Review of Clue: The Movie

Introduction

Next to Monopoly, Cluedo is one of the best-known board games in the world. It is a format that has lead to at least two tv game shows and this - the movie. The title is the US, Parker Brothers name for the game. Paramount Pictures made "Clue" in 1985. Written and directed by Jonathan Lynn (creator of Yes, Minister) from a storyline Lynn co-wrote with John Landis, the storyline bulks out the characters and situations of the board game. They`re all there - Col. Mustard (Martin Mull), Mrs Peacock (Eileen Brennan), Miss Scarlet (Lesley Ann Warren), Mrs White (Madeline Kahn), Professor Plum (Christopher Lloyd) and Mr Green (Michael McKean). With butler Wadsworth (Rocky Horror`s Tim Curry), Yvette the maid (Colleen Camp) and Mr Boddy (Lee Ving), the scene is set for murder.

The movie is, of course, played for laughs and the quick-fire insanity of some of the lines bears repeated watching. Watch this alongside "Murder By Death" and you have a perfect evening in.

In its original theatrical release, there were three different last reels which provided different endings to the movie. The home video version incorporated the three different endings, presenting them one after another. The DVD release offers the option to do either.

Video

"Clue" comes in an anamorphic widescreen 1.85:1 transfer. The previous home video version of "Clue" suffered from being a 4:3 open matte presentation. As with many features made for 1.85:1 widescreen presentation, the image projected on the theatre screen is extracted from the middle of a 4:3 frame. Now, depending on the cinematographer and the crew, varying amounts of care is taken about the area outside the 1.85:1 extraction area and frequently boom mikes, camera marks and even crew members are inadvertently captured on film. For showing in the cinema, this doesn`t matter, but when transferring movies to home video, some bright spark realised back in the 1980s there was no need to pan and scan open matte features as the entire exposed frame could be transferred. "Clue" had a home video release with a higher than average incidence of intrusions into frame - all of which have been eliminated in this DVD release. The picture is a little grainy (typical of mid 1980s cinematography), but colours and contrast are a huge improvement on the old home video version.

Audio

Surprisingly for 1985, "Clue" had a bog-standard mono soundtrack, which is reproduced here in Dolby 2.0 Mono in both English and French.

Features

Paramount has never been generous with extras on its back-catalogue titles. There are, thankfully, full subtitles on the feature and an original theatrical trailer. The disc also boasts an option to watch the movie either with all three endings (as per the home video release) or as the theatrical version with a random selection of one of the endings.

Conclusion

I`ve always enjoyed this movie, but the sloppy technical appearance of the home video version always disappointed me. This DVD version redresses the balance by showing the movie the way it was supposed to be shown. Reframed, you don`t miss anything happening onscreen, and you lose the nasty little technical faults that were so noticeable on the 4:3 version. The characterisations in the film are simply wonderful - not least Eileen Brennan`s stream-of-consciousness conversation over dinner. Christopher Lloyd turns in a subdued performance with hidden depths and Madeline Kahn`s subtly psychotic Mrs White is a delight. Like I said, watch this and "Murder By Death" and have a killer evening.