Oh Brother!

 

Picture: C     Sound: C+     Extras: D     Episodes: C

 

 

You will never see gentle comedies involving religion again.  Hijacking extremists have made shows like The Flying Nun and the BBC hit Oh Brother! relics of the past.  In the case of the latter, most of the episodes have been lost, but Koch is releasing eight surviving shows in a two-DVD set.  Derek Nimmo is the ever-accident prone and ever awkward Brother Dominic, always out of step with the norms of conformity, no matter how sincerely he tries to participate and fit in.

 

It does not have the heart and soul of The Flying Nun, but the humor or more bombastic and it has not aged that well.  Black Adder has nothing to worry about.  However, it is an acquired taste that some people enjoyed enough to make it a hit.  These shows are from 1968 – 1970 and the humor is consistent enough on its own terms that its success makes sense.  Too bad that was not enough for this critic, so only look into it if it sounds like something you would be remotely interested in.

 

The 1.33 X 1 image is not good, from the poor black and white from the earliest surviving show to the later color ones.  The Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono shows its age and that any of these shows survived is amazing considering that most were lost.  There are no extras.

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo