Search - Topsy-Turvy on DVD

MPAA Rating: R Content Advisory: Brief Nudity, Adult Situations, Questionable for Children, Adult Language Movie Release: 1999 DVD Release: 06/20/2000 Format: DVD - Enhanced Wide Screen Letterbox for 16x9 TV - Closed Captioned Edition: Dual Layered Audio Tracks: English Subtitles: English, French, Spanish SwapaDVD Credits: 1 Number of Discs: 1 Run Time: 2 hrs 41 mins Studio: Polygram USA Video Members Wishing: 13 Genres: Comedy Drama, Musical, Period Film, Musical Drama, Biopic [feature]

Noted for intimate character studies created in collaboration with his actors, director Mike Leigh makes a dramatic change of pace with this biography of comic opera composers W.S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan. Gilbert (Jim Broadbent) is an easily angered but otherwise emotionally remote lyricist who works in collaboration with composer Sullivan (Alan Corduner), a genial and fun-loving sort who feels unsatisfied writing light operettas and longs to work with more serious material. While Sullivan is having a creative crisis, Gilbert is facing a failing marriage to Lucy (Lesley Manville), who loves her husband even if he can't return her affections, and must deal with his ailing father (Charles Simon). When they suffer their first failure, both men are depressed, and Sullivan announces that he's giving up operetta for good. However, a visit to an exhibit of Japanese art sparks an idea in Gilbert, and soon he and Sullivan are hard at work on what will become one of their greatest successes, The Mikado. Much of the film is devoted to the staging of this classic, with Shirley Henderson, Dorothy Atkinson, Martin Savage, Timothy Spall, and Kevin McKidd as members of the operetta's cast. Jim Broadbent won Best Actor at the 1999 Venice Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Jim Broadbent - W.S.Gilbert
Alan Corduner - Arthur Sullivan
Lesley Manville - Lucy Gilbert
Eleanor David - Fanny Ronalds
Ron Cook - Richard D'Oyly Carte

Mike Leigh's loving tribute to the musicals of Gilbert and Sullivan, Topsy Turvy comes to DVD with a widescreen anamorphic transfer that faithfully reproduces the original theatrical aspect ratio of 1.85:1. Closed-captioned English soundtracks are rendered in both Dolby Digital 5.1 and Dolby Digital Surround. Spanish and French subtitles are accessible. Supplemental materials include information on the famous composing duo, a theatrical trailer, television spots, a "making of" featurette, a photo gallery, and cast and crew biographies and filmographies. Admirers of Gilbert and Sullivan, as well as aficionados of period pieces, will savor this generous disc. ~ Perry Seibert, All Movie Guide