The Movie

The Missionary is a slight but charming film, with a powerhouse cast and a "naughty but tasteful" attitude that never wears out its welcome. Michael Palin stars as the Reverend Charles Fortescue, a missionary who has returned to London from ten years working in Africa, only to find himself ordered by his Bishop to direct his evangelical energies towards London's "fallen women." Conflict ensues when many of the tawdry nightwalkers agree to Fortescue's particular brand of salvation, but only if accompanied by a night of charged ribaldry. Fortescue must also fend off the lustful advances of Lady Isabel Ames, played by Maggie Smith in a wonderfully understated performance that radiates both mannered gentility and unrestrained sexual aggression.

The film has several laugh out loud moments, but The Missionary is rather subtle and gentle. Palin has always been able to exude both bewilderment and bravado at the same time, and his performance as Reverend Fortescue centers the film around his warm, appealing performance. Palin also wrote the literate and witty screenplay which, combined with the ever luminescent Maggie Smith (whose engaging presence can make the worst movie ever made seem like Ikiru) and wonderful appearances by Denholm Elliot and Trevor Howard, makes The Missionary an enjoyable 87 minutes of movie-watching.

Unfortunately, MGM's bare-bones DVD release of the film cripples your enjoyment of The Missionary due to an ill-advised pan-and-scan transfer.

The DVD

Video:
Ah, those dreaded words that curve the spine: "Modified to fit your screen." As previously mentioned, MGM has released The Missionary as a full-frame, pan-and-scan hatchet job. The Missionary's original aspect ratio is 2.35:1, filmed on Panavision 35mm. Due to the cramped nature of the image composition on this transfer, I would venture to guess that this is a true pan-and-scan transfer and not open matte. Blown up to a 1.33:1 aspect ratio, the video is betrayed by excessive grain structure. Colors are reasonable and often strong, with warm, accurate flesh tones, deep blacks, and a vivd palette. Some outdoor scenes sport some spotty contrast levels, but this is an accurate representation of the original film (as well as drab, grey, lifeless and rainy London afternoons.) Shadow detail varies, from strong delineation to weak recession, throughout the film. But aside from a touch of edge-enhancement and some occasional speckling, wear, and debris on the print, the overall quality of the video is reasonably good -- if you can get past the MAR butchering.

Audio:
The Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtrack is acceptable but almost exclusively a mono presentation. There was some prevailing hiss throughout the film that detracted from the quality of the dialog. The soundstage lacks any discrete effects or spatiality whatsoever. LFE and surrounds are both non-existent. Orchestrations and ambient noise are well-delivered, but again confined within the limited boundaries of the center channel.

Extras:
The extras on this DVD include a host of trailers for other MGM discs, such as When Harry Met Sally and The Princess Bride, as well as a montage preview entitled MGM Means Great Movies.

Final Thoughts

While The Missionary is certainly a charming little film, it's a shame that MGM has released the film bare-bones and without any real supplements. Anchor Bay released a nice edition in Region 2 with a commentary track by Michael Palin and some other value-adding special features. On this release, even the film's original trailer is nowhere to be found. But even the lack of extras would be acceptable if the film featured a solid video transfer in it's original aspect ratio, but fans of the The Missionary will find themselves saddled with a pan-and-scan transfer which, while solid in quality, is still not an accurate representation of the movie. While the DVD sports a pretty cheap list price, in this instance you are getting less that what you paid for. True fans of the The Missionary are bound to be disappointed.