THE PLOT THUS FAR
The romantic tale of a sheltered uptown Cocker Spaniel dog and a streetwise downtown Mutt.
WHAT WE THOUGHT
Lady arrives one Christmas for Darling, who immediately falls in love with her. Lady didn’t like having to sleep in the kitchen all by herself and as much as Jim despised it, he allowed Lady to sleep with he and Darling…Just for that night though. Two years later, Lady, still sleeping with Jim Dear and Darling awakened to her basic everyday life: chasing birds and fetching the paper. Yeah, life was going along great. She even showed off her new collar and tag to neighbor dogs Scotty Jock and bloodhound Trusty. Trusty has lost his sense of smell and is ashamed to admit it. Can you blame him?
Not too far away in the railroad yard lived Tramp, an unwanted dog. He’s chased by the dog catcher daily and get’s bones for breakfast at Tony’s Italian Eatery. Back at Lady’s house, Darling is expecting! Lady is worried, Jock and Trusty assure her it’s nothing to worry about and Tramp, who just happened by, said it was disaster! When the baby moves in, the dog moves out. Nine months later, the baby came! But Jim Dear and Darling kept Lady, who grew very fond of the infant. Next, they go on a trip and leave Aunt Sarah to tend to the baby, who takes an immediate dislike to Lady. She even get’s Lady a muzzle! But Tramp helps her get it off thanks to a beaver in the zoo. Then they go to dinner at Tony’s where they are served spaghetti and meatballs. Tony even sings for them! Yes, things were going along great when Lady was captured by the dogcatcher and taken to the pound where she meets dogs who knew Tramp and described him as just that, but Tramp proves himself worthy when he catches a rat that had gotten into the baby’s room, but that mean old Aunt Sarah called the pound and had Tramp taken away.
Each character is definitely defined, with Lady’s pampered, sheltered lifestyle reflected in her prettied-up appearance and dainty mannerisms contrasting sharply with that of Tramp, who revels in dirt and walks like he owns the streets. It’s an obvious conflict, but effective like all the best romantic obstacles. Opposites attract indeed. One could try to read some social implication here, but I’m not sure it’s that deep. Rather, the theme here is of many different types of creatures interacting, making this more of a general and simplified story about prejudice than anything else. Honestly, I’d have liked Disney to get more daring with this and actually show some real destitution among the dogs.
The Blu-Ray comes with deleted scenes, featurettes and a DVD copy. I’ve never seen the deleted song before, but I’m glad that the Peggy Lee lawsuit from the early 90s didn’t derail including her material on the set. The Puppypedia stuff is fun, plus the Disney daughter remembrance is pretty touching. However, the A/V Quality is what makes this release a winner. You get the strongest DTS-HD 7.1 audio track of the year with this release. Plus, the 1080p transfer maintains the proper Cinemascope release format of 2.55:1, which is seemingly a home video first. While the movie was originally intended for Academy ratio, the decision to go ultra-wide on the flick happened roughly halfway through the production. The result was that most home video offerings took that friendly 1.37:1 and disregarded the proper cinema release. Fixing that alone makes this release well worth owning. In the end, I’d recommend a purchase.
RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW!
