DVD Review: Rent
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::Movie review
Rent opens with the main characters lined up on a stage in an empty theater, singing the song "Seasons of Love." A spotlight shines on each cast member and the camera moves up and down the line, giving us an opportunity to be introduced, through song, to each character. The intent of this scene seems clear: "The movie you're about to watch is a musical. Get over it." (Side note: I wrote the above before listening to the commentary and, coincidentally, director Chris Columbus says almost the exact same thing as his reasoning for opening the film this way.)
Musicals have been a part of Hollywood for generations (anyone remember a little film called "The Wizard of Oz?") and, until the last few decades, have always enjoyed a certain level of success. Recently, however, it seems that audiences are less tolerant of big musical productions (while, ironically, Broadway seems to be enjoying a renaissance).
There are exceptions: for whatever reason, people don't seem to mind musicals when they're animated. And then there are films like Chicago, but it had the appeal of big name stars working out of their perceived element.
So along comes Rent, a smash hit Broadway success that should have been a smash hit theatrical production. But it wasn't. According to the Internet Movie DataBase, Rent had a production budget of 40 million, but only took in nearly 30 million in ticket sales, definitively classifying it as a flop. Furthermore, it had decidedly mixed reviews, with Rottentomatoes.com giving it a 50% hit or miss rating.
How is this possible for an adaptation of a Broadway musical that was nearly universally admired and loved? By many accounts from the Rent fans (the Rent-heads, if you will), Chris Columbus' adaptation is honest and faithful to the spirit of the original. Many fans even appreciate the "fat" that was trimmed in order to streamline the story, and quite a lot of them praise the improved technical qualities of the music.
The lack of big name stars might have scared off some audiences from investing their time in a musical. Broadway fans will certainly recognize names like Taye Diggs and Idina Menzel, but those names will have little meaning to anyone else. The subject matter might have also played into it. When it premiered 10 years ago, HIV was still a freshly sore subject, and the controversy of the story likely motivated early attendance. But our world has changed since then. Most people seem more concerned with computer viruses than human ones, and HIV is no longer as harsh a death sentence as it once was.
I came to Rent fresh, having never seen the stage production, and before researching this review, I had read very little about it. So from that perspective and with all of the preamble out of the way, here are my thoughts:
Mark (Anthony Rapp) and Roger (Adam Pascal) are bohemian artist roommates (a filmmaker and a musician respectively) living rent-free in a New York apartment building. They aren't paying rent because a former roommate, Benny (Taye Diggs), married into money and purchased the buildings, promising his friends they could stay for free.
Benny reneges on his promise and threatens to evict everyone unless Mark and Roger make a deal with him. Benny wants to build a cyber cafe on an empty lot next to the apartments, but first he must clear out the homeless living there. If Mark and Roger will agree to help put a stop to the protests so that he can get his cafe built, Benny will allow them to continue to live in the building.
Throughout this are various subplots. Living below Mark and Roger is Mimi (Rosario Dawson), an exotic dancer strung out on heroine. She is attracted to Roger, but Roger is reluctant to get close to her because he is HIV Positive.
Tom Collins (Jesse L. Martin) comes to visit Mark and Roger, but is mugged in an alley. He's taken in by Angel (Wilson Jermaine Heredia), a drag queen with whom he unexpectedly falls in love with.
Mark, meanwhile, is pining for Maureen (Idina Menzel), who dumped him to pursue a relationship with Joanne (Tracie Thoms). Although Joanne initially dislikes Mark, she begins to warm up to him when she becomes frustrated by the same promiscuous behavior from Maureen that resulted in her dumping Mark in favor of Joanne.
Finally, the spotlight-loving Maureen, is orchestrating the very protests that Benny wants Mark to help stop.
As I watched Rent, I found myself much more interested in these various subplots than in the main story, which seemed rather contrived and unconvincing (and based upon the opera, La Boheme, which is equally contrived and unconvincing). In fact, whenever the "rent" issue popped back into the story (which was thankfully somewhat rare), it felt more like a distraction. Rather than a celebration of people living free, it just felt to me like a group of adults who were refusing to take responsibility (in an ironic moment, right after considering whether or not to do what Benny says so he can continue to live rent-free, Mark complains that the very reason he refuses to move back in with his parents is because he doesn't want them controlling him).
The subject of the rent may be the thread that holds all of the other story elements together, but it is a weak thread at best an the film works much better when this plot device isn't the focus.
Being a musical, the music must be considered in this review because the songs are almost like another character in the film. Unfortunately, the music winds up being one of the weakest elements of the film. The problem, I think, is that director Chris Columbus had an opportunity to either fully replicate the non-stop operatic score of the theater production, or limit the film to just the key songs and omit the rest. Instead, he chose to straddle the middle and the result are a number of sung "conversations" that don't have the melody and flow of real songs and lack the support of a stage orchestra to sell it as a full-on opera.
The bigger songs work well, but those more intimate, smaller numbers suffer from a nearly fatal limitation. In live theater, the audience actually becomes a character in the story. The actors are singing as much to them as to their fellow characters and the visceral interaction allows for much more leeway in the suspension of musical disbelief. The movie screen strips away this relationship between the characters and the audience, so rather than becoming involved in the story, we're jarringly reminded that we're watching a Musical.
Although Rent, the theater production, was so well known for the music, I think that Rent, the movie, might have been better off just focusing on the bigger productions and losing the rest. Film is different from theater, a fact that Chicago and Moulin Rouge understood, but Rent doesn't quite grasp.
Overall, I liked Rent, although much more for the individual character stories. It doesn't have quite the appeal or natural flow of other recent filmed musicals, but it is well made, well acted, and mostly entertaining.
::Video
These days, really poor transfers are extremely rare. This is great for all of us as viewers, but really tough for me as a reviewer, because it leaves me little to talk about. I found the transfer for Rent to be about average for an A-list DVD release of a modern film -- and that is to say, the image looks really good. I didn't notice hardly anything in the way of edge enhancement and digital compression was minimal.
::Audio
The 5.1 mix on this DVD is easily the best part of this set. The dynamic range is excellent, and the vocal clarity is nearly flawless. I've spoken with people who have seen both the stage version and the film and they all agree that the movie is a vast improvement on the sonic quality of the music.
::Special Features
Rent comes as a 2-disc special edition.
Disc one includes a feature length audio commentary with Chris Columbus, Anthony Rapp and Adam Pascal. These guys have a pretty good time talking about the film and one thing that many Rent fans will appreciate is that, due to their extensive history with Rent, Rapp and Pascal are not shy when it comes to grilling Columbus about his choices to deviate from the stage version. The one thing that did irritate me about this commentary, however, was the decision to censor out some of the swearing. Commentaries are meant to be candid discussions about the film, and should not be watered down by some idiotic notion of "decency." Rent is a story with violence, death, drugs, gays and lesbians, yet we can't take a few curse words in a commentary? Give me a break!
Disc 2 features a the documentary No Day But Today, which is actually broken up into several sections that run between 20 and 30 minutes. This documentary is mostly about Jonathan Larson and his struggles to get Rent made. It goes fairly in-depth into the production of the stage version and doesn't really get into the film until toward the end. Still, this is a fascinating look at how Rent was brought to life, and a nice tribute to Larson's life.
There are also about 12 minutes worth of deleted musical numbers and scenes, as well as public service announcements for the Jonathan Larson Performing Arts Foundation and the National Marfan Foundation (Larson was killed by Marfan's Syndrome).
::Bottom Line
I enjoyed Rent, despite some of its musical miscalculations. A better adaptation, one that understood the differences between theater and film, could have elevated Rent to the stratospheric greatness of Chicago. Still, Rent is a good effort, with strong performances and a couple of really stand-out musical numbers.
| Movie |  |
3.5 / 5 |
| Video | |
4 / 5 |
| Audio | |
4.5 / 5 |
| Extras | |
4 / 5 |
| Family Friendly | |
0.5 / 5 |
| Rent is not really a story intended for the younger kids. It's fine for the teens, however. | ||
| Overall | |
4 / 5 |
- Robert Wurth, ©2006
::Technical Specs
Studio:
Sony Home Entertainment
Year of Theatrical Release:
2005
Disc Format:
2 single-sided, Dual Layer
Image Format:
Anamorphic Widescreen
Aspect Ratio:
2.35:1
Region Encoding:
1 (North America)
Sound Format:
Dolby Digital 5.1, Dolby Digital 2.0 (pro logic)
Running Time:
135 minutes
Director:
Chris Columbus
Stars:
Anthony Rapp, Adam Pascal, Idina Menzel, Taye Diggs, Rosario Dawson
MPAA Rating:
PG-13
Disc Supplements:
- Commentary with Chris Columbus and select cast
- No Day But Today documentary
- Bryce's DiaryM. Night's Home Movie Deleted musical numbers and scenes
- Public Service Announcements
