instances that noticable. If anything, the best element of the audio was the appropriately madcap score, which sounded absolutely fantastic and really added to the comedy.
MENUS: Paramount has done a very nice job with the menus, as the main menu shows the characters, using the same animation as the opening credits.
EXTRAS:
Andy & Jerry Interview: This is a short interview with director Jerry Zucker and writer Andy Breckman. The two chat about the making of the feature, talking about elements such as working with the actors (and each other), as well as how to make the jokes transition well from script-to-screen.
Deleted Scenes: Rightly deleted scenes, actually. There are six included, each with short introductions by Jerry Zucker. One scene with the gamblers playing monopoly for real money got a laugh, but I didn't find the other five very funny.
Jerry and Andy Call The Actors: Originally, director Zucker and writer Breckman were going to record a full-length commentary track for the movie itself. Apparently bored with their discussion (which I find unfortunate, given that I thought Zucker's past commentaries were hilarious) and decided to simply record themselves calling the actors instead. This feature is included in the supplemental section - a pair of menus with pictures of the actors pop up, then clicking on a picture plays the audio-only conversation. The conversations (with all the leads) are quite lengthy altogether, so it's curious that these tracks weren't edited together into an audio track that could play along with the film. As for the conversations themselves, I didn't find much to them - there's a lot of small talk to get through to actually get to any interesting stories about the film.
Making of "Rat Race": This is a 22-minute "making of" featurette, whose only interesting feature is the occasional gem in the interviews. Other than that, this is stroll down the usual, as the featurette mainly focuses on promoting the story and characters.
Gag Reel: This is a 4 minute reel of outtakes - while not the funniest outtakes reel that I've ever seen, there are some extremely funny moments contained within - especially a scene where Lovitz tries to get Gooding, Jr. to say one of his more famous lines.
Giggles: A lengthy clip showing two actors from the film suffering from a laughing spell.
Also: The trailer.
Final Thoughts: "Rat Race" isn't fantastic, but it's occasionally very funny and often works considerably better than it should have, thanks to Zucker and a talented cast. Paramount's DVD offers good audio/video quality and a nice batch of supplements. Recommended.
One of the few bright spots of the late Summer season, "Rat Race" brings back "Airplane" director Jerry Zucker in fine form. It's another one of the usual Zucker efforts - throw everything at the audience and see what sticks - and actually, most of it works well. Sort of a remake of "It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World", the film starts off bringing all of the main characters in front of millionaire casino owner Donald Sinclair (John Cleese). After joking with them about being selected for being saved from the end of the world, he lets them in on the real deal: there's two million dollars in the locker of a train station in New Mexico; the first one there gets the cash - and, "there are no rules".
A few of the players pair off into teams, while others prefer to go their own way: Duane and Blaine Cody (Seth Green and Vince Vieluf), Vera and Merrill (Whoopi Goldberg and Lanei Chapman), Nick and Tracy (Breckin Meyer and Amy Smart), Randy Pear (Jon Lovitz) and his family, Owen Templeton (Cuba Gooding Jr.), Enrico (Rowan Atkinson). The group heads off towards their destination by train, helicopter, bus, feet and balloon.
I will admit that it didn't look good; the trailers showed little promise, but the movie actually comes up with some inspired comedic moments, especially revolving around Lovitz and family. One of the film's funniest running jokes focuses not on the racers, but those betting on them. We're shown that billionaires from around the world were brought together to bet on the winner. Along the way, the wealthy and bored individuals find many other things to bet on, including the first one of them to have air sickness.
The film doesn't start off particularly well; the tone seems a little off and things aren't moving along very well. About 15 minutes in, I was already looking at my watch, which was not a particularly good sign. Yet, when the race finally begins, the movie really hits an impressive stride. Although not completely consistent, the movie got funnier and funnier as it went along. The performers were not always that amusing, though - Goldberg and Chapman are really hardly given much to do, while Atkinson's bits were not all that funny. Meyer and Smart (who were both in "Road Trip") have good chemistry again here and Cleese, Lovitz and Green are quite entertaining.
The only piece of the film that doesn't quite come together is the ending; it's warm-hearted, but goes on too long and provides yet another appearance by rock band Smash Mouth, who's been on the soundtrack for far too many films at this point. Still, "Rat Race" works far better than it should have for the majority of the running time, a fun couple of hours of comedic chaos that generated some solid laughs.
The DVD
VIDEO: "Rat Race" is presented by Paramount in 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen. The presentation is quite good and would skip over into great if it wasn't for one considerable flaw. Sharpness and detail are strong, though - the picture appeared consistently well-defined and crisp, delivering Thomas Ackerman's widescreen photography quite well.
Everything would be terrific if it wasn't for one flaw - a mild amount of edge enhancement is visible rather frequently, which was dissapointing, considering the picture quality was fine otherwise. Print flaws were nearly absent, as only one or two minor specks were visible. Pixelation was also nowhere to be found. Colors remained bright, strong and nicely saturated throughout, with no smearing or other problems. While not perfect, this is still a very good effort.
SOUND: "Rat Race" is presented in Dolby Digital 5.1. The comedy doesn't exceed expectations when it comes to sound use - the audio really stays almost completely in the front three speakers. A few sequences of more intense action do have some sound effects distributed to the surrounds, but I doubt that many will find these instances that noticable. If anything, the best element of the audio was the appropriately madcap score, which sounded absolutely fantastic and really added to the comedy.
MENUS: Paramount has done a very nice job with the menus, as the main menu shows the characters, using the same animation as the opening credits.
EXTRAS:
Andy & Jerry Interview: This is a short interview with director Jerry Zucker and writer Andy Breckman. The two chat about the making of the feature, talking about elements such as working with the actors (and each other), as well as how to make the jokes transition well from script-to-screen.
Deleted Scenes: Rightly deleted scenes, actually. There are six included, each with short introductions by Jerry Zucker. One scene with the gamblers playing monopoly for real money got a laugh, but I didn't find the other five very funny.
Jerry and Andy Call The Actors: Originally, director Zucker and writer Breckman were going to record a full-length commentary track for the movie itself. Apparently bored with their discussion (which I find unfortunate, given that I thought Zucker's past commentaries were hilarious) and decided to simply record themselves calling the actors instead. This feature is included in the supplemental section - a pair of menus with pictures of the actors pop up, then clicking on a picture plays the audio-only conversation. The conversations (with all the leads) are quite lengthy altogether, so it's curious that these tracks weren't edited together into an audio track that could play along with the film. As for the conversations themselves, I didn't find much to them - there's a lot of small talk to get through to actually get to any interesting stories about the film.
Making of "Rat Race": This is a 22-minute "making of" featurette, whose only interesting feature is the occasional gem in the interviews. Other than that, this is stroll down the usual, as the featurette mainly focuses on promoting the story and characters.
Gag Reel: This is a 4 minute reel of outtakes - while not the funniest outtakes reel that I've ever seen, there are some extremely funny moments contained within - especially a scene where Lovitz tries to get Gooding, Jr. to say one of his more famous lines.
Giggles: A lengthy clip showing two actors from the film suffering from a laughing spell.
Also: The trailer.
Final Thoughts: "Rat Race" isn't fantastic, but it's occasionally very funny and often works considerably better than it should have, thanks to Zucker and a talented cast. Paramount's DVD offers good audio/video quality and a nice batch of supplements. Recommended.
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