Wonderwall

Released by: Shout! Factory
Released on: March 25, 2014
Directed by: Joe Massot
Cast: Jack MacGowran, Jane Birkin, Iain Quarrier
Year: 1968
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The Movie

Wonderwall is most well known today as the inspiration for That Song. That song that every oh-so-sensitive-guy-with-a-guitar plays to pick up women in university dorms everywhere. However, the film was also the reason George Harrison got together with Eric Clapton, Ringo Starr and The Remo Four to record Wonderwall Music, Harrison's first solo album and the soundtrack for Wonderwall. So yes, for better or worse, Wonderwall is part of music history, but as a film, it's an artifact of the late 1960s that's more interesting when viewed as a product of its time rather than a fully satisfying work in its own right.

Wonderwall tells the story of a reclusive old bachelor known as the Professor (Jack MacGowran) who becomes infatuated with Penny Lane (Jane Birkin), the beautiful model who lives next door, and the psychedelic world she inhabits with her swinging photographer boyfriend (Iain Quarrier) and their friends. Alone in his flat one night, a shadow of Penny is projected through a hole in the Professor's wall, and he is immediately drawn to her slender naked form. Through the hole in the wall, the Professor becomes transported into Penny's world of fashion, modeling, sex, and psychedelic drugs. The Professor becomes so obsessed with her that he strips the wallpaper from his wall and drills as many holes as he can into it so he can spy on Penny from every angle and vantage point. Eventually, the Professor is inspired to become her champion. Or at least, he's inspired to put on a top hat and cape and sneak into her apartment. Being a champion is confusing when you're an old man on an acid trip.

MacGowran is charming and humorous as the befuddled, obsessed Profesor. His facial tics, odd behavior, and deadpan comedic delivery make his performance consistently amusing to watch, and it's not hard to imagine an audience of hippies in 1968 laughing their asses off while watching this doddering old square trip out and go gaga for Jane Birkin. If MacGowran wasn't such a likeable old fool, his character would have been quite creepy. He's a peeping tom, but the film presents him as a romantic hero, inspired and transformed by his love for the girl next door. As Penny Lane, Birkin is beautiful and alluring, but also sympathetic. This is especially true of the Original Theatrical Version, which includes two key scenes involving her character that don't appear in the Director's Version. It's possible to criticize the script for not giving her much to do except look sexy in the first half of the film and pathetic in the second, but Wonderwall's strengths aren't in its script or performances from the cast.

Wonderwall isn't meant to be watched for the story. Wonderwall is meant to be watched on drugs. That's not a dismissal of the film; it's an acknowledgment of the filmmaker's intentions. This is an acid movie. It's a movie in which a man dressed up as LSD Superman fences with an old man dressed in a top hat and cape, only to defeat him with a giant tube of lipstick. The droning sitar and tabla score from Harrison and his collaborators is meant to be a mind-expanding, sonic compliment to the non-diegetic high you're already feeling. The same is true of its visuals, which often feature fluctuating colors, strobe effects, dreamy montages, and painted title cards that ask existential questions like “Are you in a hole?” and so on.

Wonderwall is a time capsule of the era that produced it, and reflects the mindset and values of the youth culture in 1968. It has a plot and characters and an outline of a story, but these are all secondary to the sitar tunes and trippy visuals. You're not supposed to tune in to Wonderwall; you're supposed to tune out as the lysergic spectacle unfolds and greets you with montages of Jane Birkin's comely legs dancing around while animated butterflies flutter in front of your dazed eyeballs. As a movie it's just okay, but as an artifact of the Love Generation in Swinging London during the late 60's, Wonderwall is a curiosity that's worth preserving, and Shout! Factory has done a great job of that.

Audio/Video/Extras

Wonderwall is presented in its Original Theatrical Version as well as a Director's Cut in 1080p on Blu-ray in 1:66:1 aspect ratio. The Original Theatrical Version runs 92 minutes long, and the Director's Version has a running time of only 74 minutes. In addition to cutting two scenes from the Original Theatrical Version, the Director's Version features a different music arrangement. The Pinewood restoration, is identical in both versions, and the results vary throughout the film. Their high-definition transfer looks quite good for the most part, but there are certain points in the film where the print appears to have been badly damaged. Colors are at their most vivid and saturated during the scenes at Penny Lane's flat. Overall, Wonderwall looks quite good in HD for a film that probably had to be restored from multiple sources.

The DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio audio presentation of Wonderwall leaves something to be desired. If you're a fan of the pop and hiss of vinyl, then you might feel comfortable with this release, but the sound is very thin and despite being mixed in 5.1 stereo it sounds more like a DTS-Mono track. The film never really seems like it's in stereo until the score by George Harrison and the Remo Four kicks in.

Fans of Wonderwall will enjoy a wealth of extras on this Blu-ray, starting with a 31-page collector's booklet, which details the cultural context and background of the film's production in 60's London, how George Harrison and the Remo Four became involved with the film, the recording of Wonderwall Music, the film's soundtrack and Harrison's debut solo album, biographies of the principal cast, and much more. For a 31-page booklet, it provides an in-depth look at the making of the film in the absence of an audio commentary track, which this disc does not include.

Other extras featured on this Blu-ray include: a gallery of publicity stills, publicity text, including a casting story and a press release, cast biographies for Jack MacGowran, Jane Birkin, and Iain Quarrier, a 2-minute highlight reel from MacGowran's performance as the Professor called The Comic Art of Jack MacGowran, a 12-minute short film directed by Joe Massot featuring The Beatles called Reflections on Love (1966), The Art of Marijke, a highlight reel of the painted title cards from the film, a music video for Eric Clapton's “Skiing,” a 32-second track from the film score, an untitled poem by John Lennon, a music video for Harrison and The Remo Four's song “In the First Place,” a Theatrical Trailer, and an outtake from the film.

The Final Word

Wonderwall is best viewed as a curiosity from another era, probably while high, but it's also a surprisingly sweet and charming film that will entertain even while sober. Fans of the film will be delighted by Shout! Factory and Pinewood's presentation of the film on Blu-ray which, despite some problems with the quality of the original film elements and a somewhat lackluster DTS-HD 5.1 sound mix, is supported by two separate versions of the film, an in-depth collector's booklet, and many additional features.

Click on the images below for full sized Blu-ray screen caps!