Search - Arsenic and Old Lace on DVD

MPAA Rating: NR Content Advisory: Suitable for Children Movie Release: 1944 DVD Release: 08/29/2000 Format: DVD - Black and White,Pan and Scan Audio Tracks: English Subtitles: English, French SwapaDVD Credits: 1 Number of Discs: 1 Run Time: 1 hrs 58 mins Studio: Warner Home Video Members Wishing: 88 Genres: Comedy, Farce, Screwball Comedy, Crime Comedy

Arsenic and Old Lace is director Frank Capra's spin on the classic Joseph Kesselring stage comedy, which concerns the sweet old Brewster sisters (Josephine Hull, Jean Adair), beloved in their genteel Brooklyn neighborhood for their many charitable acts. One charity which the ladies don't advertise is their ongoing effort to permit lonely bachelors to die with smiles on their faces--by serving said bachelors elderberry wine spiked with arsenic. When the sisters' drama-critic nephew Mortimer (Cary Grant) stumbles onto their secret, he is understandably put out--especially since he has just married the lovely Elaine Harper (Priscilla Lane). Given the homicidal tendencies of his aunts, the sinister activities of his escaped-convict older brother Jonathan (Raymond Massey) and the disruptive behavior of younger brother Teddy (John Alexander)--who is convinced that he's really Theodore Roosevelt, and runs around the house yelling "CHAAAAARGGGE"--Mortimer isn't keen on starting a family with his new bride. "Insanity runs in my family," he explains. "It practically gallops." Further complications ensue when the murderous Jonathan Brewster arrives home, with his snivelling accomplice Dr. Einstein (Peter Lorre) in tow. When Jonathan learns that his darling aunts have killed twelve men, he is incensed--they're challenging his own record of murders. Though the movie rights for Arsenic and Old Lace were set up so that the film could not be released until 1944, director Capra shot the film quickly and inexpensively in 1941, so that his family could subsist on his $100,000 salary while he was serving in World War II. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Cary Grant - Mortimer Brewster
Priscilla Lane - Elaine Harper
Raymond Massey - Jonathan Brewster
Jack Carson - Officer O'Hara
Peter Lorre - Dr. Einstein
Edward Everett Horton - Mr. Witherspoon

Arsenic and Old Lace stands in a unique place in Frank Capra's output. Capra had directed a few screwball comedies (It Happened One Night, You Can't Take It with You), and even Meet John Doe had elements of screwball comedy buried within its social commentary, but Arsenic and Old Lace mixed screwball pacing with elements of the macabre into a singularly unusual whole. The circumstances of its production were even more extraordinary -- Capra was about to go into the army and wanted to do a film that would tide him and his family over while he was away; the producers of the play Arsenic and Old Lace allowed him to do the film adaptation, even though it was in the midst of a successful theatrical run, provided that it was held back from release until 1944. He was contractually limited as to the number of actors that he could borrow from the stage production for the film, using John Alexander and Josephine Hull but not, alas, Boris Karloff, who is replaced here by Raymond Massey.
The film's Brewster family of Brooklyn Heights is something like the Addams Family of more recent vintage on television. They're eccentric, live in a big old house, have a lot of strange family members, and have a custom of murdering people in the most genteel manner. Cary Grant is hysterically funny as the only normal member of the family and the one who initially believes the others to be merely eccentric, not murderers. The film is done at a breakneck pace, so that the macabre nature of the action cannot be dwelt on or taken seriously in the least.
The DVD features a glittering film-to-video transfer, with a very clean and sharp image, superior to that of the laserdisc version in most respects. The one flaw is the sound, which is mastered at a relatively low level and which does seem soft in its detail and resolution. The audio does require some pumping up, especially on a speaker system, but at least it's clean enough to permit this without distortion. The disc offers no extras apart from a choice of English of French subtitles, not even a trailer, although it is broken down into 37 chapters that map out the two-hour running time very nicely. The menu pops up automatically on start-up. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide