Review of What`s Eating Gilbert Grape

Introduction

Another day and another budget release from Prism. They seem to have cornered the market when it comes to budget releases. This one is an early film in the careers of Johnny Depp, Leonardo DiCaprio (hereafter known as the Sprout Faced Actor, a term coined by Lee and Herring in This Morning with Richard Not Judy) and Juliette Lewis.

The plot (what little there is) is outlined up above.

Video

A budget release gets a budget transfer, with a cropped full frame transfer on offer here. This is a cheap tactic, as other releases of the film have featured widescreen transfers (not always good ones though). There`s the usual dirt, dust and grain found on budget discs, and it just looks incredibly average, and only just better than VHS in some places. A shame, as there looks to be some good cinematography here that gets destroyed by a careless transfer.

Audio

A DD2.0 stereo soundtrack, which is just as unremarkable as the visuals. The sound is clear and crisp throughout, and there`s nothing wrong with it, it`s just rather unexciting.

Features

Nothing (a web link to Prism`s wholesale site doesn`t count).

Conclusion

Another day, another Prism budget title, but this one doesn`t rank as one of the better films. It`s a very dull story, and I never enjoy watching the Sprout Faced Actor, no matter how many plaudits this performance gained him. Johnny Depp is ok, but Juliette Lewis` character is an annoying hippy type straight from the sterotypes manual. And the whole thing is just slow, slow, slow.

When the film started out with a small town delivery boy making out with a frustrated housewife, I thought I was watching Romero`s Martin again by mistake. Sadly it wasn`t even as good as that bad film.

I was expecting a predictable and dull film, and boy did I get it, and then some. A below average film on an very average DVD. Not one to go hunting down.....