At this point, most of the major sports played in the U.S. have a quotable film that fans love to reference. Baseball has Major League. Hockey has Slap Shot. Basketball has White Men Can’t Jump. Football has Jerry Maguire and The Longest Yard. For Golf, Caddyshack is that film. There is no equal. In fact, Caddyshack is downright one of those quotable movies for all occasions. Then again, what did you expect when you had Harold Ramis direct Rodney Dangerfield, Bill Murray, and Chevy Chase? It’s one of the most resilient comedies of the last 50 years and now Warner Brothers has given it the Blu-ray treatment.
Bushwood Country Club is like any place where rich white people congregate. It has a golf course, old people, and plenty of room for satire. Danny Noonan (Michael O’Keefe) works as a caddy there and walks a fine line as the caddy for both easy going, suave golfer Ty Webb (Chevy Chase) and the rich Judge Smails (Ted Knight), who might be the key to Danny getting a scholarship. It’s not easy being Smails’s caddy though, as his fiery temper gets plenty of fuel from the ever-talkative, obnoxious Al Czervik (Rodney Dangerfield) and the romantic ambitions of his suggestively named niece Lacey Underall (Cindy Morgan). The story starts with a brief intro of the characters and works up to the big showdown between Webb and Smails. In between it all the caddies wreak havoc, Dangerfield rolls out one-liners like cars at a used car fire sale, and Bill Murray hunts down a gopher in one of his most memorable roles (mostly due to how quotable he is). As Carl Spackler, the mumbling, mentally absent handyman of the country club, Bill Murray crafts plastic explosive gophers, floods the golf course, and gives rambling monologues about sexing up the club’s patrons and delivers the oft-quoted line about the Dalai Lama.
The Blu-ray transfer doesn’t fix any pre-existing picture problems, however it definitely gives a noticeable boost to the colors. There’s new life for the film in the hi-def transfer, at least visually. However, what aren’t fixed are the individual scenes where the lighting of a given sequence changes to be dimmer than in those previous or the ones immediately afterward. It’s an odd issue, and one that has always existed. I can’t fault Warner Brothers for not going through and correcting something Ramis should have done all those years back, but it’s one of those “Hey, while you’re poking around in there…” factors that would have been interesting to see changed.
The sound hasn’t gotten too much of a kick either. The places where the recorded audio for a given scene were blown out in the original remain that way here. The only possible place where a change might have been made was in the mastering of the music track. The film captures that feeling of summer days better than many films that have followed and the soundtrack deserves credit for that. Kenny Loggins became a staple for 80s soundtracks and for Caddyshack it’s a perfect match.
It’s the film you know, it’s the film you love, it’s the film you quote when you want everyone around you to laugh in approval. It’s on Blu-ray now and while most of the problems that existed beforehand are still there, it does look better visually thanks to the colors looking more vivid in hi-definition. If that’s not enough, maybe the feature-length documentary will sway you.
Blu-ray Bonus Features
For a full hour and twenty minutes, we get to listen to the cast and crew talk about the 3-month party that was the filming of Caddyshack. John Murray, Harold Ramis, Michael O’Keefe, Scott Columby, and Cindy Morgan recount some of the chaotic happenings that made Caddyshack what it is. If you ever wondered if the cast was hammered or high throughout the film, the answer is pretty much a unanimous ‘yes’. And, surprise surprise, just like in the movie, Ted Knight found the onset antics troubling while Dangerfield loved it all. If the new documentary isn't enough, the older DVD retrospective has been included as well.
"Caddyshack" is on sale June 8, 2010 and is rated R. Comedy. Directed by Harold Ramis. Written by Brian Doyle-Murray & Harold Ramis & Douglas Kenney. Starring Bill Murray, Chevy Chase, Rodney Dangerfield, Ted Knight, Cindy Morgan, Michael OKeefe.
