THE OH, GOD! COLLECTION: Blu-ray (Warner Bros. 1977-84) Shout! Factory
In his emeritus years, aged comedian, George Burns’ reputation
as a cynical bon vivant came roaring back to life, creating a groundswell of
interest in a career spanning all the way back to the early days of Vaudeville.
As part of the ever-popular Burns and Allen (the other half ‘literally’ filled
by Burns’ ‘other half’ – wife, Gracie Allen), George Burns had enjoyed a
sort of enviable notoriety on stage, screen, radio and television, suddenly to
slip into near oblivion after Allen’s death from a heart attack in 1964, age 69.
Stepping behind the camera, Burns turned to producing television specials for
other stars, but kept his hand in the act, doing stand-up in the nightclub
circuits, to culminate with a sold-out performance at Carnegie Hall where he
literally stopped the show to thunderous applause. By 1975, Burns was back in
the movies too, as one half of the cantankerous duo in Neil Simon’s The
Sunshine Boys, his first picture in 36 years! The project had been
conceived as a ‘reunion’ of sorts opposite Burns’ old pal, Jack Benny. But when
Benny fell ill and then unexpectedly died of pancreatic cancer, Burns was
inconsolable. Only 6 weeks earlier,
Burns had undergone triple bypass. Aware of the great duress under which the
picture was made, and even more miraculous, of the rumored pre-release ‘ease’
with which Burns gave a seemingly flawless performance, the public flocked to
see The Sunshine Boys, making it a smashing success. Better still, AMPAS
bestowed a Best Supporting Actor Oscar on Burns, cementing his place as an
irrefutable pop icon and entertainment institution who had weathered the storm
of the ‘new’ Hollywood to emerge more bankable than ever.
And although Burns was hot, he would not resurface on
the screen again until nearly 2 years later, and again, in another smash hit. On
the surface, director, Carl Reiner’s Judeo-Christian dramedy, Oh God!
(1977) may seem like an odd duck, what with an avuncular Burns delivering
several lengthy, and oft sobering monologues as only George Burns can –
virtually, none of them preaching to the choir. “Why is it so hard for you
to believe?”, Burns’ God questions during the penultimate courtroom drama
to exonerate a good man of the inference his reverence for spreading the gospel
is a sign of madness…or worse. “Is my physical existence any more improbable
than your own? What about all that hoo-ha with the devil a while ago from that
movie? Nobody had any problem believing that the devil took over and existed in
a little girl. All she had to do was wet the rug, throw up some pea soup and
everybody believed. The devil you could believe, but not God? I work in my own
way. I don't get inside little children. They got enough to do just being
themselves. Also, I'm not about to go around to every person in the world and
say, 'Look it's me, I wanna talk to you.' So, I picked one man. One very good
man. I told him God lives. I live. He had trouble believing too, in the beginning.
I understood. I'm not sure how this whole miracle business started, the idea
that anything connected with me has to be a miracle. Personally, I'm sorry that
it did. Makes the distance between us even greater.” And, in an era in the American picture-making
biz when religious-themed movies had all but fallen hopelessly out of favor, to
find a simply-themed, modestly budgeted potboiler like Oh God! ringing registers
around the world, to eventually earn a whopping $51,061,196, making it the 6th-highest
grossing picture of the year, even briefly to break Star Wars’ 15-week
stride as the #1 box office draw in the land was, undeniably, an accomplishment,
addressing directly the world-weary cynicism of 70’s pop culture otherwise to
have permeated all the popular entertainments of its day.
Screenwriter, Larry Gelbart’s original concept was to
cast Mel Brooks as God and Woody Allen as the man chosen to spread the ‘good
word’ to the world. Instead, Burns came to the role almost as an afterthought,
with Reiner stocking the picture’s backdrop full of easily identifiable names
and faces, some – like Donald Pleasence – alas, given precious little to do.
Indeed, the fourth-billed Pleasance, as theologian, Dr. Harmon, had initially
been given a considerable part to play. Alas, in the final edit, this was left
on the cutting room floor with Gelbart later revealing he could not look the
actor in the face sincerely thereafter when running into him at social events. Director,
Reiner, whose career by 1974 needed no introduction, could not resist the urge
to cast himself – as himself, appearing as a guest on The Dinah Shore Show.
Hollywood stalwarts, Ralph Bellamy, William Daniels and Barry Sullivan had
their bits to play too as attorney, Sam Raven, supermarket chain manager,
George Summers, and a cautiously skeptical, Bishop Reardon respectively. As for
the ‘other’ lead in the picture, supermarket manager, Jerry Landers, Reiner
went with the unlikely choice of Henry John Deutschendorf Jr., better known to
the world as folksinger, John Denver. Compared to his costars, Denver’s career
was practically fledgling, having risen through the ranks of pop music since
the mid-1960’s to become one of most beloved and best-selling acoustic artists
of the decade. By 1977, this legacy was irrefutable. But Denver’s movie-career
was non-existent. Yet, despite his lack of exposure as a film star, Denver
proved precisely the right bit of casting here, able to convey Jerry’s
ambivalence towards his eventual acceptance of God as God, in the
embodiment of Burns’ aged garden gnome, full of advice and vigor from the neck
up.
It is one of the picture’s curiosities that Denver,
not exactly a paragon of the masculine form, spends a good deal of Oh, God!
naked from the waste up, showing off a rather anemic body, even to converse
with the ‘All Mighty’ handing him a much-needed towel as he emerges soaking wet
from the shower. Jerry’s other half, ‘Bobbie’ is played by Teri Garr, whose
acting resume until then included an episode of TV’s Star Trek, a bit
part in Coppola’s The Conversation and a major supporting role in Mel
Brooks’ Young Frankenstein (both in 1974). In 1977, she had another opportunity
to shine in Steven Spielberg’s ensemble alien epic, Close Encounters of the
Third Kind, as the harried wife of a man obsessed with recreating Wyoming’s
Devils Tower in their living room. The character of ‘Bobbie’ in Oh God! is
undeniably a variation on this theme, and Garr, although competent, is never
really allowed much opportunity to stretch her creativity in the part beyond a
chronic expression of faux anxiety, eventually to give way to a better
understanding of Jerry’s newfound passion for the gospel.
The title, Oh, God! is considered blasphemous
by some. But otherwise, the movie gingerly skirts around offending believers of
the faith, chiefly, as Burns’ God is subtly coaxed into the pseudo-reality of
the piece after an absence of nearly 30 minutes, or roughly, one-third of the
picture’s total run time. Until then, we meet the Landers, Jerry, Bobbie and
their two children, Adam (Moosie Drier) and Becky (Rachel Longaker). In this depiction
of middle-class morality, the Landers are a pretty wholesome lot. Jerry is a
rising assistant supermarket manager with little to complain about until he
receives a rather cryptic note in the mail, instructing him to attend an ‘interview’
with God on the 27th floor of a local office building. Naturally,
Jerry assumes the ‘invite’ to be a colossal gag. But when the note he tries to
toss away several times keeps turning up as a reminder of his appointment,
Jerry reluctantly keeps this rendezvous, only to discover the office building
in question has 17 floors. Nevertheless, when the elevator stops, Jerry has
indeed arrived on the 27th floor, ushered into an all-white and
sparsely decorated suite where God speaks to him via the intercom.
Instructed to spread the gospel as a modern-age Moses,
Jerry reluctantly makes his first attempt to convince L.A. Times religious
editor, Briggs (George Furth) of the legitimacy of the calling card given to
him by God. Briggs, alas, does not take Jerry seriously. Even more
disheartening, however, is the complete lack of faith exhibited by Jerry’s own
wife and children. Bobbie is initially reticent to downright dismissive of her
husband’s claim, while Adam and Becky exhibit abject shame at even allowing
Jerry to pick them up from school in the presence of their friends. But before
long, Jerry’s story gains momentum and notoriety. Reporters and religious zealots
picket his front lawn and The Dinah Shore Show telephones to program him as a
guest. On television, Jerry commits to a
police sketch artist, who produces a likeness of God for all the world to see. Regrettably,
Jerry’s newfound fame is an anathema to his boss, Mr. McCarthy (David Ogden
Stiers) and their superior, George Summers, who threatens Jerry with dismissal.
Even the ecclesiastics are cynical about Jerry’s revelation, particularly
pompous TV evangelist, Willie Williams (Paul Sorvino) whom God wishes would
simply ‘shut up’. To prove he can converse with the Almighty, Bishop Reardon
presents Jerry with a list of questions, transcribed in Aramaic to ask God on
his next visitation. The panel of priests further sequester Jerry in a hotel
suite where he will be unable to ask for outside help to reply to this query.
God reappears, this time as the hotel’s room service,
and proceeds to fill out the questionnaire on Jerry’s behalf. Even so, Willie
Williams files a lawsuit to discredit Jerry. The matter is taken to the court
of Judge Baker (Barnard Hughes). Pressed to the point of breaking under
pressure, Jerry is given the ultimate reprieve when God makes his presence
known to everyone present in the courtroom and speaks on Jerry’s behalf. God
questions the times in which we live, suggesting the age of miracles is the
only way He can prove He is who He says He is. God performs a routine card
trick for the Judge, but then causes the cards to miraculously disappear, then
reappear. “If it pleases the court, and even if it doesn’t, please the
court, I'm God, your honor.” After exonerating Jerry of the charge of
fraud, God departs the witness stand, disappearing in mid-stride as the courtroom
falls silent. His disembodied voice provides one final appeal on humanity’s
behalf, “It can work. If you find it hard to believe in Me, maybe it will
help to know that I believe in you!” Unable to explain away what has only just occurred,
Judge Baker dismisses the charges. Regrettably, this does not help Jerry keep
his job. Left strangely elated and yet simultaneously disheartened, Jerry is
afforded one final audience with God who explains, “Lose a job, save the
world.” As to Jerry’s inquiry about what he should do when again he needs
God’s inspiration, God replies, “I'll tell you what. You talk. I'll listen”
before departing for good.
Oh, God! was a titanic
hit, practically guaranteeing a sequel. Regrettably, Oh, God! Book II
(1980), proved a fairly tepid successor. This time directed by Gilbert Cates, as
scripted by a small host of screenwriters to include Josh Greenfeld, Hal
Goldman, Fred S. Fox, Seaman Jacobs and Melissa Miller, the premise of the
Divine Creator visiting a young school girl, Tracy Richards (Louanna Sirota),
whose parents, Paula (Suzanne Pleshette) and Don (David Birney) have separated,
fell into virtually every dramatic pitfall and religious cliché the original
movie had so skillfully avoided. Under Cates’ direction, Book II quickly
unravels into a rather bizarrely cruel investigation of young Tracy’s sanity –
under siege from a militant psychiatrist, Dr. Jerome Newell (Anthony Holland)
after she organizes the children of her school to help spread the word of God with
decorative posters plastered all over town. In reply, the principal (Conrad
Janis) suspends Tracy from school while Newell subjects her to a barrage of
medical tests before desiring to have her permanently committed to a sanitarium
with Paula and Don’s complicity. Young Tracy, however, is not without means and
eventually runs away with God’s help. As in the first movie, Book II
culminates in a convening of the ‘experts’ who only think they know better under
Newell’s guidance to deliberate on Tracy’s future. God appears and performs
several ‘magician-like’ miracles (e.g., placing his name on the roster of ‘experts’
to discuss Tracy’s sanity, and, making the chandelier overhead momentarily
disappear while all are in observance). Don and Paula, who have since
reconciled as a united front on Tracy’s behalf, elect to take her home. And, as
before, God offers his diminutive emissary some parting words of wisdom before vanishing
for good.
Oh, God! Book II is so woefully
a desperate copycat of the original movie, but with very few highlights to
recommend it, that it remains a small wonder George Burns was invited yet again
to assume the role of the Almighty for one final outing, Oh, God, You Devil
(1984). This time, however, the results are infinitely more satisfying, with
Burns playing God and Satan, rechristened herein as aged hard rock agent, Harry
O. Tophet. A prologue set in 1960
introduces us to Bobby Shelton (Ian Michael Giatti as a six-year-old boy, and,
Ted Wass as his adult counterpart). As a child, Bobby is spared from a virulent
bout of the flu after his father prays over him. Fast forward into the present,
and Bobby – now wed to Wendy (Roxanne Hart) is a failed musician whose current
agent, Charlie Grey (Eugene Roche) cannot set up his client for anything more
substantial than wedding gigs for Hollywood’s hoi poloi. Desperate for a better
life and opportunities to succeed, in a moment of weakness, Bobby declares he
would sell his soul to the devil for a chance at fame and fortune. This plea
is, alas, heard by Harry Tophet who is, at present, wrecking the Florida coast
with a powerful hurricane. Tophet conjures up pop superstar, Billy Wayne (Robert
Desiderio), whose seven-year contract with him is due to expire.
After Grey fails to bring about a successful interview
with wily record producer, Gary Frantz (Ron Silver), Tophet gets Bobby to dump
his agent and then, presents Bobby to Gary as Billy Wayne, whose status needs
no introduction. Frantz is elated. But Bobby soon discovers, in order to
assuage into his new life, he has to give up the one he once had with Wendy –
the woman he truly loves. Indeed, Tophet has already re-cast Billy as Bobby. A
scene in which Bobby witnesses Billy with Wendy at their favorite restaurant,
she pregnant with their first child, is heartbreaking. Meanwhile, Bobby – as Billy
– rises to new heights as a legendary pop star, even as he sinks to the boozin’/ballin’
temptations of his newfound celebrity. Eventually, Bobby realizes he cannot go
on, even as his contract with the devil stipulates an undisclosed period of
prosperity. Bobby now pleads for God’s guidance to release him from his
contractual obligations. In reply, God appears at the casino where Tophet is
overseeing what he plans to be Bobby’s last concert tour. Instead, God barters
with the devil for Bobby’s soul over a game of poker. Having won the hand, God
reclaims Bobby’s soul. Tophet retires and Bobby awakens from his nightmare in
Wendy’s arms, realizing the life he had was precisely the one he so deserved.
Shout! Factory’s Blu-ray release of the Oh, God!
trilogy will be cause enough for some to rejoice. The 1080p transfers here are
supplied by Warner Home Video, and this alone ought to have pegged them as a
quality affair. For the most part, WB has maintained their usual high standards
in remastering, though, alas – and rather curiously – not without a few caveats
to be discussed herein. For kick-starters, those who love the first movie will
be very pleased to learn it comes across here with a solid video/audio
presentation, surely not to disappoint. Colors, while appropriately dated in a
late-70’s palette, do not suffer from untoward digital tinkering and/or fading.
Flesh tones can occasionally lean ever so slightly towards a ruddy orange bias,
likely in keeping with cinematographer, Victor J. Kemper’s natural lighting.
The rudimentary photography for the first two movies, the first sequel shot by
Ralph Woolsey, is basic TV movie-of-the-week quality. There is no ‘style’ here,
per say, other than to competently frame the action taking place without
cutting off heads. For Oh God! You Devil, the honors went to cinematographer,
King Baggot, who rather appropriately tries to liven up the rock n’ roll
sequences with a high key-lit ‘concert tour-esque’ flair that adds immense authenticity. The rest of the scenes, however, fall back on
a mid-80’s vibe for the television sitcom.
Oh, God! Book II is where Warner’s
mastering efforts come under scrutiny. The original movie, either due to
budgetary constraints, or perhaps, more wisely, because director, Carl Reiner
simply realized, such trickery was unnecessary, sparingly used optical effects
to make Burns’ God disappear and reappear. Opticals of the day, it should be
noted, could be counted upon to significantly downgrade image quality, in
tandem to amplify grain and diminish color fidelity. There are also instances
where rear projection is glaringly obvious. Personally, I find this latter
shortcoming a ‘quaint’ throwback to an era in picture-making when SFX were
almost considered an ‘afterthought’ rather than the whole shebang for making a
movie in the first place. In the original movie, these limitations are actually
concealed and the overall consistency in the video presentation is admirable.
Not so much on the first sequel, as these trick photographic effects create unanticipated
anomalies, exacerbated in this new mastering effort. The problems here begin
during the scene where young Tracy awaits her parents in Dr. Newell’s outer
office. The optical effect that allows Burns’ God to suddenly appear at her
side are riddled in age-related dirt, with film grain suddenly exploding into
an ugly, muddy digital mess and color fidelity plummeting to a thoroughly
washed out and anemic level. But much worse, the telecine scanner here has
misinterpreted the SFX and the added grain as something to be either digitally
removed or sharpened. Hence, the subsequent sequence in Dr. Newell’s office
with Tracy’s parents, containing no SFX, is riddled in edge effects, with image
instability and telecine wobble creating some harsh and digitally ugly halos
around virtually any hard horizontal or vertical surface. This inexplicable
degeneration of the image continues for several scenes thereafter. These scenes
also contain no SFX, so the downgrade in image quality is not only perplexing,
but exceptionally distracting.
Overall, image quality is the most refined on the last
movie in this franchise, Oh, God! You Devil. Owing to improved film
stocks and its ever-so-slightly younger vintage, Burns’ swan song as God and
his counterpoint looks pretty spiffy, sporting an appropriately dated vintage
80’s palette. Contrast is excellent and film grain is kept appropriately in
check. There are only a handful of SFX
shots in the picture, most to allow Burns to interact with himself as both God
and the devil during the penultimate poker match for Bobby Shelton’s soul. The
split screen use, apart from ever so slightly amplifying film grain with a
modest downgrade in overall color fidelity and saturation, is otherwise well
concealed. The audio on all 3 movies is a big fat 1.0 DTS mono. It works well
enough for these dialogue-driven kitchen dramas and is free of age-related hiss
and pop. Extras are pretty anemic for a Shout! Select release. We get 3 audio
commentaries, one for each movie by critic/theologian, Dr. Donna Bowman, and an
additional commentary on the original movie recorded for its DVD release,
costarring Carl Reiner, Larry Gelbart, Teri Garr and producer, Jerry Weintraub.
Bowman offers some good insight. There are also vintage TV appearances by
Reiner, John Denver, George Burns and Teri Garr, and theatrical trailers for
all three movies. Bottom line: the Oh, God! trilogy is basically one
good movie – the original – with one lackluster, and another so-so sequel
bringing up the rear. Are these worth your time? While I thoroughly enjoyed the
original movie, I can’t say I’ll ever be revisiting either of its latter-day
reprises. The second movie is too sappy and silly for my tastes, while the
third is curiously dark, with Burns’ God only making a guest appearance, mostly
in service to defeat the devil, whom Burns also plays with gusto for the bulk
of that picture’s run time. The Blu-rays of movies 1 and 3 are competently
rendered. Part 2 is a mastering mess. Judge and buy accordingly.
FILM RATING (out of 5 – 5 being the
best)
Oh, God! – 4
Oh, God! Book II – 1.5
Oh, God! You Devil – 3
VIDEO/AUDIO
Parts 1 and 3 – 3.5
Part 2 – 2.5
EXTRAS
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