"Napoleon Dynamite" DVD Review
Title: "Napoleon Dynamite" ($19.99)
The place, Idaho. The name, Napoleon Dynamite. The plot, nonexistant, but who cares! Follow the exploits of Napoleon as he befriends a glamour shot queen, a presidential hopeful, and even shows off a few of his "skills" along the way through one of the most original indies ever.
Picture: Anamorphic Widescreen at 1:85:1, which I'm starting to dislike, frankly. Foolscreen transfer is on the flip-siiiiiide.
Sound: Napoleon gets the 5.1 Dolby dip, which is nice for the films great score and movie driven dialogue. No explosions to speak of. Spanglish speaking viewers get 2.0 Dolby Surround.
Features: Killer interface! The opening frame is of an old school television sat down on a brown velour couch. The main "menu" is of a school lunch tray, with assorted food, and the selections written in ketchup and mustard, lol. The other menu's share ideas used in the opening credits. Easy to navigate, it makes you hella hungry, though.
Extras: Not a bad extree stack for an indie. It includes "Peluca", a short film from 2002 which went on to be "Napoleon Dynamite" itself, about 5 deleted scenes, a Kip wedding documentary, still frames, and the original 8 MTV "3 Easy Steps.." TV spots. Director/Writer/Producer commentary is there as well, and always a plus. Soundtrack trailer and 2 movie trailers round out the discs extras.
The BAD part about it is that the extras are split up over the two sides, since it's a dreaded flipper. Blech.
OVERALL: "Napoleon Dynamite" was one of my favorite movies of 2004, an independent gem, and a riot most of the time. Typical transfer and sound offerings get a 8.0, extras are bountiful even if on two sides, recieving aother 8.0, and I absolutely love the actual movie, naturally, for an overall score of 8.5.
Fans of independent cinema will eat this up, but mainstream America will see Napoleon as one of the stupidest movie characters since "Dumb and Dumber".