An Officer and a Gentleman

Dom Robinson reviews

An Officer and a Gentleman Distributed by

Paramount

• Cert:
• Cat.no: PHE 8063
• Running time: 119 minutes
• Year: 1981
• Pressing: 2001
• Region(s): 2, PAL
• Chapters: 15 plus extras
• Sound: Dolby Digital 2.0 (Mono)
• Languages: English, German
• Subtitles: 15 languages available
• Widescreen: 1.85:1
• 16:9-Enhanced: Yes
• Macrovision: Yes
• Disc Format: DVD 9
• Price: £19.99
• Extras: Trailer, Audio Commentary
  

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  Director:

  Taylor Hackford

  (Against All Odds, Bound By Honour, The Devil’s Advocate, Dolores Claiborne, Everybody’s All-American, An Officer and a Gentleman, Proof of Life, White Nights)

Producer:

Martin Elfand

Screenplay:

Douglas Day Stewart

Music:

Jack Nitzsche

Cast:

Zack Mayo: Richard Gere
Paula Pokrifki: Debra Winger
Sid Worley: David Keith
Byron Mayo: Robert Loggia
Lynette Pomeroy: Lisa Blount
Casey Seeger: Lisa Eilbacher
Sgt. Emil Foley: Louis Gossett Jr.

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An Officer and a Gentleman is what new Navy Pilot recruit Zack Mayo (Richard Gere) appears to be once he signs up and becomes the object of young girls’ desires, like many of the rest of his colleagues, as they spend their 13 weeks basic training working like a dog from Monday to Friday, then letting rip at the weekend – their “liberty time”.

They’re warned of the local girls who will do anything to marry a pilot, but true love furrows its path and finds its way and so begins the feisty relationship between Mayo and factory worker Paula Pokrifki (Debra Winger). It’s at this point where I’d say that I won’t spoil what happens, but everyone knows – even people like me who are just watching this movie for the first time, as I refused to watch it on TV where it is always censored.

The other running storyline is that between joker-of-the-pack Mayo and the hard-as-nails drill instructor Sgt. Emil Foley (Louis Gossett Jr.) who puts in a fine performance – and one for which he won an Oscar – but nothing still beats R. Lee Ermey‘s Gunnery Sgt. Hartman in Full Metal Jacket. Foley keeps insinuating to Mayo that he must quit, but Mayo aims to prove not only his drill sergeant wrong, but also his father, played by Robert Loggia, whom he feels he never matched up to.

The rest of the cast includes Sid Worley (David Keith), who becomes Zack’s best friend, Sid’s beau when the four are double-dating, Lynette (Lisa Blount) and the only female amongst the recruits, Casey Seeger (Lisa Eilbacher).

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Paramount have found a fine 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen transfer, which does have some print flecks at times, but it’s impressive for a 20-year-old film. The average bitrate is a high and steady 7.20Mb/s.

No remastered soundtrack to be found though as it’s the original mono version which is clear for dialogue but doesn’t particularly stand out.

Chapters are few and far between with just 15 and subtitles for dialogue come in the same number of languages: English (and hard of hearing), Arabic, Bulgarian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, German, Hungarian, Icelandic, Norwegian, Polish, Romanian, Swedish and Turkish.

The extras are a 2½-minute Trailer and a feature-length Director’s Commentary, which also has subtitles available in English and German. The menus are static and silent.

As I hinted at earlier, the picture looks very good for the age of the film, but also given the age it’s time that Paramount introduced a budget range for films like this, at around the £13-15 price bracket.

FILM CONTENT
PICTURE QUALITY
SOUND QUALITY
EXTRAS


OVERALL Review copyright © Dominic Robinson, 2001.