do you guys watch/listen to them? or usually skip them? if you like them, what are some of your favorites?

i LOVE dvd commentaries. my all-time favorites might surprise you. the big-name movie commentaries are usually less interesting, i think, the big actors kinda just repeat the promotional lines they regurgitate on their press junkets. right now i've got the terminator 3 commentary going, arnold gets a little tiresome after a while, but i love hearing the TX chick, just cuz she was so scary in that movie and it's cool to hear her talk like a normal human.

anyway...

it's great that sometimes people bring up awkward stuff, or if you have an obscure movie someone loved making or hated or whatever and is all tickled to revisit again. my all-time favorites are

1. director philip kaufman's commentary on the 1978 remake of "invasion of the body snatchers." he's really a fascinating dude and he uses the occasion to throw in a lot of political and cultural jabs, just talking about, yeah, you know, we're pretty much living in pod-land today. didn't you notice? if not, you may be one of them. it's really great. and i LOVE that movie, i've seen it a million times, and yet there were a bunch of things i missed. love it.

2. the director and a film-geek friend of his talking about a megaobscure cult movie from the early 70s called "last house on dead-end street." really gory, awful movie, i suggest only watching it with the commentary on, but i was very taken with the director and the fangoria or whatever guy who interviewed him just LOVED the movie so much some of that enthusiasm just has to rub off. and apparently he made last house for 1000 dollars while in a full-blown addiction to crystal meth. the movie was only notable because it has a sequence in it so violent and awful that people thought someone was actually killed in it. :o

3. the commentary for a, er, italian? spanish? no, spanish, i think, jess franco's "wanda the wicked warden." jess franco is an erotic-movie director from back in the day, did a bunch of softcore and women-in-prison type movies, wanda the wicked warden was supposed to be an ilsa movie but they couldn't get the rights to the name so they renamed her wanda at the last minute. anyway, on the commentary they have two of the women who performed in the movie and they adore jess franco, they think he's a total auteur and genius, and they do the commentary, inexplicably, with a random british guy who i guess thought he was doing commentary for "benji," or something? cuz for the whole movie he's completely SHOCKED and APPALLED and it plays off the women being all moved and blown away by the amazingness of seeing their wonderful movie again, it's really hilarious. and wince-inducing.

4. return from witch mountain. of course. ike and kim remember virtually nothing about the movie and so spend the whole commentary shagging on it MST3k style. love it. the john hough stuff is a little annoying though.

I like the ones with the actors talking to each other and nonchalantly adding things here and there about the production. I was listening to the Invader Zim DVD commentaries, those are entertaining. Actually, TV shows in general are fun to listen to the commentary for...

I like the ones with the actors talking to each other and nonchalantly adding things here and there about the production. I was listening to the Invader Zim DVD commentaries, those are entertaining. Actually, TV shows in general are fun to listen to the commentary for...
that actually reminds me that i like the space ghost: coast to coast commentaries a lot. they have one with joel hodgson (founder of MST3k) that i'm really fond of. it should really be on my list of my favorite commentaries, i think.

that actually reminds me that i like the space ghost: coast to coast commentaries a lot. they have one with joel hodgson (founder of MST3k) that i'm really fond of. it should really be on my list of my favorite commentaries, i think.


I haven't seen that show in a very long time. I should get ahold of the DVDs then, eh?

I haven't seen that show in a very long time. I should get ahold of the DVDs then, eh?
space ghost: coast to coast is effin' brilliant. four-star television. they like to have their retro actors come out and do interviews, you might notice, i would obviously give a minor digit to have kim and ike do a space ghost. it's one of my dreams. they'd be nice to kim like they were to dawn wells, and really mock ike like they did the professor. it'd be cool. it'd be good, and i think ike could deal, he'd bring it.

space ghost: coast to coast is effin' brilliant. four-star television. they like to have their retro actors come out and do interviews, you might notice, i would obviously give a minor digit to have kim and ike do a space ghost. it's one of my dreams. they'd be nice to kim like they were to dawn wells, and really mock ike like they did the professor. it'd be cool. it'd be good, and i think ike could deal, he'd bring it.


That was very confusing, but erm... yeah!

That was very confusing, but erm... yeah!
you have to see the space ghost with dawn wells aka mary ann from gilligans island. they totally kiss dawn wells' ass, shamelessly, cuz she's all beautiful and whatnot. whereas when the professor comes on, they really mess with him.

Everytime i buy a dvd of a movie i've already watched,i go straight for the commentary,in fact i think that's the coolest thing about dvd's :)

The best ones i can remember:

Fight Club - Brad Pitt is the butt of the joke here so that's always wonderful lol,and you got to love Ed Norton,his analysis of the movie is spot on.

From Dusk Til Dawn - Tarantino and Rodriguez together do the funniest commentary ever,too bad Quentin doest comment his own flicks

Boogie Nights - I'm pretty sure PTA,the director, is drunk during this one.

Resident Evil - Do you know who Michelle Rodriguez is? She's the funniest dvd commentor in the world

Swingers -  Skip the boring director commentary and go straight to Vince and Jon they're fun guys

Manhunter - Michael Mann gives us wonderful insights about every scene without being boring like other directors are

Brazil - Best example of how a commentary can be better than the movie itself.Terry is amazing!

Oh and every Pedro Almodovar movie,he gets all excited talking about his movies,he's so lovable and talented,plus you can never hear too much spanish lol

Yeah, I watch them, depending on the film though.