DVD : The Pink Panther Film Collection (The Pink Panther / A Shot in the Dark / Strikes Again / Revenge of / Trail of)
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Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
Audience Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Binding: DVD
Brand: MGM STUDIOS
EAN: 9780792860129
Format: Anamorphic, Box set, Color, DVD-Video, Dolby, NTSC
ISBN: 0792860128
Label: MGM (Video & DVD)
Manufacturer: MGM (Video & DVD)
Number Of Items: 6
Publisher: MGM (Video & DVD)
Region Code: 1
Release Date: April 06, 2004
Running Time: 520 minutes
Sales Rank: 2839
Studio: MGM (Video & DVD)
Theatrical Release Date: June 23, 1964
Related Items:
Editorial Review:
Description:
Disc 1: THE PINK PANTHER Disc 2: REVENGE OF THE PINK PANTHER Disc 3: THE PINK PANTHER STRIKES AGAIN Disc 4: A SHOT IN THE DARK Disc 5: TRAIL OF THE PINK PANTHER Disc 6: BONUS DISC
Amazon.com essential video:
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
Average Rating: 
Rating:  -
Mankind is divided between those who love Pink Panther movies and those who think once you've seen one, you've seen 'em all. People in the first group talk about Peter Sellers' "comedic genius", and Inspector Clouseau being his ever lasting masterpiece. Me, I always saw a jaded comedian milking an overkilled cash cow he no longer found funny. Whether I'm wrong or not, depends on which camp you take sides with, but personally, I've had my share of Cato fights and French pseudo accents, thank you very much. Give me Pepe Le Pew instead. Anytime.
Having said that, and supposing you haven't picked your party yet, let's recap that Blake Edwards wanted to do a comedy caper much in the style of Alfred Hitchcock's endearing "To Catch a Thief", where Cary Grant played a debonaire burglar getting chased by a gorgeous girl in posh Monte Carlo. Based on Grant's character being known as "The Cat", and on the belief that pinkies up are thought to be sophisticated, Edwards titled his movie "The Pink Panther", a witty name that evoked class, sex, danger, and humor. Henry Mancini was signed to write the score, and with those four ideas in mind he came up with what probably is the best music theme in the history of cinema.
So catchy was this simple tune that Edwards thought of an animated credits sequence to underline it. The job went to Fritz Freleng, an artist who had recently gone freelance after the Golden Era of Warner Cartoons came to a close. The result was an animated ... Read More
Rating:  -
These DVD's are just like I imagined. They are great. They give you laugh after laugh. I would recommend them for every one, young or old.
Rating:  -
3 sets of dvds sent not 1 as requested
dvds advertised as uk compliant were north america compliant
$50 import duty had to be paid for wrong shipment
Rating: -
I had forgotten how funny these movies were and how marvelously inept and arrogant the inspector was. I think I laughed as hard at the chase scene in the Pink Panther as I did when I first saw it. I am sharing this collection with people who are not old enough to have seen them when they came out. They find them as hilarious as I do.
Rating:  -
I am going to toss trail of into some generic box and insert Return of the Pink in the case,THEN I will have a TRUE Pink Panther collection. Otherwise all the reviews are right about quality and the worth of the body of art.
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starring: David Niven, Peter Sellers, Elke Sommer, Herbert Lom, Robert Wagner
directed by: Blake Edwards, Carolyn F. Russell, Friz Freleng, Gerry Chiniquy, Hawley Pratt
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Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
Audience Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Binding: DVD
Brand: MGM STUDIOS
EAN: 9780792860129
Format: Anamorphic, Box set, Color, DVD-Video, Dolby, NTSC
ISBN: 0792860128
Label: MGM (Video & DVD)
Manufacturer: MGM (Video & DVD)
Number Of Items: 6
Publisher: MGM (Video & DVD)
Region Code: 1
Release Date: April 06, 2004
Running Time: 520 minutes
Sales Rank: 2839
Studio: MGM (Video & DVD)
Theatrical Release Date: June 23, 1964
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