Rachel Getting Married [Blu-ray]

MOVIE DESCRIPTION:

Lingering tensions clash with new hopes in director Jonathan Demme's ensemble drama set during an idyllic wedding that threatens to descend into chaos with the appearance of the bride's estranged sister -- a volatile and unpredictable girl whose turbulent history of personal crisis and family conflict quickly threatens to take precedence over the happy ceremony. Rachel Buchman (Rosemarie DeWitt) is about to be married to the love of her life, but while the weather outside may be perfect, there's a storm blowing in. That storm goes by the name Kym (Anne Hathaway). Kym is the family black sheep, and wherever she goes disaster is sure to follow. Now, as friends and family gather together for a memorable day of dining, dancing, and celebration, everyone braces themselves knowing that, at any given moment, old skeletons may be dragged out and dusted off for display by the bombshell who seems to have an acerbic one-liner for every situation, and a flare for drama that could set their family home ablaze. Bill Irwin and Debra Winger co-star. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

DVD FEATURES:

• Number of Discs: 1
• Screen: Color
• Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1 (Theatre Wide Screen)
• Audio: Dolby TrueHD
• Features:
  • Deleted Scenes
  • Filmmaker and Cast Commentaries
  • Cast & Crew Q & A
  • A Look behind the scenes of Rachel Getting Married
  • The Wedding Band

AWARDS

• Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences

•     Nominated Best Actress - 2008 (Anne Hathaway)

• Alliance of Women Film Journalists

•     Won Best Ensemble - 2008
•     Won Best Woman Screenwriter - 2008 (Jenny Lumet)

• Austin Film Critics

•     Won Best Actor - 2008 (Anne Hathaway)

• Broadcast Film Critics Association

•     Won Best Actress - 2008 (Anne Hathaway)
•     Nominated Best Acting Ensemble - 2008

• Chicago Film Critics Association

•     Won Best Actress - 2008 (Anne Hathaway)
•     Nominated Best Original Screenplay - 2008 (Jenny Lumet)
•     Nominated Best Supporting Actor - 2008 (Bill Irwin)
•     Nominated Best Supporting Actress - 2008 (Rosemarie DeWitt)

• Dallas/Fort Worth Film Critics Association

•     Won Best Actress - 2008 (Anne Hathaway)

• Detroit Film Critics Society

•     Nominated Best Actress - 2008 (Anne Hathaway)
•     Nominated Best Ensemble - 2008
•     Nominated Best Newcomer - 2008 (Rosemarie DeWitt)
•     Nominated Best Supporting Actress - 2008 (Rosemarie DeWitt)

• Hollywood Foreign Press Association

•     Nominated Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture - Drama - 2008 (Anne Hathaway)

• Houston Film Critics

•     Won Best Actress - 2008 (Anne Hathaway)

• Independent Spirit Awards

•     Nominated Best Actress - 2008 (Anne Hathaway)
•     Nominated Best Director - 2008 (Jonathan Demme)
•     Nominated Best First Screenplay - 2008 (Jenny Lumet)
•     Nominated Best Picture - 2008 (Jonathan Demme, Neda Armian, Marc E. Platt)
•     Nominated Best Supporting Actress - 2008 (Debra Winger, Rosemarie DeWitt)

• London Film Critics Association

•     Nominated Best Actress - 2008 (Anne Hathaway)

• London Film Festival

•     Film Presented - 2008

• National Board of Review

•     Won Best Actress - 2008 (Anne Hathaway)
•     Won Best Independent Film - 2008

• New York Film Critics Circle

•     Won Best Screenplay - 2008 (Jenny Lumet)

• New York Film Critics Online

•     Nominated Best Picture - 2008

• Rotterdam International Film Festival

•     Film Presented - 2009

• Screen Actors Guild

•     Nominated Best Actress - 2008 (Anne Hathaway)

• Southeastern Film Critics Association

•     Won Best Actress - 2008 (Anne Hathaway)

• Toronto Film Critics Association

•     Won Best Director - 2008 (Jonathan Demme)
•     Won Best Screenplay - 2008 (Jenny Lumet)
•     Won Best Supporting Actress - 2008 (Rosemarie DeWitt)

• Toronto International Film Festival

•     Film Presented - 2008

• Utah Film Critics

•     Won Best Screenplay - 2008 (Jenny Lumet)
•     Won Best Supporting Actress - 2008 (Rosemarie DeWitt)
•     Nominated Best Actress - 2008 (Anne Hathaway)
•     Nominated Best Picture - 2008

• Vancouver Film Critics

•     Won Best Supporting Actress - 2008 (Rosemarie DeWitt)

• Venice International Film Festival

•     Film Presented - 2008

• Washington D.C. Film Critics Association

•     Won Best Original Screenplay - 2008 (Jenny Lumet)
•     Won Best Supporting Actress - 2008 (Rosemarie DeWitt)

• Women Film Critics Circle

•     Won Best Screenplay - 2008 (Jenny Lumet)

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:

• Cast:

  
       Anne Hathaway - Kym Buchman
       Rosemarie DeWitt - Rachel Buchman
       Bill Irwin - Paul Buchman
       Tunde Adebimpe - Sidney Williams
       Debra Winger - Abby
       Mather Zickel - Kieran
       Anna Deavere Smith - Carol
       Anisa George - Emma
       Jerome LePage - Andrew
       Victoria Haynes - Bridesmaid
       Beau Sia - Wedding Czar
       Annaleigh Ashford - Quick Stop Cashier

• Director:

  Jonathan Demme

• Producer:

  Jonathan Demme, Marc E. Platt, Neda Armian

• Screenwriter:

  Jenny Lumet

• Cinematographer:

  Declan Quinn

• Composer (Music Score):

  Zafer Tawil, Donald Harrison Jr.

• Musical Direction/Supervision:

  Innbo Shim

• Editor:

  Tim Squyres

• Production Designer:

  Ford Wheeler

• Art Director:

  Kim Jennings

• Co-producer:

  H.H. Cooper

• Associate Producer:

  Elizabeth Hayes, Innbo Shim, Emily Woodburne

• Executive Producer:

  Ilona Herzberg, Carol Cuddy

• Costume Designer:

  Susan Lyall

• First Assistant Director:

  H.H. Cooper

• Casting:

  Bernie Telsey

• Production Sound Mixer:

  Jeff Pullman

• Music Editor:

  Suzana Peric

• Post Production Supervisor:

  Kendall McCarthy

REVIEW:

• Rachel Getting Married reminds audiences what Jonathan Demme does best, but also suffers from the same faults that have mucked up his recent work. The film opens with Kym's (Anne Hathaway) father (Bill Irwin) and stepmother picking her up from rehab so that Kym can go home for her sister Rachel's (Rosemarie DeWitt) nuptials. The family house overflows with musicians, artists, and friends who are busy preparing for the big event; someone in the house is playing music almost all of the time. Within minutes of her arrival, the dysfunctional relationships within the family fall into a familiar rut with Rachel yelling at Kym for her selfishness, Kym demanding sympathy from everyone, and their ineffectual dad trying to keep the peace.
  
  Hathaway and DeWitt are superb together. There is no doubt of their genuine love for -- and absolute exasperation with -- each other. Your sympathies shift between the two during the opening scenes, and this is one of Demme's great strengths -- he never judges Kym for her addictions, and never questions Rachel's frustration and anger. The actresses each deliver finely detailed performances, particularly in the scenes where their recriminations fall away to reveal the genuine affection flowing underneath all the resentments.
  
  Had Demme focused on this human drama he might have created a minor-key masterpiece, but instead he indulges in sequences featuring all the other people who are part of the wedding. Understand, these scenes don't actually introduce us to all these people -- we don't get to know them at all -- they are just simple moments that don't add up to anything. For example, a series of toasts during the rehearsal dinner starts charmingly before devolving into speech after speech from characters you've barely seen before and might not see again; eventually, you feel as bored as you would be at a social function where you don't know a single person. Demme's humanism used to be effortless, but here it leads to deadening collections of scenes that serve no dramatic purpose. Demme wants us to observe the diversity, but he makes us look at it for so long that you start to question why he's making us stare at it instead of trusting us to accept that this is how this world is. He presents cultural diversity with a dispassion that's meant to illustrate how ordinary this idealized picture of togetherness should be, but observing a microcosm of a social utopia isn't as interesting as being part of one. By failing to return regularly to his engaging main story, Demme neuters the power of his own subtext.
  
  From his early days with Roger Corman, Demme possessed both a gargantuan humanism and a light touch. Few filmmakers could put characters as odd as those that populate Melvin and Howard, Citizens Band, and Something Wild onscreen without an ounce of judgment or condescension. In Hannibal Lecter, Demme finally found a character that matched his own ability to observe human behavior. This sympathetic connection helped make The Silence of the Lambs a classic, but it seems to have exhausted Demme creatively. In Philadelphia and Beloved, he ceased looking at people for the sheer joy of understanding them, and began to look at them out of some sense that his audience would become better people for having done so. That kind of moral ambition rarely leads to quality filmmaking. Rachel Getting Married does offer a glimpse of the simple humanitarianism Demme used to handle with aplomb, but once again, it's compromised by mild self-righteousness. ~ Perry Seibert, Rovi