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Caveman's Valentine
List Price: Unknown [Buy now and save at Amazon]
The Movie:
"Caveman's Valentine" is one of the weirdest movies that I've seen in ages, but it certainly was never boring. Kasi Lemmons, who made her directorial debut a few years ago with the excellent "Eve's Bayou", returns here with the story of Romulus Ledbetter (Samuel L. Jackson), a formerly brilliant pianist who graduated from Julliard, but who now is a homeless person with mental problems - he believes that a force is looking out on him from the Chrysler building. He preaches to the non-believers all day, rarely retreating to his cave in Central Park to sleep and occasionally watch TV - except it's not actually plugged in.
One morning though, Rommulus finds a frozen man outside of his home. Although the police believe that the death was accidental, Rommulus believes that he can find the killer and clues lead him to believe that the man was a model for a famous photographer named David Leppenraub (Colm Feore) and that the photographer is responsible. Meanwhile though, he's embarassing his daughter, one of the police officers on the scene when he reports the incident. She wants to help him get help for himself, but he refuses each time.
The idea of having a man who has mental trouble attempting to solve a murder is an interesting one, but the way that it goes along here is not entirely believable. Rommulus goes from a man who believes that there are spirits against him and voices in his head to someone who is clearly intent on solving a murder. I did like that the voices in his head did seem to come less frequently as he became more involved in the case, but this fact doesn't seem to be followed-up. There's also a piece of the plot with Rommulus having an affair with Leppenraub's sister (Ann Magnuson), which seemed random.
The film's second half begins to feel like its wandering, not quite sure of which way it wants to go in having Rommulus try to solve the case. Bits and pieces ramble and some scenes don't seem to be pushing the plot anywhere. I was never bored by it all though, mainly because of Samuel L. Jackson. An amazingly intense performance, Jackson's Rommulus has an inner fire that's fascinating to watch. The actor gives his very best, and he is the reason why the film is able to jump over some of the places where the plot is lacking.
Overall, an interesting if not always successfully told story, but some awfully good performances help support where the film otherwise falls short.
The DVD
VIDEO: "Caveman's Valetine" is presented in a 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen edition that is uniformly superb, certainly one of the Universal's better efforts in recent months. Sharpness and detail are terrific; the picture looks smooth and film-like, with wonderful depth in many shots, whether the bright outdoor sequences or the warm, rich interiors.
Flaws were very few and far between. A couple of instances of very tiny and light edge enhancement was noticed once or twice, but I didn't see any pixelation. A couple of stray speckles were the sum of all of the print flaws - certainly nothing major and not even very noticable.
Colors looked excellent throughout the movie. The warm, rich colors of the interiors looked well-saturated and bold, while many of the exterior scenes provided a more crisp, cool color palette. Beautiful cinematography by Amy Vincent translates quite well to this DVD presentation, which is another fine effort from Universal.
SOUND: Presented in DTS and Dolby Digital 5.1 audio, "Caveman's Valentine" really suprised me with its audio use. Going into a smaller drama like this one, I was expecting a dialogue-driven film with little, if any, surround use. Although a good deal of the film does follow the dialogue-driven way, there's some suprising use of the surrounds. To convey the voices that are going on in Rommulus' head, creepy voices and sound effects occasionally flow out of the surrounds. These sequences are terrifically mixed, with sounds enveloping the listener, putting them into the middle of Rommulus's mind. There's also the occasional low bass during these sequences. Praise to supervising sound editor Jay Nierenberg (who also worked on new theatrical release "The Fast and the Furious") for doing such a creative and inventive sound presentation - it really adds to the film.
Audio quality was excellent. Terrence Blanchard's excellent score sounded warm and rich throughout and sound effects both natural and unnatural came through clean sounding and convincing. Overall, "Caveman's Valentine" provided a sound experience that was occasionally wildly agressive, but even in its more subtle moments still very effective.
MENUS:: Menus are non-animated, but a piece of music does play in the background of the main menu.
EXTRAS:
Commentary: The DVD provides commentary with director Kasi Lemmons and editor Terilyn Shropshire. The duo provide a mostly interesting and informative commentary with some entertaining stories, but there are some slow points. The duo do focus a bit too much at times on praise for those that they worked with, but thankfully do usually get back to talking about the production after a little while. The director often discusses her thoughts on filmmaking in general and goes into some of the specifics of "Caveman's Valentine", like casting, working with the actors, the story and giving the film its particular look. There's a bit of silence here and there during the track as well as quite a bit of the previously mentioned praise for those they worked with rather than information, but overall it's not a bad commentary and worth a listen for fans of the film.
Deleted Scenes: 4 lengthy, but unnecessary, deleted scenes are included. No optional commentary is included, so the exact reason for their absence remains unknown.
Also: Trailer (Dolby 2.0), production notes, cast/crew bios, recommendations.
Final Thoughts: "Caveman's Valentine" was an odd, but often compelling feature that usually kept my interest due to Samuel L. Jackson's performance. Universal's DVD provides very good image quality, but really exceptional audio quality. The audio is really effective in bringing the viewer into the character's situation and added greatly to the experience. There's also a few solid extra features. Worth a look as a rental.
"Caveman's Valentine" is one of the weirdest movies that I've seen in ages, but it certainly was never boring. Kasi Lemmons, who made her directorial debut a few years ago with the excellent "Eve's Bayou", returns here with the story of Romulus Ledbetter (Samuel L. Jackson), a formerly brilliant pianist who graduated from Julliard, but who now is a homeless person with mental problems - he believes that a force is looking out on him from the Chrysler building. He preaches to the non-believers all day, rarely retreating to his cave in Central Park to sleep and occasionally watch TV - except it's not actually plugged in.
One morning though, Rommulus finds a frozen man outside of his home. Although the police believe that the death was accidental, Rommulus believes that he can find the killer and clues lead him to believe that the man was a model for a famous photographer named David Leppenraub (Colm Feore) and that the photographer is responsible. Meanwhile though, he's embarassing his daughter, one of the police officers on the scene when he reports the incident. She wants to help him get help for himself, but he refuses each time.
The idea of having a man who has mental trouble attempting to solve a murder is an interesting one, but the way that it goes along here is not entirely believable. Rommulus goes from a man who believes that there are spirits against him and voices in his head to someone who is clearly intent on solving a murder. I did like that the voices in his head did seem to come less frequently as he became more involved in the case, but this fact doesn't seem to be followed-up. There's also a piece of the plot with Rommulus having an affair with Leppenraub's sister (Ann Magnuson), which seemed random.
The film's second half begins to feel like its wandering, not quite sure of which way it wants to go in having Rommulus try to solve the case. Bits and pieces ramble and some scenes don't seem to be pushing the plot anywhere. I was never bored by it all though, mainly because of Samuel L. Jackson. An amazingly intense performance, Jackson's Rommulus has an inner fire that's fascinating to watch. The actor gives his very best, and he is the reason why the film is able to jump over some of the places where the plot is lacking.
Overall, an interesting if not always successfully told story, but some awfully good performances help support where the film otherwise falls short.
The DVD
VIDEO: "Caveman's Valetine" is presented in a 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen edition that is uniformly superb, certainly one of the Universal's better efforts in recent months. Sharpness and detail are terrific; the picture looks smooth and film-like, with wonderful depth in many shots, whether the bright outdoor sequences or the warm, rich interiors.
Flaws were very few and far between. A couple of instances of very tiny and light edge enhancement was noticed once or twice, but I didn't see any pixelation. A couple of stray speckles were the sum of all of the print flaws - certainly nothing major and not even very noticable.
Colors looked excellent throughout the movie. The warm, rich colors of the interiors looked well-saturated and bold, while many of the exterior scenes provided a more crisp, cool color palette. Beautiful cinematography by Amy Vincent translates quite well to this DVD presentation, which is another fine effort from Universal.
SOUND: Presented in DTS and Dolby Digital 5.1 audio, "Caveman's Valentine" really suprised me with its audio use. Going into a smaller drama like this one, I was expecting a dialogue-driven film with little, if any, surround use. Although a good deal of the film does follow the dialogue-driven way, there's some suprising use of the surrounds. To convey the voices that are going on in Rommulus' head, creepy voices and sound effects occasionally flow out of the surrounds. These sequences are terrifically mixed, with sounds enveloping the listener, putting them into the middle of Rommulus's mind. There's also the occasional low bass during these sequences. Praise to supervising sound editor Jay Nierenberg (who also worked on new theatrical release "The Fast and the Furious") for doing such a creative and inventive sound presentation - it really adds to the film.
Audio quality was excellent. Terrence Blanchard's excellent score sounded warm and rich throughout and sound effects both natural and unnatural came through clean sounding and convincing. Overall, "Caveman's Valentine" provided a sound experience that was occasionally wildly agressive, but even in its more subtle moments still very effective.
MENUS:: Menus are non-animated, but a piece of music does play in the background of the main menu.
EXTRAS:
Commentary: The DVD provides commentary with director Kasi Lemmons and editor Terilyn Shropshire. The duo provide a mostly interesting and informative commentary with some entertaining stories, but there are some slow points. The duo do focus a bit too much at times on praise for those that they worked with, but thankfully do usually get back to talking about the production after a little while. The director often discusses her thoughts on filmmaking in general and goes into some of the specifics of "Caveman's Valentine", like casting, working with the actors, the story and giving the film its particular look. There's a bit of silence here and there during the track as well as quite a bit of the previously mentioned praise for those they worked with rather than information, but overall it's not a bad commentary and worth a listen for fans of the film.
Deleted Scenes: 4 lengthy, but unnecessary, deleted scenes are included. No optional commentary is included, so the exact reason for their absence remains unknown.
Also: Trailer (Dolby 2.0), production notes, cast/crew bios, recommendations.
Final Thoughts: "Caveman's Valentine" was an odd, but often compelling feature that usually kept my interest due to Samuel L. Jackson's performance. Universal's DVD provides very good image quality, but really exceptional audio quality. The audio is really effective in bringing the viewer into the character's situation and added greatly to the experience. There's also a few solid extra features. Worth a look as a rental.
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