Mill Creek has released a new 2-disc Blu-ray set containing four comedies from Columbia Pictures starring Peter Falk, who is probably best known for playing the eccentric detective Columbo on TV. The films included in this collection are Luv (1967), The Cheap Detective (1978), Big Trouble (1986), and Happy New Year (1987). While some of these movies had previously been released on DVD, this is the first time any of these films have been released on Blu-ray (at least for U.S. audiences). The collection provides a fun sampling of Peter Falk’s comedic film career, though in all of these he seems to play either some sort of detective or con-man (or both). I had never seen or heard of many of these films, but was looking forward to checking them out.
Here’s a breakdown of the movies included on this set:
Luv (1967)
Harry Berlin (Jack Lemmon) has never really experienced love in his life. He’s lonely, depressed, and has decided to end it all. As he climbs the Brooklyn Bridge and prepares to jump, Milt Manville (Peter Falk) happens to be driving by on his scooter and notices his old college friend/classmate, whom he hasn’t seen in 15 years. After they talk a bit (and Harry makes a few more failed suicide attempts), Milt invites Harry over for dinner with him and his wife Ellen (Elaine May). Milt believes Harry could be the solution to his problem. Milt has fallen in love with a woman named Linda (Nina Wayne), but is afraid to ask his wife for a divorce. So he comes up with the plan to make her fall in love with Harry so she’ll suggest a divorce on her own. Harry isn’t too wild about the idea, but nothing else in life has worked for him, so he decides to play along.
What follows is a wacky, madcap tale of these four people constantly discovering that the the grass isn’t always greener, as they try to manipulate one another into various set-ups, weddings and divorces, with things never quite ending up the way they expected them to. Jack Lemmon’s Harry is a bit off his rocker, always breaking into song and dance, wearing paper hats, and acting crazy, which leads to a lot of hilarious physical humor. Falk makes a great con-man who’s constantly trying to swing and spin every situation to his advantage.
The Cheap Detective (1978)
Set in San Francisco in 1939, The Cheap Detective is Neil Simon’s parody of/homage to Casablanca and Humphry Bogart’s Sam Spade films. When his business partner Floyd Merkle is murdered, private detective Lou Peckinpaugh (Peter Falk) becomes one of the prime suspects, due to the fact that he had been secretly having an affair with Floyd’s wife, Georgia (Marsha Mason), for the past 9 years. So Lou sets out to prove that both he and Georgia are innocent. He receives a call from the mysterious Mrs. Montenegro (Madeline Kahn), claiming to have info on the murder, but soon discovers that she has yet another case for him. She wants him to find a missing person—though she’s not the most reliable client as she keeps changing her name, and the name of the person she is looking for. As Lou heads to the club Nix Place to look into a tip, he runs into an old flame, Marlene (Louise Fletcher). She and her husband Paul DuChard (Fernando Lamas) are visiting from France, but an evil German Colonel Schlissel (Nicol Williamson) has just stolen their travel documents. So Lou takes on yet another case—finding and returning these documents so the DuChards can return to France. However, seeing Marlene again has awakened old feelings between them, and Lou doesn’t necessarily want to lose Marlene again. As Lou investigates the cases, he discovers that they are all connected in one way or another, and finds himself coming in contact with lots of odd, crazy characters, including several women who have become drawn to him.
The Cheap Detective is filled with clever and creative wordplay, sight gags, and physical comedy. There’s also a bit of a farcical element as Lou weaves through his apartment with a different women behind each door. While I’ve never seen any of the films this movie was parodying, there are so many recognizable classic lines and references that were not lost on me. The film features an amazing, recognizable supporting cast, including Dom DeLuise, Ann-Margret, Eileen Brennan, Sid Caesar, Stockard Channing, James Coco, John Houseman, Phil Silvers, Abe Vigoda and more.
Big Trouble (1986)
Insurance salesman Leonard Hoffman (Alan Arkin) is excited that his triplets have all been accepted to Yale, however he’s unsure how he can afford to pay for college. He reaches out to his wealthy employer Mr. Winslow (Robert Stack), who’s a Yale legacy, hoping he would put in a word with the scholarship committee, but he is rejected. Then, an unusual opportunity presents itself when a woman calls out of the blue to check on her homeowner’s policy. Blanche Rickey (Beverly D’Angelo) tells Leonard that her husband Steve (Peter Falk) is in debt and has only 6 weeks to live. So Leonard reluctantly schemes with Blanche to set up a $5M life insurance policy on her husband. The only catch is that to get the full payout, Steve will need to die in train accident. So they plot a way to kill Steve and make it look like a railway accident, but Leonard soon realizes that he may be the one getting played.
This was probably my favorite of the four films. Falk is playing his typical con-man character, and pairs well with Beverly D’Angelo. Alan Arkin is more of the straight man who gets sucked into this plan, and is forced to play along. In this film we also get to see a bit of Falk with prosthetics and teaming up with Charles Durning—I guess a trial run for the final film of the collection.
Happy New Year (1987)
Small time crooks Nick (Peter Falk) and Charlie (Charles Durning) have known each other since reform school. Now they are planning an elaborate psychological heist on West Palm Beach jewelry store Harry Winston. As the men test their escape route timing and scope out the store, Nick becomes smitten with one of the sales girls at the antique store next door, Carolyn (Wendy Hughes). While Nick pursues the young woman as himself, he also dons various old person disguises and elaborate cover stories in order to gain access to and explore the interior of the jewelry store and get to know the store’s manager Edward Saunders (Tom Courtenay). While everything seems to be going to plan, will Nick’s fascination with Carolyn become too much of a distraction and derail the heist?
Happy New Year is a remake of the 1973 French film La bonne année. It is a heist film plus a romantic comedy, with a lot of physical humor as well. Nick often dons prosthetics to play an old man and his sister who are shopping for jewelry the man’s dying wife. The tale of this dying sister-in-law keeps getting wilder and wilder as the film goes on and Nick needs another excuse to visit the jewelry store. This is very much a Peter Falk vehicle, with Nick appearing in nearly every scene. He is hilarious as he plays these ridiculous older siblings. Charlie only appears in a few scenes, and primarily provides narration for the film.
Overall, I found this to be a generally satisfying and entertaining collection of films. All four films are presented with stereo soundtracks. While there isn’t that immersive feeling of a more modern track, I didn’t really find anything lacking, and the dialogue remained clear throughout. The picture quality was pretty solid on all four films, with a generally clean and clear picture on all four films. Luv, the oldest of the movies, was surprisingly the best looking, with the most detail in faces, etc. The picture never looked bad on the others, just not as sharp and fine detailed as one would expect. None of the films really had any noticeable film grain, so I’m not sure if there was a lot of noise reduction or other processing done to them. A couple of the movies also had the occasional white flecks here and there, but nothing too distracting.
Mill Creek’s set is offered at a very reasonable price. The four films reside on two Blu-ray discs, each of which has a basic menu with a Subtitle On/Off option and a Play button for each of the two movies on that disc. Luv and The Cheap Detective are on the first disc, while Big Trouble and Happy New Year are on the second. The discs reside on either side of a standard HD keepcase, which is placed inside a cardboard slipcover. There is no bonus material on either disc, and no digital digital copies are included.
What’s Included:
Films:
- Luv (1967) (1:35:47)
- 1080p / Widescreen 2.35:1
- Audio: English 2.0 DTS-HD Master Audio
- Subtitles: English SDH
- The Cheap Detective (1978) (1:32:13)
- 1080p / Widescreen 2.35:1
- Audio: English 2.0 DTS-HD Master Audio
- Subtitles: English SDH
- Big Trouble (1985) (1:33:02)
- 1080p / Widescreen 1.85:1
- Audio: English 2.0 DTS-HD Master Audio
- Subtitles: English SDH
- Happy New Year (1986) (1:24:50)
- 1080p / Widescreen 1.85:1
- Audio: English 2.0 DTS-HD Master Audio
- Subtitles: English SDH
Extras:
-
This release contains no bonus material.
Final Thoughts:
Mill Creek’s Peter Falk 4-Film Comedy Collection is a fun collection of films that showcase Peter Falk’s comedic talents. Falk is joined by some amazing guest- and co-stars in these movies, which make for an entertaining movie marathon. All of the film are being offered on Blu-ray for the first time, and the audio/video presentation is generally pretty solid. While there is no bonus material included on the set, the collection is very reasonably priced, making it an easy recommendation.
PETER FALK 4-FILM COMEDY COLLECTION/BD
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