Possibly one of the most accessible films to be released by the Criterion Collection, Jonathan Demme’s “Something Wild” features a wonderful performance by Melanie Griffith, Jeff Daniels and Ray Liotta. But it’s the clever writing from E. Max Frye along with Demme’s direction that really makes this film enjoyable, entertaining and fun! Recommended!
Image courtesy of © 1986 Orion Pictures Corporation. 2011 The Criterion Collection All Rights Reserved.
TITLE: Something Wild – The Criterion Collection #563
RELEASE OF FILM: 1986
DURATION: 113 Minutes
DVD INFORMATION: Color, 1:78:1 Aspect Ratio, 2.0 Surround
COMPANY: Orion Pictures/MGM/The Criterion Collection
RELEASED: May 10, 2011
Directed by Jonathan Demme
Written by E. Max Frye
Eecutive Producer: Edward Saxon
Producer: Jonathan Demme, Kenneth Utt
Associate Producer: Ronald M. Bozman, Bill Miller
Music by Laurie Anderson, John Cale
Cinematography by Tak Fujimoto
Edited by Craig McKay
Casting by Risa Bramon Garcia, Billy Hopkins
Production Design by Norma Moriceau
Art Direction by Stephen J. Lineweaver
Set Decoration by William F. Reynolds
Starring:
Jeff Daniels as Charles Driggs
Melanie Griffith as Lulu/Audrey Hankel
Ray Liotta as Ray Sinclair
George “Red” Schwartz as Counter Man
Leib Lensky as Frenchy
Tracey Walter as the Country Squire
Dana Preu as Peaches
Mary Ardella Drew as Donna Penski
Margaret Colin as Irene
Steven Scales as Nelson
Robert Ridgely as Richard Graves
A straitlaced businessman meets a quirky, free-spirited woman at a downtown New York greasy spoon. Her offer of a ride back to his office results in a lunchtime motel rendezvous—just the beginning of a capricious interstate road trip that brings the two face-to-face with their hidden selves. Featuring a killer soundtrack and electric performances from Jeff Daniels, Melanie Griffith, and Ray Liotta, Something Wild, directed by oddball American auteur Jonathan Demme, is both a kinky comic thriller and a radiantly off-kilter love story.
Academy Award winning director Jonathan Demme is well-known for his films such as “The Silence of the Lambs” (1991), “Philadelphia” (1993) and the remake of “The Manchurian Candidate” (2004) but many years before these films, he had been directing since the early ’70s beginning with “Caged Heat” in 1974.
The film would be the first major collaboration between Jonathan Demme and cinematographer Tak Fujimoto (“The Silence of the Lambs”, “The Sixth Sense”) and in 1986, having worked together for several films, the duo once again returned to work on the film “Something Wild”, written by E. Max Frye (“Band of Brothers”).
The film would star Jeff Daniels (“Good night, and good luck”, “SPEED”, “Pleasantville”), Melanie Griffith (“Body Double”, “Working Girl”, “The Bonfire of the Vanities”) and Ray Liotta (“Goodfellas”, “Identity”, “Smokin’ Aces”). And the film would not only become a cult hit, each of the three major talent received a Golden Globe nomination for their performance in the film.
Also, a highlight of the film was its music soundtrack featuring music from New Order, Oingo Boingo, UB40, Fine Young Cannibals, David Y Celia, Jimmy Cliff and Sister Carol to name a few. The film had two composers, John Cale (“American Psycho”, “Shrek”, “The School of Rock”, “Sid and Nancy”) and music artist Laurie Anderson.
While “Something Wild” has received a DVD release back in 2001, the DVD has been out of print for quite some time. But now the Criterion Collection will be releasing their second Jonathan Demme film (the first was “The Silence of the Lambs – The Criterion Collection #13”) on Blu-ray and DVD in May 2011.
The film would receive a restored high definition digital transfer supervised by cinematographer Tak Fujimoto and was approved by Jonathan Demme.
“Something Wild” is a film that begins with a banker named Charles Driggs (played by Jeff Daniels). A banker who was recently made to VP, a family man and looks like your average normal and successful guy. But when he was at a local diner, Driggs did a dine and dash which caught the attention of Audrey “Lulu” Hankel (played by Melanie Griffith).
When Audrey confronts him about not paying his bill, needless to say that Audrey’s flirtatious and wild side begins to allure Charles into wanting to spend time with her. When she asks him to join her, Charles calls in late for work but part of him is cautious about this woman he just met. He just met her and already they are wanting to have sex with each other.
But she’s also a thief, easily going into gas stations and using her sexuality to get men to do things for her (while she steals) and even making Charles do a major dine and dash at a restaurant, needless to say, what has he gotten himself into? He is a married man with children with a wonderful job but here he finds himself doing mischievous things together while they spend a day on a road trip from New York to Tallahassee.
Beginning with their hot lovemaking (use of handcuffs), getting Charles to drink hard liquor to Charles pretending he is Lulu’s husband in front of her mother and at her high school reunion, he is doing something unusual and Charles finds himself drawn to the wild Lulu.
She’s wild, she’s carefree and he’s drawn to her…but yet, Lulu finds herself drawn to Charles. May it be that clean cut and successful lifestyle that he lives and emits the facade that he is a straight-lace individual but down inside, he lies but also partakes in a little dine and dash.
Is there a rebellious side of Charles that is yearning to come out?
At first, Charles feel that there should be no problem by spending some time with Lulu because after all, they are hundreds of miles away from New York, where no one knows who he is.  But Charles is shocked and begins to worry when he is spotted by the accountant of his company who attended high school with Lulu and happens to be at her high school reunion. Also, to make things worse, an ex-convict who has apparent history with Lulu named Ray Sinclair (played by Ray Liotta) has some unfinished business with her.
Needless to say, life for Charles Driggs from this day forward will never be the same.
VIDEO:
“Something Wild” is presented in the director’s approved aspect ratio of 1:78:1. Director of photography Tak Fujimoto supervised the restoration and the final high-definition digital transfer was approved by director Jonathan Demme.
According to the Criterion Collection, this new high definition digital transfer was created on a Spirit Datacine from a 35 mm interpositive. Thousands of instances of dirt, debris, scratches, splices, warps, jitter and flicker were manually removed using MTI’s Digital Restoration System and Pixel Farm’s PFClean system, while Digital Vision’s DVNR system was used for small dirt, grain and noise reduction.
With that being said, if you want the best presentation of this film, you will definitely want to get the Blu-ray release.  But I will say that this DVD release is fantastic, especially when comparing the picture quality to the 2001 DVD release. The PQ looks a lot cleaner and doesn’t look aged at all. I would assume that since the film is shot outdoor for many scenes, that the Blu-ray release will be much more vibrant but still, this is a really good presentation of the film on DVD and fans of the film should be happy.
AUDIO & SUBTITLES:
“Something Wild” is presented in 2.0 Surround. According to the Criterion Collection, the soundtrack was mastered at 24-bit from a 35 mm magnetic track and clicks, thumps, hiss and hum were manually removed using Pro Tools HD. Crackle was attenuated using AudioCube’s integrated workstation.
Similar to the video, if you want the best presentation for audio, you will definitely want to go for the Blu-ray release. Otherwise, the 2.0 surround track is clear through the front channels. I opted to set my receiver to play stereo on all channels for a more immersive soundtrack but for the DVD sounds great. I didn’t notice any audio defects and the dialogue and music were crisp and clear, especially during those short action sequences.
Subtitles are presented in English SDH.
SPECIAL FEATURES:
“Something Wild – The Criterion Collection #563” DVD comes with the following special features:
- Interviews – The following interviews are featured: Director Jonathan Demme (33:14) on working on the film and casting the talent and writer E. Max Frye (9:19) talking about how he came up with the story for the film and why he chose Jonathan Demme to direct the film.
- Trailer – (2:27) The original theatrical trailer for “Something Wild”.
EXTRAS:
Included is a 20-page booklet featuring the following essay “Wild Things” by David Thompson.
Melanie Griffith definitely made heads turn when she played the porn star in Brian De Palma’s “Body Double” in 1984.  I have no doubt that she is going to make heads turn with her erotic and mischievous performance in “Something Wild”.
A film that is a vindication for Jonathan Demme who saw his previous film “Swing Shift” being re-shot and changed due to actress Goldie Hawn and the studio insistence as they were not content with the film’s serious tone, a tone that Demme wanted the film to be.
His work on “Swing Shift” was not what he and Taku Fujimoto were expecting and for Jonathan Demme, it could have been the end of his filming career as he was discontent with what had happen to his film. But fortunately, screenwriter E. Max Frye was a fan of one of Demme’s films and had him on the shortlist with Martin Scorsese. With Scorsese busy with another film, Demme was brought back in but this time, giving him the creative freedom to make “Something Wild” the way he wanted it to be.
What we get is a sexually-charged ’80s film but with characters that have depth but also have a mysterious side to them that is revealed as the storyline progresses.
Melanie Griffith plays a multi-dimensional role as a mysterious and care-free woman who is looking for trouble but somehow the man she ends up being interested in, is not your average bad boy. He’s a straight-laced, clean cut guy who is a successful businessman but a man who likes to dabble in the side of danger, even if that danger may be him not paying his tab at a diner. But it’s the sexual tension between Lulu and Charles that captures everyone to the big screen. The eroticism at the beginning of the film shows us that Griffith literally owned the role, she was perfectly cast and did a wonderful job.
Jeff Daniels on the other hand does a very good job at playing the clean cut guy who probably is tired of being clean-cut but willing to do small things that he can always get away with by pretending that her forgot to pay for his tab. But you know this guy wouldn’t do anything to risk his career. Lulu knows it and we see in the beginning of the film that she tries to make his life a little bit unpredictable when she handcuffs him while on top of him and then calling his office and then literally making him talk to his boss while she pleasures him. Daniels plays the innocent guy very well, as Griffith can easily play the naughty girl role as she did with “Body Double” but this time around, showing us that she has tremendous potential as an actress (which should earn her an Academy Award nomination for her starring role in the 1989 film “Working Girl” and a Golden Globe nomination for her role in “Something Wild”).
But perhaps the biggest surprise was Ray Liotta, the soap opera star from “Another World” and only appeared in TV series, being given the chance to be in a feature film. Liotta did a fantastic job as the ex-convict Ray who literally has an aura which makes you feel that he is a guy up to no good.  I have no doubt that his role and strong performance in “Something Wild” was what gave him the opportunity to play a tough guy and one of the main characters in Martin Scorsese’s 1990 film “Goodfellas”.
“Something Wild” is now a cult film that people still love to watch because it’s a unique movie. Both director Jonathan Demme and writer E. Max Frye managed to create a film that is built around its characters and fortunately, casting was perfect for this film and working with Daniels, Griffith and Liotta paid off. We know that Charles friendship/relationship with Lulu would get him into trouble but instead of going through the usual banal route of a spiraling person out of control, instead we see how both Charles and Lulu eventually compliment each other.
As for the Blu-ray and DVD release of “Something Wild”, I wish there was an audio commentary included, as a Criterion Collection release without one is usually unheard of.  Special features are more on the short side but you do get about 45 minutes of special feature content with interviews with director Jonathan Demme, writer E. Max Frye and the film’s original theatrical trailer plus a 20-page book. You do get a much better transfer on DVD (and I’m quite confident that the film looks and sounds even better on Blu-ray) than its 2001 DVD counterpart but you have to give credit to the Criterion Collection for taking an ’80s film (which could have shown it’s age) and really giving Criterion fans a solid transfer. “Something Wild” looks very good on DVD and I can only imagine how magnificent it would look on Blu-ray.
While Jonathan Demme will always be remembered for his work on “The Silence of the Lambs” and possibly even “Philadelphia”, his work on “Something Wild” is possibly among my favorite films from the director because this could have been a dark and twisted film.
Demme and E. Max Frye chose to focus on character development and we can see the transformation of these characters as the story progresses and thanks to the wonderful performances by the three talents, the efficacy of “Something Wild” was realized with its strong plot and its fun musical soundtrack made “Something Wild” a highlight for me back in the mid-80’s.
Overall, “Something Wild” is possibly one of the more accessible Hollywood films released from the Criterion Collection. If you are looking for a fun, smart, upbeat black comedy…you can’t go wrong with “Something Wild”.
Definitely recommended!
