Search - Yankee Doodle Dandy [Special Edition] on DVD

MPAA Rating: NR Content Advisory: Suitable for Children Movie Release: 1942 DVD Release: 09/30/2003 Format: DVD - Black and White - Closed Captioned Edition: Dual Layered,Restored/Remastered Audio Tracks: English Subtitles: English, French, Spanish SwapaDVD Credits: 2 Number of Discs: 2 Run Time: 2 hrs 5 mins Studio: Warner Home Video Members Wishing: 22 Genres: Musical, Musical Drama, Biopic [feature]

Yankee Doodle Dandy is no more the true-life story of George M. Cohan than The Jolson Story was the unvarnished truth about Al Jolson -- but who the heck cares? Dandy has song, dance, pathos, pageantry, uproarious comedy, and, best of all, James Cagney at his Oscar-winning best. After several failed attempts to bring the life of legendary, flag-waving song-and-dance man Cohan to the screen, Warners scenarist Robert Buckner opted for the anecdotal approach, unifying the film's largely unrelated episodes with a flashback framework. Summoned to the White House by President Roosevelt, the aging Cohan is encouraged to relate the events leading up to this momentous occasion. He recalls his birth on the Fourth of July, 1878; his early years as a cocky child performer in his family's vaudeville act; his decision to go out as a "single"; his sealed-with-a-handshake partnership with writer/producer Sam Harris (Richard Whorf); his first Broadway success, 1903's Little Johnny Jones; his blissful marriage to winsome wife Mary (a fictional amalgam of Cohan's two wives, played by Joan Leslie -- who, incredibly, was only 17 at the time); his patriotic civilian activities during World War I, culminating with his writing of that conflict's unofficial anthem "Over There" (performed by Nora Bayes, as played by Frances Langford); the deaths of his sister, Josie (played by Cagney's real-life sister Jeanne), his mother, Nellie (Rosemary DeCamp), and his father, Jerry (Walter Huston); his abortive attempt to retire; and his triumphant return to Broadway in Rodgers & Hart's I'd Rather Be Right.

His story told, Cohan is surprised -- and profoundly moved -- when FDR presents him with the Congressional Medal of Honor, the first such honor bestowed upon an entertainer. His eyes welling up with tears, Cohan expresses his gratitude by invoking his old vaudeville curtain speech: "My mother thanks you, my father thanks you, my sister thanks you, and I thank you." Glossing over such unsavory moments in Cohan's life as his bitter opposition of the formation of Actor's Equity -- not to mention George M.'s intense hatred of FDR! -- Yankee Doodle Dandy offers the George M. Cohan that people in 1942 wanted to see (proof of the pudding was the film's five-million-dollar gross). And besides, the plot and its fabrications were secondary to those marvelous Cohan melodies -- "Give My Regards to Broadway," "Harrigan," "Mary," "You're a Grand Old Flag," "45 Minutes from Broadway," and the title tune -- performed with brio by Cagney (who modifies his own loose-limbed dancing style in order to imitate Cohan's inimitable stiff-legged technique) and the rest of the spirited cast. Beyond its leading players, movie buffs will have a ball spotting the myriad of familiar character actors parading before the screen: S.Z. Sakall, George Tobias, Walter Catlett, George Barbier, Eddie Foy Jr. (playing his own father), Frank Faylen, Minor Watson, Tom Dugan, John Hamilton, and on and on and on. In addition to Cagney, music directors Ray Heindorf and Heinz Roemheld also won Oscars for their efforts. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

James Cagney - George M. Cohan
Joan Leslie - Mary Cohan
Walter Huston - Jerry Cohan
Richard Whorf - Sam Harris
Irene Manning - Fay Templeton

Michael Curtiz's Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942) never had a significant history on video, apart from the dubious honor of being the first Warner Bros. title to be released in a colorized version on VHS tape and television. This DVD makes up for that neglect, with about two weeks' worth of viewing and listening material, covering a lot more than the movie Yankee Doodle Dandy, though that is a handy jumping off point. The first and most obvious virtue of this disc is the sparkling new transfer (in glorious black-and-white), looking and sounding better than existing theatrical prints. The contrast and density have been adjusted and balanced within and between each shot from an extraordinarily clean source print. The 125-minute movie has also been given a very generous 38 chapters, with each major plot development and performance number labeled.

The real beauty of this release, however, are the bonus materials. The wall-to-wall commentary track by Rudy Behlmer is one of the finest ever done, crediting every relevant player and walking us through the shoot day-by-day and shot-by-shot. Behlmer even credits future director Don Siegel for his montage work in the movie, which is among the film's oft-unheralded virtues, and delineates the uncredited contributions of writers Julius J. Epstein and Philip G. Epstein. There's barely a bit player missed, or too many details of James Cagney's career overlooked in Behlmer's narration, or much about George M. Cohan that's not here. The big challenge with this movie, in terms of commentary, is keeping up with the unusually large number of memorable moments that were improvised on the spot, leaving one even more impressed with the results. Behlmer's commentary is like a movie in itself, and a delightful one, carrying the viewer into the two bygone entertainment worlds that produced Cohan and which produced Cagney and Yankee Doodle Dandy. The other special visual feature on disc one is the most easily overlooked: "A Night at the Movies," which describes what a full evening's entertainment at the movies was like in 1942, with excerpts from trailers, newsreels, cartoons, and a patriotic short, all hosted by Leonard Maltin. It is accompanied by a list of Academy Awards won by Yankee Doodle Dandy and a list of cast and crew.

Disc two is highlighted by the biographical featurette, "James Cagney: Top of the World," hosted by Michael J. Fox, which includes interviews with friends and colleagues such as David Huddleston, Mae Clarke, Joan Leslie, Virginia Mayo, Jack Lemmon, producer A.C. Lyles, screenwriter Julius J. Epstein, and Cagney's daughter Casey Cagney Thomas, as well as audio interview material with Cagney. The featurette doesn't slight Cagney's personal life or his politics, which led him to co-found the Screen Actor's Guild, and even mentions his successful lawsuit against Warners in 1936. The early Cagney movies excerpted for this documentary are fairly rare and look so good that one hopes that Warner Bros. is thinking about releasing them on DVD as well. The account of Cagney Productions is a little too brief, as well as slightly inaccurate (the company made more than three movies), although it does explain the connection between that company and the making of White Heat -- but then it jumps to Mr. Roberts from White Heat, instead of delving into the relationship between White Heat and Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye, his personally produced answer to the earlier movie. Despite its minor flaws, the documentary by itself is almost worth the price of this double-disc set. "Let Freedom Sing: The Story of Yankee Doodle Dandy" is equally fine, with film historians Bob Thomas and John McCabe leading off an account of the production that starts with George M. Cohan's life and career. It fills in any holes in Behlmer's commentary track, and adds visuals to the narrative account, including a tribute to Cagney's brother William, who handled the business side of the actor's career, and also to Joan Leslie (who appears) and Frances Langford, though the best part is the account of Cohan's later life and his reaction to the movie.

There's a serious remembrance of Cagney by John Travolta, and then the disc gets to the delightful peripheral influences of the movie, a pair of classic Looney Tunes cartoons, Yankee Doodle Daffy and Yankee Doodle Bugs. The former is a stitch, with a manic Daffy Duck tormenting studio chief Porky Pig in his pitching of a new acting talent, which allows the lunatic waterfowl to do musical excerpts from the Warner library, even from musical numbers that were never produced. A patriotic wartime Warner Bros. short, You, John Jones, presenting Cagney in an unusually low-key, reflective role, rounds out the visual library supplements. There are also song rehearsals and audio-only outtakes, mostly featuring Cagney with piano accompaniment, and a radio presentation of highlights from Yankee Doodle Dandy presented on the Lady Esther Screen Guild Theater show of October 19, 1942, with James Cagney, Walter Huston, Joan Leslie, and Jeanne Cagney, plus images of Cohan sheet music and production stills, and poster and publicity art from the movie. All of these supplements are easy to access, through multi-layered menus that pop up automatically and are well-delineated. The internal menus are similarly easy to use, and the selections advance automatically with each choice as it concludes. The whole release is an embarrassment of riches, the biggest problem of which will be finding the time to enjoy all of it. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide