Search - Blame it on Rio on DVD

MPAA Rating: R Content Advisory: Brief Nudity, Nudity, Adult Situations, Not For Children, Adult Language, Adult Humor, Profanity Movie Release: 1984 DVD Release: 05/22/2001 Format: DVD - Enhanced Wide Screen Letterbox for 16x9 TV Audio Tracks: English, French, Spanish Subtitles: English, French, Spanish SwapaDVD Credits: 1 Number of Discs: 1 Run Time: 1 hrs 40 mins Studio: MGM Members Wishing: 2 Genres: Comedy, Farce, Sex Comedy

This attempt to remake the clever 1977 French farce Un Moment d'Egarement stars 50-film-a-year man Michael Caine as an executive named Matthew Hollis, who, together with friend Victor Lyons (Joseph Bologna), travels to Rio de Janeiro on business. Victor sets out on the town in search of a lambada partner, leaving Matthew to fend for himself against his friend's over-sexed teenage daughter (Michelle Johnson), who's come along for the ride. Soon, Matthew succumbs to her advances, despite his efforts to break off the affair, and finds himself a repeated statutory rapist, at least by American legal standards. The script plays out like an extended version of Three's Company, with lots of near-misses and dumb-dumb humor; critics aptly noticed Caine's apparent discomfort throughout the film. ~ Jeremy Beday, All Movie Guide

Michael Caine - Matthew Hollis
Joseph Bologna - Victor Lyons
Valerie Harper - Karen Hollis
Michelle Johnson - Jennifer Lyons
Jose Lewgoy - Eduardo Marques

Blame It on Rio performed fairly well at the box office in 1984 and went on to become popular cable fodder throughout the rest of that decade but the harsh critical reception to the movie went on to harm the motion picture careers of famed director Stanley Donen and comedy writer Larry Gelbart. This MGM Home Entertainment DVD release of Blame It on Rio shows that for this limp but ultimately harmless sex farce, the punishment was much more severe than the crime. The DVD shows off the sumptuous Rio locations and Reynaldo Villalobos' rich location cinematography with a flawless widescreen anamorphic transfer while the Dolby Digital 2.0 mono puts all the lame one-liners squarely in front of the swank bossa nova soundtrack. This is a budget-priced disc so it shouldn't come as a surprise that the only extras are foreign-language tracks and subtitles, closed captioning, and the original trailer. Blame It on Rio was below the high standards of both Donen and Gelbart and it wasn't the first mediocre picture either of them was involved in; but if making bad movies was a crime, then no one would ever work again in Hollywood. It seemed to be more a problem of bad timing than one of artistic merit. Hollywood was suddenly a very young town ruled by baby-boomer executives and this was a movie about sweaty middle-aged men and high-school-age girls. It's not that this tame film seemed sleazy, it's that the movie seemed like it was made by old people and aimed at older people -- and this was suddenly the biggest taboo of all in Hollywood at the time. Writer Larry Gelbart was able to keep working, doing brilliant work for stage and the small screen but sadly, Blame It on Rio was the last time that Stanley Donen was able to direct a picture, and he was a very young 60 at the time of the picture's release. ~ Nick Dedina, All Movie Guide