Category: Comedies - Comedy Video - Feature Film-comedy - Gift Set - Movie
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DVD The Pink Panther Film Collection (The Pink Panther / A Shot in the Dark / Strikes Again / Revenge of / Trail)
Cue the Henry Mancini music and watch out for Cato--the gist of the Pink Panther series has been gathered in a six-disc boxed set. At the center of it is Peter Sellers's incarnation of inspector Jacques Clouseau, a hopelessly bumbling detective with a genius for resting his hands in the wrong place (on the surface of a spinning globe, for instance) and mangling the English language.
Writer-director Blake Edwards cast Peter Ustinov as Clouseau in The Pink Panther, but Ustinov dropped out just before shooting began. Edwards (who recounts this story in a spotty commentary track included here) and Sellers bonded over their affection for Laurel and Hardy, and immediately transformed the character of Clouseau into a walking sight gag. The first film has a delicious swinging sixties vibe, while jewel thief David Niven, Claudia Cardinale, and Capucine occupy as much screen time as Sellers. Sellers really hits his stride in A Shot in the Dark, an elegantly funny tale of Clouseau sleuthing out a murder investigation. This one introduced Herbert Lom, as the increasingly frazzled Inspector Dreyfus, and Burt Kwouk, as Clouseau's houseboy-nemesis Cato. Sellers and Edwards, whose relationship was stormy, put Clouseau aside for over 10 years, until a trilogy of mid-1970s comedies restored the character to commercial (and dare we say cultural) primacy.
Unfortunately, the very funny comeback picture, Return of the Pink Panther, is absent from this set due to rights issues with the studios involved. The Pink Panther Strikes Again has Dreyfus going bananas and targeting Clouseau; Revenge of the Pink Panther puts Clouseau in a hilarious series of disguises, climaxing in a wonderfully mounted sequence in Hong Kong. (Throughout the series, the calm, classical staging of gags by Blake Edwards reminds you of what a lost art this has become.) Trail of the Pink Panther looks better now than it did when originally released in 1982, shortly after Sellers's death; it's a batch of unused Sellers routines from previous pictures, strung together with a loose plot. In other words, it's a "deleted scenes" extra, and quite funny at times.
Subsequent efforts Curse of the Pink Panther and Son of the Pink Panther are neither included nor mentioned. A half-hour documentary gives pleasant memories from Edwards, but feels incomplete. The cartoon Panther gets his own 11-minute mini-doc, plus six cartoon shorts including the Oscar-winning "The Pink Phink." --Robert Horton
Review(s): DVD The Pink Panther Film Collection (The Pink Panther / A Shot in the Dark / Strikes Again / Revenge of / Trail)
do you have a rheume?
I have always loved these movies. That said, there was no way that I would pass up this set.
However, customers should be mindful of the fact that as mentioned many times before in reviews, Return of the Pink Panther is not included. It can be bought separately, though the picture quality on that is pretty bad. I hope that one day a remastered edition of that can be presented.
Some complain about the extras in this, and I admit they are few. This is where I must tell you that the European edition of this has more documentaries. EEEEYUP, we Americans are apparently not sophisticated enough to merit these extras!
These include the Unknown Seller, a vintage 1978 Special Thats Panthertainment, and some commercials that Peter Sellers made.
If you have the ability to get and watch them, it might be nice, but perhaps they will release these the next time there is a new wrinkle in technology!
Just be happy they didn't put the new Steve Martin Pink Panther in this!
A Classic Set of Classic Comedies
As many times as I've seen these films, I never get tired of them. Classic comedy never gets old, and Peter Sellers created one of the finest comic personas of all time with his Inspector Clouseu.
For those reviewers that lament the absence of "Return of the Pink Panther", it should be noted that "Return" was produced at Universal Studios, and could not be licensed for this MGM Set. It was not a purposeful omission.
This set has the best of the MGM Releases packaged in a terrific looking book (box?) The transfers are excellent. This set is well worth the money.
5 Classic Pink Panther films in one great collection!!! + extras!!!
What a great set of DVD's!!! This awesome collection includes 5 classic Pink Panther movies & a disc of extras,(including a documentary and some classic Pink Panther cartoons!)!!! All nicely put together in one cool package!!! Two thumbs up!!! Five Stars!!! A+
Related DVD's The Pink Panther Film Collection (The Pink Panther / A Shot in the Dark / Strikes Again / Revenge of / Trail)
Peter Sellers's third go-around as the prideful but bumbling Inspector Jacques Clouseau is funny enough, but this 1975 Blake Edwards revival of the Sellers-Clouseau connection is a little weak in comparison to predecessors The Pink Panther and A Shot in the Dark (both made in 1964). Costar Christopher Plummer actually gets some of the most interesting screen time as a retired cat burglar whom Clouseau accuses of getting back into the business. (If it sounds like there might be a To Catch a Thief vibe mixed in here, you're right.) Herbert Lom is hilarious as Clouseau's psychologically eroding boss, and Clouseau's ritualistic collisions with valet Cato (Burt Kwouk) are great examples of Edwards's delicious comic timing. --Tom KeoghMore Info about this DVD Director(s): Blake Edwards DVD Release Date: Released the 10 January 2006 Usually ships in 24 hours
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Though this film is a relatively minor one in the massive canon of Peter Sellers, it has moments of absolute hilarity. Written and directed by Blake Edwards, one of Sellers's most fertile collaborators, the film stars Sellers as a would-be actor from India (let them try to get away with that today) who is a walking disaster area. After ruining a day's shooting as an extra on a film, he finds himself unintentionally invited to a big Hollywood party. That's pretty much it as far as plot goes, but Edwards and Sellers know how to milk a simple idea for an unending string of slapstick gags. The result is a film that is episodic and sketchy, but also frequently loony in an inspired way. --Marshall FineMore Info about this DVD Actor(s): Peter Sellers Director(s): Blake Edwards DVD Release Date: Released the 11 December 2001 Usually ships in 24 hours
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One of the unforeseen (and hugely profitable) benefits of the first Pink Panther movie was the popularity of the cartoon cat from that film's classic credits sequence. Added on a hunch by director Blake Edwards and concocted by the DePatie-Freleng animation team, the slinky pink feline immediately spawned his own series of cartoons, first for theatrical release and later for television. The saga is gathered in The Pink Panther Classic Cartoon Collection, five discs of 124 cartoons, plus extras. This would have to be considered the ultimate such collection, and more than the average fan could handle in a few sittings (or a few dozen). But they're all here.
When United Artists commissioned David DePatie and Friz Freleng (whose new company was born from the... More Info about this DVD Director(s): Sid Marcus - Friz Freleng - Arthur Davis DVD Release Date: Released the 31 January 2006 Usually ships in 24 hours
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Thanks to an extraordinary, delicately balanced performance by Peter Sellers, Being There received mixed reviews during its theatrical release in 1979, but has since become a celebrated comedy with a loyal following. It's one of the most unusual black comedies ever made, simply because it stretches a simple premise over 130 minutes of straight-faced, strangely compelling commentary on politics, media, and celebrity in media-savvy America. Adapted by Jerzy Kozinsky from his own novel, the movie's about a simple-minded, middle-aged gardener who, after a lifetime of seclusion and safety in a Washington, D.C. townhouse, gets his first exposure to reality beyond the walls of his sheltered existence. His only reference to the world is through his childlike addiction to television, and... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Peter Sellers - Shirley MacLaine Director(s): Hal Ashby DVD Release Date: Released the 03 April 2001 Usually ships in 24 hours
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