Analyze This / Analyze That (DVD)

Author's product rating:   

Did you enjoy it?	Liked it
Story	Good
Characters / Performances	Outstanding
Special Effects	Unmemorable
How does it compare to similar films?	Good

Advantages:	Good acting, 1 fanatstic movie
Disadvantages:	1 disappointing movie, a loss of direction

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

Oh no, another DVD review by Iama, what a shame as they all suck... >_>

Anyway, I got Analyze this/Analyze that from Morrisons for £5 recently and watched them the following few nights (whilst admittedly mildly drunk). Despite wanting these for a while it took me around 18 months to finally decide to actually get the bloody things (and at that sort of a price who can refuse?)

The movies order is Analyze This then Analyze that (if you want to watch them chronologically anyway), so thats the way I'll review them.

Analyze this-
The movie opens with a shoot out between rival mobsters and quickly introduces you to Paul Vitti (Robert DeNiro) and the overall ganster themes that the series has.

Then the movie introduces us to psychiatrist Ben Sobel (Bill Crystal) talking to a client and introduces us to some of the surreal humour that we soon get used to. The conversation with the client goes from him listening to the client to him 'snapping' and telling them to get real. Soon after this we see more of the odd humour when a Sobel on the way to his fathers crashes into gangster Vitti's car and the first meeting between the two (and one of the funniest scenes) occurs.

After the car crash Sobel hands Jelly (Joe Viterelli) his business card, which really begins the comedy caper. With Vitti being under a fair bit of pressure and it seemingly all on top of him (with panic attacks, an inability to kill people, and erm an inability to use another member his problems just seem to keep growing). So what better for an insecure mob boss then a pyschiatrist.

Before long Vitti begins to slowly drive Sobel mad and with Sobel's fiance (Lisa Kudrow) frustrated at Ben and angry at Vitti the comedy just keeps coming. With Michael Sobel (Ben's son played by Kyle Sabihy) beginning to obsess with Paul and Paul almost destroying Ben's life the movie's light hearted humour with gangster undertones really does bode wonderfully well.

With a humour storyline, great acting and a wonderful script the movie sits well to me, though I do feel it is aimed more at guys and Lisa Kudrows role does seem a little bit minimal. Though Joe Vitterelli is an addittion to the movie that would sit well in any film.

The lack of explosions and killings for a gangster film would perhaps turn some off but easily one of the best movies I've seen all year.

The DVD extras are:
Wide Screen version (the Disk is double sided with 1 side being full screen, the other being wide-screen)
A commentary by Crystal and DeNiro
A gag reel

Analyze that on the other hand is a lot less funny (which is odd as the main actors are the same and the writer/director are the same). With the first movie having a lot of light hearted gangster humour this movie takes you more gangster and less humour.

Paul Vitti in Analyze this was a fun gangster, who sure wasn't a wonderfully nice bloke but had reformed and was repenting for his sins. In Analyze that (based 3 years later) Vitti goes crazy in prison (with the wonderfully brilliant scene of him singing West Side Story songs), and sadly the humou goes a bit crazy to. Despite being a pretty likeable gangster in the original in the sequel Vitti's class has gone and he basically seems more and more like a street crook (until very late in the movie).

The cast is almost directly the same (with the actor of Micheal being the only real change) but this time the reformed Vitti is out there as a wanted man (by rival factions of the mob) and as a result wants to turn the the tables on those that want him dead. The light humour has become more dark and it's become a bit more of The Italian job (remake) rather than The Godfather, which is a shame as the series could have closed on the high that it started off at. The story also deos seem to go a bit Italian Jobish as well, as Vitti turns his back on the good work he did pre-prison and starts back on the road to reclaim the mob.

Despite some really high parts the movie on the whole doesn't match it's younger, fresher, funnier and nicer brother which makes it seem more of a disappointment than it really is.

Extras-
Gag reel
TV spots
Commentary by Michael Landis
A documentary

Summary-A good buy if you can get it cheaply enough, but overall the second movie does seem a little bit shoddy compared to the first.