The Kid Stays In The Picture DVD Review

The Kid Stays In A Picture traces the meteoric rise, fall and rise again of legendary Hollywood producer Robert Evans. Having successfully produced some superb films such as Francis Ford Coppola's The Godfather and Roman Polanski's Chinatown, Evans' career faltered in the early 1980s thanks to a cocaine bust and his rumoured involvement in the 'Cotton Club' murder.

In the early 1990s, the producer rallied again, as he secured the rights to The Saint and released Sliver. This documentary, adapted from his bestselling autobiography, chronicles his life, his loves (with the likes of Ali Macgraw) and friendships (with Jack Nicholson, Roman Polanski, Henry Kissinger and Dustin Hoffman). Evans actually narrates the 90 minute journey himself.

Critique

Tracing the rollercoaster career of Hollywood producer Robert Evans, The Kid Stays In The Picture is a fascinating documentary that will particularly appeal to film buffs. Narrated by the man himself and adapted from the autobiography of the same name, this non-fiction journey begins with Evans landing a surprise acting career on the East Coast. After a few roles, it became evident that his acting skills were almost non-existent and a career change was in order - Evans, or 'The Kid', decided that he wanted to turn his attention to running a studio and getting involved in off-camera activities.

Before long, he was a top executive at Paramount, which was the ninth biggest film studio at the time. After the emergence of a few disappointing projects, the Board of Directors stated that they were going to close the filmmaking company and terminate the production of all unfinished films. Evans put together a historic 20 minute appeal onto film and showed it to the Board in person - his desperate plea was successful and Paramount was allowed to continue operating on a probationary basis.

Over the next few years, the studio released massive hits, such as Love Story and The Godfather, which become worldwide money-makers, thus elevating Paramount from ninth to first in the studio league table. Deciding he wanted to do more hands-on producing himself, Evans set out to put together some films of his own. His first project was Chinatown, one of the finest films of all-time, while Marathon Man, starring Dustin Hoffman, followed soon after - it seemed that Evans' success was far from diminishing. However, Hollywood closed its door on The Kid after he was linked to a murder and exposed as a cocaine abuser, leaving him well and truly in the cold. Depressed and near-suicidal, Evans' life was on a drastic downwards U-turn and his fall was even speedier than his meteoric rise. Iit was only in the early 1990s when The Kid started to claw his life back inch by inch.

Directed by Nanette Burstein and Brett Morgen, this riveting tale will even be of interest to film fans who have never heard of Robert Evans before. The mix of archived footage, film clips and news reports is joined together excellently, while The Kid's narration is frank and very rarely evasive. Some of the anecdotes are particularly intriguing, such as the section devoted to The Godfather. Evans claims that Francis Ford Coppola's original cut of the film was quite short and it was only after the producer's stern protest that the epic was lengthened to the form we know it by today.

Furthermore, clips from the legendary appeal to Paramount's Board of Directors are included, along with tidbits of interesting information on Rosemary's Baby, which Evans got made with Roman Polanski in the director's chair. By the time of this documentary DVD's release, Evans had been married six times - five of the unions ended in divorce and the other was anulled - however, only his relationship with actress Ali McGraw is mentioned at length. Equally detailed information on the other five ladies may have not been relevant to the documentary, but some form of passing mention should have been inserted at the very least. As the documentary stands, the viewer is left with the false impression that Evans only married once.

The only significant flaw of the feature is perhaps the brevity of its ending - Evans has started to produce films again (although not as freqently and successfully as before) and his general return is not treated to a fitting level of detail. Even his fall from grace seems to rush past at times, leading to some slight disappointment. Overall, however, this is a fantastic look at one of Hollywood's legendary figures - watch the highs, lows, scandals and successes unfold in your living room.

8 out of 10

The Video

The video quality for titles like these is far less important than in the case of film discs. Presented in anamorphic widescreen, the documentary is made almost entirely out of film clips, news archive footage and photographs. The only significant items of newly-shot material are the ghostly yet beautiful camera moves around Evans' secluded home. This brand new footage looks great, exhibiting perfect black levels and vivid colour reproduction, while there is no print damage on display and sharpness levels are fine.

The remaining material looks as good as can be reasonably expected, with the image quality fluctuating wildly as the source material is switched. The photographs are, of course, the clearest, while the film clips finish a distant second. The worst looking portions are the archived news clips and interviews, which have obviously not been preserved very well over the years but are still clear enough.

As stated before, however, this is a documentary and all that matters is that the transfer is watchable - thankfully, this is indeed the case and the overall impression of the visuals is a good one.

8 out of 10

The Audio

As with the video quality, the only thing the soundtrack for a title like this needs to provide is clarity. There is no need for a Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack and the disc sticks with the expected Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo format - note that the Region 1 disc does actually feature a 5.1 stream. Evans' narration is crystal clear, while the original soundtracks of the various clips used are always intelligible. Overall, therefore, the disc delivers all it basically needs to in terms of sound quality.

8 out of 10

The Extras

Most documentaries are presented with no bonus material whatsoever, making the extras on this disc a nice surprise despite their modest quantity. Note that all the supplements are in 1.33:1 full-frame, unless otherwise stated, with Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo sound. Up first is the 2 minute US theatrical trailer, which is presented in non-anamorphic widescreen - someone who unwittingly stumbles across this could quite conceivably believe in places that it is an advert for a real film, the biopic of a powerful Hollywood producer.

The extras continue with a 10 minute reel of red carpet celebrity interviews on Evans. All of these appear to have been conducted at The 2003 Spirit Of Life Award ceremony celebrating the producer's career and are, obviously, very praising and positive. A few associates from The Kid's professional life can be seen here, along with his son, Director Brett Ratner and Matthew McConaughey. There's nothing new to learn about Evans himself and these bite-sized interview snippets turn out to be quite hollow in the end.

The next bonus material item, the 7 minute Evans gag reel, is a true gem. This incredibly rare (non-anamorphic widescreen) montage is the complete collection of outtakes from 1976's Marathon Man where Dustin Hoffman hilariously improvises a handful of scenes in the style of The Kid. Hoffman comes up with some totally random yet amusing lines and the longest outtake is actually shown during the end credits of the documentary itself. This final blooper is more poignant than Hoffman could have ever imagined at the time, since in it, the actor pretends that Evans becomes washed up and suicidal over the next 20 years.

Up next are 4 lengthy 'The Truth According To Bob' clips, which clock up another 37 minutes of viewing in total. The first clip, 'The Film That Saved Paramount', is the famous plea to the studio's board of directors mentioned in the documentary. Running at 8 minutes, this is the original footage in non-anamorphic widescreen, although the actual film clips that Evans mentions have been removed and replaced by title cards with a few seconds of audio commentary from the man himself. This historical piece of footage was a thoughtful addition to the disc.

The second clip, 'The Kid Stays On The Red Carpet', runs for only a minute and sees the producer share a few forgettable thoughts with the camera during The 2003 Spirit Of Life Award ceremony. The third item in this section, labelled 'Receiving The Spirit Of Life Award', is thankfully much more substantial over its 15 minute course. Famous US television personality Larry King presents the award to Evans, who tearfully recounts an encounter that he had with King a fair while back that affected his life profoundly. The producer talks about how he had recently found true love and got married (for the sixth time in his life) - sadly, he filed for another divorce not too long afterwards.

The fourth clip, 'Receiving The Lifetime Achievement Award', is 13 minutes long and Evans' old pal Dustin Hoffman is the accolade presenter this time round. Hoffman is incredibly charming and funny as he shares a lengthy memory of The Kid with the audience before handing over the award. On a final note, the menus are animated and accompanied by background sound in Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo.

Overall, this collection of extras is extensive compared to most documentary titles, although hardly immense by any standards. The Dustin Hoffman gag reel and Evans' appeal to the board of directors are the two most important, historic items here and very interesting, but the remainder is certainly not amazing. The most disappointment perhaps comes from the fact that the US Region 1 disc also features an audio commentary for the documentary by the two directors (Nanette Burstein and Brett Morgen), along with a few other featurettes.