Customer Reviews

Topper/Topper Returns

5 star:		(59)
4 star:		(20)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

I couldn't be more pleased with the image quality of both TOPPER and TOPPER RETURNS on this DVD from Hallmark & Artisan, and I'm a demanding viewer. Both prints are top-notch and the transfers are outstanding, offering extremely clean, clear presentations. I'm so pleased with this DVD that I was compelled to write this (my first note on Amazon) just to assure fellow fans of these great comedies that you should by all means order this disc with confidence.

The "Disgusted Hal Roach Fan" seems to be in his own tormented little world! I read his review prior to buying the Topper/Topper Returns video because I love this movie and had not seen it in a very long time. I thought, oh well, even if it is as bad as the "DHRF" said it was, at least I would get to see this movie again.

My only explanation for the "DHRF" is that his sight isn't very good, he needs a new DVD player, or he just has an ax to grind against Artisan Video. The Topper video is crystal clear and the sound is great. If you like Cary Grant and want to see one of his earlier screwball comedies, this is a great DVD.

ARTISAN Home Entertainment brings us a remastered DVD of Hal Roach Studios (who brought us Laurel & Hardy and the Little Rascals in 1920's through the 1930's on the side experimented with full length feature films,greater than 65 minutes in length) original 1937 Topper. In 1937 Hal Roach used trick photography, camera magic and ground breaking FX technology for the amazing ghost creations.

"Topper" with a Star studded cast Cary Grant as Millionaire George Kirby (at his comedic best), Constance Bennett as his wife Marion (a beautifully devine actress), Roland Young as their Banker Cosmo Topper (nominated for Best Supporting Actor as "Topper") and Billie Burke as Mrs. Topper (best known as Glenda the "Good Witch" from the 1939 "The Wizard of OZ"). Included is a very young song writer/singer Hoagy Carmichael.

This wonderfully remastered Black / White Standard Feature DVD is delightful. Worth the price of admission alone but the 1941 sequel "Topper Returns" is also included. Note: a very weak sequel but still a cute storyline featuring Roland & Burke in reprise. A double feature DVD with no extras.

Summary: The jet setting, ever partying Millionaire Kirby's die in an automobile accident on a late night country road. They enter a state of limbo (earthbound ghosts) until they perform a good deed. So they go about trying to free their banker "Topper" from his dull routine high collar lifestyle and make him a jet setting man of high society. This is a great story with ghosts, floating objects and Topper talking to himself. Mrs Topper has the hardest time trying to figure out whats happening to her timid obedient husband. Lots of laughs here. Enjoy.

Although I don't think Topper with Cary Grant is as good as some of his other B&W comedies, "Bringing up Baby", "The Bachelor and Bobby Soxer" or even "Monkey Business", it is a good old B&W movie to watch. However, I think I like "Topper Returns" even better, "Topper" gets bettter as the movie nears the end, but "Topper Returns" seems to keep laughs coming throughout the picture. I find the scenes with "Rochester" from the old Jack Benny show most memorable, the comments he makes ( he has a very memorable voice) , the way he rolls his eyes and responds to the ghost extremely funny. "Topper Returns" has more people doing the funny scenes, little things throughout the movie.

The picture and sound quality on this DVD seems better on our Hitachi 57S700 better than "Topper Returns" by Alpha Video. We have one of our Dtivos getting every Cary Grant movie for the past few years but never seemed to get Topper. We were at a store and saw "Topper Returns" by Alpha Video. After buying this I decided to buy Topper/Topper Returns here on Amazon, just to get "Topper" with Cary Grant, and glad I did. Once again, for those of you that like old B&W comedies, this DVD is welll worth the Amazon price.

When bombshell Joan Blondell accompanies friend Carole Landis to her spooky family home and is murdered for her pains, she returns as a ghost bent upon the solution of her own murder--and enlists Roland Young (as Cosmo Topper) as an unlikely aide. The result is a wildly funny film that offers great performances from some of the finest screwball character actors of the period.

Based on characters originally seen in the earlier TOPPER starring Cary Grant and Roland Young, TOPPER RETURNS is a broad take-off on the stereotypes of "old dark house" mysteries popular in the 1930s and 1940s--most particularly the classic CAT AND THE CANARY and THE BAT, which were noted for their black-costumed criminals and creepy mansions complete with secret passages, but also referencing Hitchcock's REBECCA. Blondell gives a typically lively performance as a ghost with attitude, and Young is perfectly cast as the mild-mannered banker she blackmails into assisting her. Carole Landis is also attractively cast as the heiress targeted for murder.

But the real stars of TOPPER RETURNS are the supporting cast, most particularly Billie Burke, Patsy Kelly, and Eddie "Rochester" Anderson. Burke gives her sublime flair for the ridiculously absurd full reign in the role of Cosmo Topper's ditsy wife, and few could match Patsy Kelly's combination of drop-dead humor and double-take. But the real scene-stealer is Eddie Anderson, best known as Jack Benny's radio and television sidekick "Rochester." Although the actual script plays to racial stereotypes of the day, Anderson completely transcends its less savory aspects with a performance that is nothing short of comic genius, and it makes one wish the era in which he worked had afforded him broader opportunity.

The entire family should enjoy TOPPER RETURNS, which plays at director Hal Roach's typically fast pace with nary a lag, and the special effects are fun to watch. The film is an overlooked comic gem and deserves a place in any collection.

This is a good transfer indeed. I know Artisan is hit and miss. This DVD title is clear. The 1st Topper is always my favorite. Why? Cary Grant and Constance Bennett are in it. Wow she has a figure no man today would turn away. And I am a woman saying that.

The second movie has the couple that play the Toppers. But Not the Kirbys. (No Grant and Bennett). he Kirby's haven't been re cast, they aren't in it. It is still an interresting movie though. A comedy/murder movie.

At the price this DVD can be bought at it is a steal. A must get for your collection.

Thorne Smith (1892-1934) was one of the most popular American writers of the Prohibition Era. Like many clever and witty members of his generation, he punched in at the New Yorker Magazine. He wasn't especially successful there and he didn't stay very long but he associated with Dorothy Parker, Robert Benchley and the usual crowd of assorted, egotistical boozers. His success came with a string of highly popular comic novels. He might be thought of as an American P. G. Wodehouse, although he was not nearly as accomplished a wordsmith as the great British master and his books dealt more in giddy titillation than in high comedy.

As a writer, Smith is best remembered for his novel "Topper" (1926) and its sequel "Topper Takes a Trip" (1932), but no less than five of his books were filmed and one generated a successful television series. The Hollywood versions of his novels were "Night Life of the Gods" (1935, all prints apparently lost), "Topper" (1937), "Topper Takes a Trip" (1939), "Turnabout" (1940) and "I Married a Witch" (1942, based on Smith's final, unfinished novel, "The Passionate Witch"). "Topper Returns" (1941) was not based on anything written by Smith but simply a commercial outing very loosely based on Smith's original set up.

In "Topper," the quiet, repressed and not very happily married banker, Cosmo Topper, finds himself haunted by the ghosts of the recently departed George and Marion Kirby. They are very much a Jazz Age couple and Marion, in particular, maintains some very earthy ideas for such an unearthly creature. In the sequel, "Topper Takes a Trip," Topper's marriage, as usual, is in a rocky state. The Toppers are in Paris in at attempt at reconciliation when George and Marion turn up again.

The movie version of "Topper" is a true classic. If it is not quite a comedy of manners, it is certainly a farce of manners. Of all the films of Thorne Smith's novels, it is the closest to the original, although Constance Bennett's Marion is more toned down and respectable than Smith's. The film boasts a Hollywood dream cast with Bennett, Cary Grant and Roland Young, as well as such stalwarts as Billie Burke, Eugene Pallette and Alan Mowbray. It is also a thing virtually unique in Cary Grant's career, for Roland Young neatly steals every scene they share.

The second movie of the series, "Topper Takes a Trip," is much more loosely based on the original book. Marion appears, but George is nowhere to be found. Cary Grant, I suspect, had no intention of ever again being a second banana.

The third and final film, "Topper Returns," included in this package, brings Roland Young back as Topper but now even Marion has disappeared. Topper is bedeviled by an entirely different feminine ghost. "Topper Returns" is a perfectly competent example of a class of movies that includes Abbot and Costello's "Hold That Ghost," Olsen and Johnson's "Haunted House" and even a couple of Bowery Boys outings. It abandons Smith's Jazz Age sensibilities for the newer, radio-era style of wisecracks with attitude.

OK folks: Below this review, you'll see mostly positive reviews and 1 negative review (by a person that has since been dubbed the "Disgusted Hal Roach Fan") for this Artisan/Hallmark release. The negative review claims that the picture and sound are "flat," tells us what that means, and how it came to be. That reviewer is absolutely correct about the *technical details* of this release, especially with the comparison of this release to the Nostalgia Merchant release of Topper in 1984 (I own a copy of that, too). I do not agree with that reviewer's other perspectives though.

Regardless of the deficiencies, it's still a good release: the picture and sound are not the best, but they are good enough to delight the average viewer. The more discerning viewer will notice the issues discussed by the "Disgusted Hall Roach Fan," but this release is good enough not to be a distraction.

I recommend this release with 3.5 stars, but I would have given 5 stars (I really do love these films) if the producers had found the original film elements for the DVD transfer, as the difference between an original black and white verses a flat black and white are substantial - the world becomes almost completely two-dimensional in a flat film.

For comparison, I just watched The Criterion Collection's version of Hitchcock's film Notorious. It's a black and white film that was restored from the best nitrate originals and passionately supervised by leading film historians. I was stunned by the clarity and depth of the picture.

If you think you'll enjoy these films, buy this DVD - if there is to be a restored edition, it is probably 2 years away.

_____

D.P.B.

I have both this edition and the IMAGE edition of TOPPER RETURNS. I bought this DVD more for the first TOPPER film than anything else, having last seen it on MGM/UA home video, and I must say this is a very good print, very clean, much cleaner than I remember it. Title cards look right to me, I am a stickler for that as well.

"Topper" is the supernatural screwball comedy about a pair of fun-loving ghosts who wreak havoc on the life of henpecked banker, Cosmo Topper (Roland Young). Cary Grant and Constance Bennett simply glow as George and Marion Kirby, a couple of devil-may-care free spirits who accidentally kill themselves by wrapping their car around a tree. They return as a couple of blithe spirits, determined to introduce Cosmo to the good life. Billie Burke costars as Cosmo's stuffy and hilarious bubble-head wife. The sequel, "Topper Returns" uses this same premise but replaces Grant and Bennett with Joan Blondell. Although she's amply cast, she doesn't quite eclipse the memory the original. The engaging murder mystery plot of "Topper Returns" with its sumptuous setting and elegant cinematography compensate, particularly the surreal visual splendor of Blondell's haunting death and her ghostly reincarnation.
THE TRANSFER: "Topper" is a little bit worse for the wear than "Topper Returns". This is to be expected since, after years of being a late night television fav', the rights to this classic have fallen into public domain. MGM is credited with originally making this classic. The gray scale is a trifle underexposed on "Topper" well seemingly close to dead on in "Topper Returns." Age related artifacts are more heavy and noticeable on "Topper" as well. Over all, the image has a dated appearance but contrast and black levels are generally good on both movies. Edge enhancement is present slightly on "Topper" only. The audio is mono for both films. "Topper" suffers from slight hiss and popping but "Topper Returns" is generally more natural sounding on the ears.
EXTRAS: None.
BOTTOM LINE: "Topper" is an outstanding Cary Grant comedy with few equals - save "Bringing Up Baby." Perhaps one day we'll see the release of that classic on DVD!