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Christmas Memory (A) AKA Truman Capotes A Christma's Memory (TV)
R1 - America - Genius Products Review written by and copyright: Pat Pilon (24th December 2007). |
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The Film
 I'm a big fan of 'The Simpsons' and about five minutes in this movie, I was reminded of something from that show. In the 'Rear Window' spoof episode, Bart, to pass the time, writes a play. He then reads the play to torture Lisa to make her do something. This movie reminds me of the play Bart wrote. This is only because the movie takes a while to start, and the first 20 minutes or so is spent with characters that aren't the focus of the movie. The focus is the relationship between a young boy (Eric Lloyd) who's wiser than his years and an old woman (Patty Duke) who's not as wise as her years may indicate. The pair gets into all sorts of trouble but because it's Christmas time they decide to spend all their money to make fruitcakes for everybody. Soon after making their cakes, they get into more trouble. At the same time, Buddy, the boy, meets a girl, and the two form a friendship. Well, as it is, the old lady, Sook, by the way, and Buddy can't stay together forever and at the risk of spoiling the movie, I won't go into further details. The movie is pretty cute and though it doesn't pose any big questions it does explore the psychology of a few characters. It's pretty simple and they have to get over themselves, but it's not harmful or overly dramatic at any time during the movie. The characters are clear-cut and you can guess what's going to happen at any one time. The plot moves at a nice pace and seeing the two main characters interact is pretty fun (despite the boy's on-again, off-again southern accent). Nothing is very surprising but it's an enjoyable movie, if a bit light. There's nothing bad about it and if you don't know what other Christmas television movie to watch, then this one is a nice choice.
Video
1.33:1 full screen. This television movie is from 1997 but it looks older. The picture is incredibly soft and the black level is not very good. The scenes in the bar/speakeasy are quite weak, and the palette, which concentrates on earth tones, has been reproduced better on other discs. The contrast is a little flat. The print does have some small specks and scratches but the print was probably that way when the movie originally aired. There also isn’t any problem with the compression.
Audio
The movie comes with an English Dolby Digital 2.0 stereo track. Unfortunately, the track doesn’t seem to have been cleaned up as much as it could have. There’s no hissing or popping, but the track is kind of thin. Dialogue gets a little bit squeaky and a slightly screechy at times. The score is soft, and so sounds nice enough. The range is pretty limited, but then again, the movie never really has big range. It’s an adequate track, but I’m guessing the original elements have probably deteriorated a little. There are no subtitles.
Extras
No extras whatsoever here, not even a start-up trailer.
Overall
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