DVD Corner

Listen Up Philip DVD Review

Shut Up Philip.

“Listen Up Philip” is a story about an angry, rude, and selfish author (Philip), his unhappy photographer girlfriend (Ashley), a veteran author/mentor to Philip (Ike), and Ike’s daughter (Melanie). While light on plot, this character study digs into themes and ideas such as relationships, solitude, and writers.

“Listen Up Philip” desperately wants to be a Woody Allen or Wes Anderson film. The only problem is this film doesn’t hold a candle to either of those filmmaker’s works.

Rather than crafting a smart story about artists, writer/director Alex Ross Perry goes out of his way to make the writer characters so insufferable that you wonder why anyone would invest their time watching them. Now, I’m all for making a character flawed, but alienating your audience by forcing them to endure intellectual jackasses is not the best way to get fans. It’s a real shame too because of the talent involved here. Jonathan Pryce, Elizabeth Moss, Jason Schwartzman, and Krysten Ritter are all great actors and actresses so it’s tough to see their talents wasted on mediocre material.

Video/Audio:

Presentation: Widescreen. How does it look? The transfer is fine, but the nauseating shaky cam cinematography style leaves much to be desired.

Audio Track: Dolby Digital 5.1. How does it sound? In a word, solid.

Extras:
* Tribeca Film trailers and a “Listen Up Philip” teaser trailer.
* 7 minutes of deleted scenes.
* A book cover gallery.
* A short featurette on the film that contains interviews, film clips, and discussions about the characters.
* “Behind The Scenes” contains, you guessed it, a collection of behind the scenes footage.
* A solo commentary by Alex Ross Perry. Strictly for fans of the film.

March 4, 2015 - Posted by nicklyons1 | DVD review | Elizabeth Moss, Jason Schwartzman, Jonathan Pryce, Krysten Ritter, Listen Up Philip DVD Review