Synopsis
The film tells the ageless story of Romeo and Juliet against a backdrop of gang warfare in 1950’s New York. A love affair is fated for tragedy amidst the vicious rivalry between two street gangs – the Jets and the Sharks. When Jets member Tony (Richard Beymer, The Longest Day) falls for Maria (Natalie Wood, Splendor in the Grass), the sister of the Sharks leader, it’s more than these two warring gangs can handle. As mounting tensions rise, a battle to the death ensues and innocent blood is shed in a heartbreaking finale.
As musicals go, this is probably in the top five. Beautifully choreographed, composed and acted, West Side Story is a true timeless classic in every sense of the word. Of course, with the talents of famed writer/composer Leonard Bernstein and director Robert Wise, it’s not difficult to see how this was pulled off so well. What the music, story and dancing created was a balanced re-telling of Romeo & Juliet, and they did it perfectly. The Shakespearean tragedy has been done like this before, but it takes real precision and skill to make it work, especially in a 50s backdrop.
Of course, getting the story to work requires actors/actresses who perfectly fit the bill, and that was done well.
The lovely Natalie Wood leads the way as our Juliet named Maria. Her performance as a Puerto Rica beauty just goes to show how truly diverse her acting ability was at the time. Sheesh, who knew she could sing? Opposite of her was the talented Richard Beymer as Tony, a rather goofy goody-two shoes, who plays the middle-man / Romeo part without a hitch. He’s believable as the innocent of the group and his transformation from good to a killer is pretty dramatic, but beautifully appropriate. Outside of the two main characters, the passion from George Chakiris as Bernardo, the Shark’s gang leader (Tybalt, if you will) and Russ Tamblyn’s Riff, the Jets’ gang leader, was fun to watch. Their back and forth folly between hate/love was both playful and vicious.
Anyway, the acting, story and direction/music was something to behold in this 1961 classic. If you have never seen it then I would highly recommend picking this up, especially on Blu-ray.
Speaking of Blu-ray, how did 20th Century Fox/MGM treat this classic? Well, it’s about 85% absolutely stunning. The movie lends well to the format, as it features bright colors (heavy yellows, reds, blues) and some deep dark shades of loveliness (blacks, purples, etc). You get little to no graininess or artifacts, and you get absolutely no color banding. Once in a while the other 15% crops its ugly head up in the film and all that beauty seems to fade a bit. As I was watching this with my wife, who had to explain a ton of things about the story to me, I noticed that the main film would switch to a different stock. This switch caused the colors to go bland, and at times even look dirty. It didn’t happen a lot, but when it did happen it was horribly noticeable. In the end, it still looked and sounded gorgeous on the Blu-ray format. You get 7.1 audio on this release, which is fitting for an epic musical such as West Side Story.
As for features, wowsers. The features are as follows:
• ALL-NEW: Pow! The Dances of West Side Story – cast members, contemporary filmmakers, dancers and choreographers analyze and illuminate the film’s famous dance sequences.
◦ Prologue
◦ Dance At the Gym
◦ Tony and Maria’s Cha Cha
◦ America
◦ The Rumble
◦ Maria’s Roof Dance
◦ Cool
• ALL-NEW: A Place for Us: West Side Story’s Legacy – a look back at the iconic film and the impact it has had all over the world
◦ Creation and Innovation
◦ A Timeless Vision
• Song Specific Commentary by Lyricist Stephen Sondheim
◦ Prologue
◦ The Jet Song
◦ Something’s Coming
◦ Dance At the Gym
◦ Maria
◦ America
◦ Tonight
◦ Gee, Officer Krupke
◦ I Feel Pretty
◦ One Hand, One Heart
◦ Quintet
◦ Somewhere
◦ Cool
◦ A Boy Like That / I Have A Love
• Music Machine –allows viewers to go straight to their favorite musical numbers
• West Side Memories
• Storyboard to Film Comparison Montage
• Trailers
◦ Original Theatrical Trailer
◦ Original Issue Trailer
◦ Reissue Trailer
◦ Animated Trailer
I’m so happy that 20th Century Fox and MGM treated this release appropriately. They took great care into putting together new interviews with cast, crew and surviving family members. You get a lot of information about the transformation of the Broadway play to film, and you get a lot of information on the music creation from Bernstein. It’s possibly one of the more enjoyable releases this year. On top of this, you get memories, commentary and plenty of extras to keep you busy. They did an excellent job on the above features and it will keep the music playing long after the feature has ended.