Extras: Trailer, Filmographies, Ben Kingsley talks about Gandhi,
The Making of Gandhi Photo Montage, The Words of Mahatma Gandhi, Newsreel
Footage
Director:
Richard Attenborough
(A Bridge Too Far, Chaplin, A Chorus Line, Cry Freedom, Gandhi, Grey Owl, In Love and War, Magic, Oh! What a Lovely War, Shadowlands, Young Winston)
Producer:
Richard Attenborough
Screenplay:
John Briley
Music:
George Fenton and Ravi Shankar
Cast:
Mahatma Gandhi: Ben Kingsley
Margaret Bourke-White: Candice Bergen
General Dyer: Edward Fox
Lord Irwin: John Gielgud
Judge Broomfield: Trevor Howard
The Viceroy: John Mills
Vince Walker, reporter New York Times: Martin Sheen
Rev. Charlie Andrews: Ian Charleson
Sardar Patel: Saeed Jaffrey
Mirabehn: Geraldine James
Senior Police Officer Fields: Ian Bannen
Collins: Richard Griffiths
Kinnoch: Nigel Hawthorne
Sir George Hodge: Michael Hordern
Nahari: Om Puri
Gandhi
was the first time I'd heard of Ben Kingsley as he portrayed the
real-life pacifist Indian lawyer-cum-leader with more quotable quotes than
Oscar Wilde arriving in India which is struggling to free itself from the rule
of the British. Like any role played by Arnold Schwarzenegger, Gandhi arrives
to take out the trash, but unlike Arnie, Gandhi says it must be achieved by
him telling everyone what to do and if that doesn't work, he'll fast and will
even go so far as letting that kill him if need be.
The film takes in the horrific massacre at Amritsar where the British opened
fire on 15,000 unarmed men, women and children, plus the dramatic march to the
sea where Gandhi led thousands of his fellow men to prove that sea salt
belongs to everyone and not just the British, but at over three hours in
length it goes on a bit and isn't a film you can put on for a quick watch and
at the end of the day, you'll never stop all the nutters from being violent
since you can only help those who'll help themselves.
The best thing about it is its cast, which includes Candice Bergen,
Edward Fox, John Gielgud, Martin Sheen, Saeed Jaffrey, Geraldine James,
Richard Griffiths, Nigel Hawthorne, Om Puri as well as a smaller role
for John Savident, aka Fred in Coronation Street, Daniel Day-Lewis,
the Comic Strip's Daniel Peacock and another underrated British
actor, Ray Burdis.
And Railtrack think they have problems.
Apart from a few flecks and minor dropouts throughout the 19-year-old print,
the quality's superb. Presented in the original 2.35:1 widescreen ratio,
it is anamorphic and the average bitrate is 4.48Mb/s, briefly peaking above
8Mb/s.
The sound is presented in Dolby Digital 5.1 for English only, with
French and German left in surround sound. It's not a film that relies upon
multi-channel sound, though and when fights break out, a train whistle sounds
or something else loud happens, it all comes across as a little forced.
The extras include a five-minute Trailer (well, it is a long story),
Filmographies for the main cast members and director, as well as a
20-minute piece, Ben Kingsley talks about Gandhi, mentioning not only
his character but how the film itself was put together.
The Making of Gandhi Photo Montage runs for five minutes and features
many on-set pictures, the Newsreel Footage is ten minutes in four parts
showing Gandhi going to England, his farewell talk in Europe, his beginning
his death-fast and footage of the first talking picture he ever made.
Finally, The Words of Mahatma Gandhi is two minutes of his quotes
set to music.
As this is a Columbia DVD we have the usual 28 chapters and subtitles in
14 languages :
English, French, German, Dutch, Turkish, Danish, Arabic, Hindi, Swedish,
Icelandic, Norwegian, Greek and Hebrew.
The main menu is nicely animated and scored with music from the film. The
screenwipes to the other, static and silent, menus are impressive.
As of April 2009, Blu-rays and DVDs reviewed by the editor are watched on a Panasonic TH-37PX80B
37" Plasma TV with a Sony BDP-1500 Blu-ray player and played through a Yamaha DSP-AX820 amplifier.
PC games reviewed by the editor are on:
Since Jan 2011: Intel Quad Core Dell XPS 8100, i7 CPU 860 @ 2.80Ghz, 8Gb RAM, nVidia GeForce GTS 240, Windows 7
Since Nov 2005: Intel Pentium D 830 3.0Ghz, 1Gb RAM, 128Mb nVidia GeForce 6700XL, Windows XP
Since Aug 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.66Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb GeForce4 MX440 graphics, Windows XP
Since May 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.6Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb ATI Radeon 9600TX graphics, Windows XP
Since Jun 2002: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, 64Mb ATI Radeon 8500LE
Since May 2000: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, Voodoo 3 3000 AGP
