Goodbye Mr. Chips
Studio: Warner Brothers
Year: 1939
Rated: Not Rated
Film Length: 115 Minutes
Aspect Ratio: 1.37:1 Academy
Audio: DD Mono
Color/B&W: B&W
Subtitles: English, French & Spanish
MSRP: $19.98
Package: Snap Case
The Feature:
On February 3rd, Warner Bros. is poised to release seven Academy Award winning films.
Goodbye Mr. Chips was nominated for seven Academy Awards including Best Picture, Best Actor in a Leading Role (Robert Donat) and Best Actress in a Leading Role (Greer Garson). Only Robert Donat was victorious. Greer Garson would have to wait three more years to collect her statue in another film,
Mrs. Miniver, which is also among the winners to be released with this group.
Goodbye Mr. Chips is a beautiful account of a dedicated man, who, for sixty-three years, devoted his life to the school and the students he taught. Mr. Chipping (played by Robert Donat) comes across as a stiff, almost stodgy, old gentleman who teaches at England’s Brookfield Boys School. Though he initially had difficulty earning respect from his students, he eventually went on to become one of the most beloved figures of the school. Never afraid to take on the establishment, the sometimes mutinous teacher also earned the respect of his colleagues as well.
The story starts off during present day, when he finally meets Mr. Jackson his replacement, as he imparts some of his wisdom upon the eager but naive successor. Mr. Chipping falls asleep and, as a result, his life story and successful career while teaching at the academy is reflected upon by way of flashback.
Practically blindsided by naiveté, his very first day in class is a veritable free-for-all. After a stern warning “or else” from the Headmaster, Mr. Chipping realizes that he needs to get his class under control and very quickly gains the respect that’s needed. Unfortunately, he has become such a favorite of his students and fearing those qualities would be missed, he is even by-passed for an upcoming promotion of Housemaster.
During his summer vacation, the frustrated young man decides to take a trip with one of his colleagues, Mr. Staefel (played by a very young Paul Henreid interestingly credited as “Paul Von Hernried”) to Austria. During his trip, he meets a vivacious young woman by the name of Katherine (played by Greer Garson) who he falls in love with and eventually marries. Unfortunately, the love and companionship he so longed for would be very short lived when Katherine and their newborn child would pass away during the delivery. Devastated by the loss, Mr. Chips (as he would become affectionately referred to by Katherine) returned to his classroom and his students. Though, the relationship was a brief one, it would be the turning point that would change the life of Mr. Chips forever.
The years pass, and only due to the looming World War, does he eventually get the promotion he’s always dreamed of. Unfortunately, he’s become quite old and doesn’t have anyone to share it with other than the picture of his late wife Katherine which he still keeps on his desk. He becomes even more disheartened when he’s forced to read the names daily, of his former students who have lost their lives while serving their country. Sadly, in his final hours, he overhears one of his colleagues comment on the sadness of the lonely man not having any children, whereby Mr. Chips quickly responds by proclaiming “you’re wrong, I had thousands of them… thousands of them… all boys”.
What an absolutely moving and touching film…!!
Video:
Every once and awhile, it’s good to be humbled. It makes us appreciate the finer things and keeps us from taking them for granted. Such is the case with this video transfer. There have been very few WB transfers that I have admonished during my reviews. Unfortunately, this is one of them. And to be fair, I have no idea what condition the original elements were in, but I can only assume they were terrible.
Let me start with the good, since there isn’t a whole lot of it. The black levels were exceptional. Unfortunately however, that might be the very cause for much of everything else looking rather murky and downright dull. The contrast and grayscale levels were poor at best which rendered a rather flat non dimensional picture. There were occasional scenes that looked
somewhat detailed, but for the most part the image was soft at best.
I know “grain” has been the center of many discussions as of late, but the amount of grain on this transfer was particularly bothersome. That, coupled with what appeared to be excessive artifacting, made the image less than appealing at times.
As we would expect for a film of this age, there were scratches and evidence of dirt as well as light speckle and shimmer – much more than I anticipated.
We’ve been spoiled. We’ve come to expect every WB classic film to look like the new
Casablanca SE or
The Bad And The Beautiful which simply isn’t fair nor is it realistic. Unfortunately, it doesn’t make it any easier to accept when a transfer like this comes along.
Audio:
From one extreme to another… This DD Mono track has no business sounding as good as it does and it delivers to perfection.
There was a slight amount of hiss throughout the film, however, it was miniscule. There were also a couple of occasions when I noticed some slight crackle but thankfully it was short lived. The track sounded as though it was unrefined and retained its original tonal qualities.
Dialogue was always as clear as could be, always remaining intelligible. During his trip to Austria, there were many occasions of Strauss’ beautiful waltzes accompanying the film which sounded impressive on both ends of the scale. Another good example of the mono track displaying some oomph was a Christmas scene with the choir and a pipe organ as well as a bombing raid that took place over the school. We’d have no business expecting a 65 year old mono track to do a better job.
Very impressive..!!
Special Features:
You know when the box describes the special features as “Languages” and “Subtitles”… that there aren’t any… None..!!
Final Thoughts:
It seems as though, lately, there has been a resurgence of rebellious teacher films. It’s no doubt that this film was the precursor for such films as
The Emperor’s Club, Dead Poets Society and perhaps even to some extent,
The Prime Of Miss Jean Brodie. Fortunately,
Goodbye Mr. Chips relies solely on great acting and lacks the sentimentality and melodramatics of its contemporary copies.
While the audio portion of this transfer is as good as can be expected - and then some, the video portion is somewhat of a disappointment. That’s not to say it’s terrible, but it certainly has its fair shares of problems. To be clear, my only reason for not assigning a Highly Recommended tag is due to the video portion - it’s an absolutely terrific film! Just know going in that the video presentation isn’t quite on par with what we’ve become accustomed to.
Recommended..!
Release Date: February 3rd, 2004
