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Released by: Mill Creek Entertainment
Released on: March 20, 2012.
Director: David Trainer
Cast: Topher Grace, Mila Kunis, Ashton Kutcher, Laura Prepon, Wilmer Walderrama
Year: 1998
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The Movie:
That 70's Show debut on Fox in 1998 and lasted eight seasons until it finally finished up in 2006. The series remained a popular and consistently funny show, far better than your average sitcom, and despite the period setting and dress, it never came across as gimmicky or formulaic.
For those who haven't seen the show it's set in a small town in Wisconsin (and in the 70s, obviously) and based around the exploits of seventeen year old Eric Forman (Topher Grace) who lives at home with his kind hearted mother, Kitty (Debra Jo Rupp), and his tough love dad, Red (Kurtwood Smith). The Forman's live next door to the Pinciotti's - father and mother Bob (Don Stark) and Midge (Tanya Roberts), and their pretty red haired daughter Donna (Laura Prepon), who Eric is dating. They hang out with their mutual friends - superficial airheaded Jackie Burkhart (Mila Kunis), her equally airheaded boyfriend Michael Kelso (Ashton Kutcher), rebellious slacker Steven Hyde (Danny Masterson) and foreign exchange student Fez (Wilmer Valderrama). Occasionally Eric's older sister, Laurie (Lisa Robin Kelly), comes back from college to stay with her family and cause problems, as she and Eric don't get along particularly well.
A lot of the episodes revolve around typical teenage issues - trying to score beer, dealing with parental control, sex, love, school and just hanging out having fun. The series is smart enough to focus on character development first and foremost more so than placing those characters in wacky situations (though plenty of that happens too). By letting us get to know, and very quickly get to like, Eric and Donna and to a lesser extent the rest of the cast it's easy to get sucked in to the show. Some of those aforementioned wacky situations, however, have to be noted. Highlights for season one include an episode where the group finds a keg of beer at the site of the road and decides to have a keg party in the empty swimming pool of a house that Jackie's mother, a real estate agent, has listed for sale. Eric's relationship with Donna becomes strained when a friend of his sisters spends the night and coerces her into kissing him, and in one episode where Kitty insists Red be kinder to their son, he and Bob wind up taking the group to a wrestling match (look for a very self aware cameo from Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson playing his father, wresting legend Rocky Johnson!). When Red is offered a sweet sales job by his old war buddy, he and Kitty unwittingly wind up at a swinger's party and when Eric accompanies his mother to the hospital where she works as a nurse for career day, he learns how hard she works and how to best unwind after dealing with a corpse by singing your heart out in the car on the way home. An episode that takes the group to the next town over for a night of disco fun finds Hyde dancing with Donna, which would become a recurring issue throughout the series as he's quite obviously in love with her, and Fez sweeping Jackie out from under Michael's arms on the dance floor.
There's a heart to a lot of the stories that make them rather sweet, such as the episode in which Red teaches Hyde how to reconcile things with his mother, however fleetingly, and then later in the episode where, after his mother has abandoned him, Kitty insists Hyde move in with the Forman's rather than live on his own. Of course, there are plenty of sweet moments between Eric and Donna too, from the silly (like when he kisses her even though she has puke breath from drinking too much and getting sick) to more tender bits, like when they kiss at a cottage getaway (though Fez shows up shortly after, also to puke from drinking too much - but hey, drinking too much is part of being a teenager and is completely appropriate in this show!). Their relationship contrasts interestingly against the one between Michael and Jackie, who are far more interesting in how good the other one looks than in anything more substantial, at least at this point in the game. Case in point? When Michael sees her sick, without makeup on for the first time, and loses it.
The show certainly works on a small scale, rarely leaving the small town and spending an inordinate amount of time in the Forman family's basement, but it hits all the right notes and holds up incredibly well all these years later. The first season starts off strong and stays that way and by the time it all ends, you're going to want to see where things go in the second season - which is pretty much the point of any show with any sort of continuity, so mission accomplished. If it isn't ever going to be considered the most complex show to ever air on the small screen, it's never the less a fun watch and completely endearing in its own goofy, random way.
Video/Audio/Extras:
Each and every episode in this four disc set, all of which were originally shot on film, looks great by way of Mill Creek's AVC encoded 1.78.1 widescreen 1080p high definition transfers. The show was shown fullframe originally but you're not going to see any obvious cropping at all, in fact, the compositions look great here - it looks like the fullframe aspect ratio was simply cropped on the left and right to fight the 1.33.1 frame. Detail is much stronger than this reviewer expected, from the close up shots to the medium and long distance shots, while the texture now evident in all the tacky seventies fashions on display throughout every single episode is surprisingly revelatory. Skin tones look nice and lifelike, colors are reproduced perfectly and black levels are strong. There are some shots that look unusually soft here and there and some aliasing is more obvious than you might want it to be during the computer graphics transition scenes, but otherwise, the show looks great on Blu-ray.
The only audio option on the disc is an English language DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio mix, with optional English closed captioning. No other language options are provided. Sound quality is rock solid throughout the set, from the instantly recognizable opening theme song to more subdued scenes of dialogue like the moments where Eric and Donna talk on the hood of his car. Sounds effects have some nice punch to them, levels are well balanced, and the more active scenes - like the episode that takes place at the disco - have some good surround activity to show off.
Mill Creek have also included some pretty decent extra features here too, starting with an eighteen minute documentary entitled Hello Wisconsin, which is a nice look back with the core cast and crew members who all discuss their involvement in the series, their characters, the popularity of the show and what they enjoyed most about being involved with the series. The four minute Promopalooza is a collection of, you guessed it, promo spots that originally aired during the show's initial run on Fox, That 70's Show Trivia is a two minute collection of the cast asking you trivia questions which are in turn answered by a clip from the show, and the three minute Groovy Green Screen segment is a montage of clips showing how green screen effects were employed throughout the series with some before and after shots to make for some interesting comparisons. Rounding out the extras is the forty minute A Groovy Sneak Peak At Season Two, which is basically just a collection of highlights from that second season mixed in with some decent behind the scenes footage. Animated menus and chapter stops are available on each of the four discs and you can watch the episodes individually or by way of a 'play all' button. The Blu-ray keepcase is packaged inside a nice cardboard slipscase.
The Final Word:
Mill Creek Entertainment have really hit this one out of the park, offering each episode of That 70's Show in excellent quality. The transfers are surprisingly strong, the audio too, and the extras? Also very good. Given that this set is available at a ridiculously cheap price for what you get, if you're a fan of the series then this should really be a no-brainer. All in all, a pretty kick ass release for a great series.
Click on the images below for full sized Blu-ray screen caps!
