Tommy

Listening To You I Get The Music......and that's the truth while watching Tommy based on The Who's rock opera. I will say from the get go that if your not a fan of rock music or The Who, just pass it up. No one wants to sit through music they don't like and I totally understand that. However, if you appreciate 70's rock music and more importantly a fan of The Who, then you have a musical treat in store for yourself. The film is indeed a true opera and every scene is a song from the album. There is no reg talking dialog just like Pink Floyds The Wall, another epic masterpiece. The interesting thing about the movie is how they decided the tone and feel of the film. They already obviously had the songs and I assume that Pete Townsend got together with the director Ken Russell and explained his vision. It's a absolutely bizarre musical journey unlike anything else out there in the 100 years of film making...well except for The Wall. The difference is that The Wall is serious and somewhat depressing in its tone and execution while Tommy is a humorist comic book style execution with dark shades of gaudiness and over the top characters. The cast is fantastic and probably a dream team of sorts. You have the great Oliver Reed who plays the evil stepfather. His performance is so caricature and hilarious. People have criticized his singing capabilities but his performance is so great that it doesn't matter. You also have Ann Margret, Jack Nicholson, Robert Powell, Tina Turner, Elton John, Eric Clapton, Paul Nicholas, Roger Daltry as Tommy and Keith Moon as evil Uncle Ernie. All of these great actors and musicians just add to the films experience. This is the kind of film you put in and crank up the home theater sound and rock out with. If you don't get that kind of experience out of this then you're probably dead or at the very least, comatose. A note here about the music in the film vs the album. I actually like the soundtrack to the film a bit better then the original album. It's faster, a little harder edge, a little louder and a couple of more songs then the album. I have both version on my MP3 and you can tell a difference.

I absolutely love this movie. I've seen many times & plan on seeing many more! If your into the classic rock, this is defiantly a great movie to have.. Thank you❤

I loved this movie since I was 3 years old. I am 45 now. My mom thought it was harmless for me to watch because she was a fan of the Who herself. Looking back, it may not have been the most kid friendly movie, although the music was great. But Tina Turner as the Acid Queen and uncle Ernie "Fiddling about" didn't make sense to me when I was 3. I just thought he was being goofy. It wasn't until I was a teenager that I realized he was a child molester. Although I loved Tina Turner as the Acid Queen. Jack Nicholson was in it for a short period that was cool, Ann Margret, Oliver Reed, Eric Clapton with the Marilyn Monroe statues...… The music was absolutely fantastic even for a 3-year-old. However, my mother wondered why when I was a teenager I got so heavily into psychedelic drugs. Perhaps I shouldn't have seen the Acid Queen so many times. LOL. I also like the movie soundtrack better than Tommy by The Who alone that only had them singing. I much prefer the movie version and album where Ann Margaret and Tina Turner and all the others are singing. Since I became an adult quite a while ago, lol, my mother and I saw it on Broadway in NYC. Truthfully, I didn't like it very much live. They changed a lot of the stories around. Sally Simpson had a much different part and without Ann Margaret, it just didn't have that special something. It also didn't have the who in it so it wasn't even like listening to the album by The Who and minus the movie characters for Tommy it was a different story, different lyrics and for those of us who were die hard Tommy fans our whole lives it was just a little too different to the actual story then I would have preferred. And Believe it or not, I was 18 years old when we saw Tommy on Broadway and that was the first time I actually realized what Uncle Ernie's fiddling about really meant. I mean, it says it in the lyrics, but it was made much more obvious in the Broadway show. But the movie is one that should never be missed. One of the most amazing rock operas ever made.

What is there to say about "Tommy"? Most people buying this will know that it is based on the Rock Opera by Pete Townshend (with some minor contributions from both John Entwistle and Keith Moon). It was a pivotal album for the band coming off of the previous albums. Townshend had already penned a concept album ("The Who Sell Out") including jingles and the idea of listening to Radio 1. He took it to the next step using his enlightenment and following the philosophy of his guru. The big hit single from both this soundtrack and the original album was "Pinball Wizard" which Townshend integrated into the original album when a DJ stated he would play their next album if it had a song about...playing pinball. So the concept was packaged and sold as such with an inspired bit of songwriting that many artists would turn into major hits. For those that don't know the plot. Who singer Roger Daltrey plays Tommy- a child who is blind, deaf and can't speak. His one passion and what makes him come alive is playing pinball where he never loses. His mother seeks a cure for him including using unconventional methods such as drugs to try and bring him out of his prison. Eventually, a cult grows around Tommy. Featuring a stellar cast of (at-the-time) who's who of Hollywood including Jack Nicholson, Ann-Margaret, Robert Powell (who went on to fame playing Jesus Christ in the popular TV movie "Jesus of Nazareth") and Oliver Reed, the musical guests include Elton John (who turned "Pinball Wizard" into a massive hit single for the album and himself), Eric Clapton, the members of The Who and Tina Turner. Director Ken Russell known for his often outrageous approach to the material he directed, adapted the script from Townshend's songs and directed. Shout has put the film on a 100 gig 4K disc which allows for maximum detail. There's also a Blu-ray with the same transfer included. Pulled from a new 4k scan of the original camera negative (and the interpositive where the negative was damaged), colors pop and the film, with its new HDR grading, looks terrific or at least the best it possibly could for a film from 1975. There might be a smidge drop in quality where the film goes from the OCN to the inter-positive but it isn't a huge jump. Most folks won't notice it. The audio is presented in its original 5 channel presentation, stereo (for some theaters) and a 5.1 mix in DTS. There is no Atmos mix (I have to wonder if all the stems are still available or if, perhaps, they couldn't afford the expense of using Peter Jackson's MAL software to assemble an Atmos). English subs are provided. There are no special features to speak of for the film. It's a pity as a commentary track from Townshend and Daltrey would have been interesting but expensive. There are no surviving outtakes that are included, edits or trims of various scenes. A featurette discussing the making of the original album, its translation to the screen would have been of interest to fans but I suspect, due to licensing costs and the cost of the new transfer, that just wasn't in the budget. "Tommy" is dated in its own way but it's also a timeless musical at the same time. Given the fact that cult-like behavior still exists among us, it also is just as timely in its own way as it was in 1969 and 1975.

This review is on the quality of the 4K - not the storyline of the film. There are several reviews on Tommy to read here. The audio comes in 2.0 Stereo, 5.0 Channel Sound and 5.1 Surround Sound. But about the transfer, Shout Factory did a new 4K scan of the Film from the original negative. The point to this review is simple, IT IS THE BEST QUALITY 4K PICTURE I HAVE SEEN!!! The colors are intense and never bleed, the lights are bright, the shadows are dark and the detail is as sharp as it gets! I highly recommend this 4K release of "Tommy"!!! ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Tommy : The Movie; The 4k UHD Disc, Very Subtle picture improvement. Movie is listed 1.85:1 in Dolby Vision. It showed on my 65" TV almost Full Screen, barely any black bars. The clarity was outstanding. The color accurate and believable. It is technically better than when I was at the World Premiere in Quintaphonic Sound, in 1975. The Soundtrack was 5.0 Quintaphonic or 5.1 DTS HD or Dolby 2.0 Stereo. I am very pleased with quality of the mix. The vocals were clear and present, without distortion, and it really was improved over the Sony BD. I listened in 5.1 (auto 7.1 Atmos), and heard instruments that I never heard before. I have seen this movie at least 200 times. It is too bad that there is no supplemental materials, Not even a trailer. However the film, I am very pleased with this 50th anniversary edition's rendering. P.S> Although Ann-Margret was nominated for an Oscar, she didn't win, but should have.

Great movie

I have been wanting to see Tommy because I enjoy the music so much. I saw it when it first came out and had it on my Netflix DVD list forever but it always noted that it would be a very long wait. I'm also waiting for snowballs in Hell. Finally decided to see if I could buy my own DVD. When I placed order I was told it would be about a month before I would get it. Surprised me, Amazon orders are usually just a few days. I ordered it, expecting Amazon to get it to me much quicker than initially promised. After a couple of weeks I got email saying it had shipped. Figured it would be a few days after that. It was more like two weeks and it required a 21+ signature. It obviously came from overseas, had a customs label on it. As soon as wife-unit and I had an uninterrupted time, I loaded it up. The video portion was not as sharp as contemporary DVDs, but I accepted that due to the technology of the time when the DVD was produced. The audio was terrible, which surprised me, because audio has pretty much been good to great since DVDs were first made. This was very disappointing to me, Tommy is a rock opera and the music makes the production. I will try to find a better DVD locally, but this will have to suffice until I do. Tommy itself is one of my favorite albums. I got vinyl when it first came out and my wife bought a super high-end CD for about three times what the standard CD cost that I treasure. If I could only have one album on a desert island it would be Tommy--I wouldn't think twice about it.

Grande capolavoro rock, peccato non poter togliere i sottotitoli

I had this dvd already so when I got it out to watch a while ago I found it was cracked and it's such an amazing film I just had to buy a new one, it seems a bit strange in the beginning but if you stick with it and it does get better, the music is absolutely brilliant

Je possède depuis longtemps l'album TOMMY et il fallait à tout prix que je voie ce film. Bon d'accord, au niveau musical je prèfère la musique originale ;-), mais le but était pas de voir la mise en scène de l'histoire de Tommy et de mettre en face de chaque morceau une scène. C'est réussi! S'ajoute le plaisir de voir Elton John chanter et jouer du piano avec un flipper hallucinant (Pinball Wizard), Jack Nicholson jouer le rôle de Docteur (There's A Doctor et Go To The Miror), Tina Turner dans le rôle de la gitane qui essaye de guérir Tommy par injection de LSD dans un sarcophage et des seringues aussi hallucinante (The Acid Queen), pour ne citer que quelques scènes. Au niveau de la distribution, Roger Daltrey, le chanteur de The Who s'en sort très bien, et Ann-Margret et Oliver Reed son excellent.s Quant au ton du film, ses extravagances et aux décors, wouah! je vous laisse juger. Admiration sans borne de Pete Townheld! Qualité de Blu-ray : OK.

Excelente la edición, con slipcover de cartón y caja del bluray color blanco... en cuanto a la película se realmente muchísimo mejor que ediciones anteriores en bluray y el sonido 5.1 es excelente. Muy recomendable

La consegna è stata rapida. Quanto al prodotto, la confezione era integra. Considerando che sono passati quasi 50 anni dalla registrazione del film, la qualità del dvd è davvero buona e non ha deluso le mie aspettative. Sono rimasto soddisfatto. Giorgio