Francis Ford Coppola is one of those directors that you don’t have to love, but you have to at least appreciate his contribution to cinema. Personally my favorite film of his is Apocalypse Now, and then The Godfather II. I know other film geeks out there will argue with what his ‘best” film is, but I think it’s fair to say he’s one of the greatest film directors out there no matter how you may rank his films. When the chance to review One From The Heart came along I jumped at the opportunity, because, well, it’s a film I had never actually seen or even knew that Coppola had done. In watching the bonus features on the disc, I found it amusing that this was supposed to be a simple film for him to do after the insane task of directing Apocalypse Now. This was supposed to be a simple rom-com with a budget of $2 million, but things got out of hand. Coppola bought a studio for his American Zoetrope company and used all the studios stages to build sets for the film, and in the parking lot even had a real jet parked for one of the films sequences. In the end the film’s budget ballooned to over $25 million (that translates to about $88 million in today’s economy), and to make matters worse, the film was a big giant dud at the box office. But is the movie any good? A simple yes or no won’t suffice for this film, but one thing I’m sure of, it is something to marvel at, and you can certainly see where the money went on this production.
As I mentioned, Coppola decided to build all his sets for this film, and that feat alone deserves to be applauded, because he managed to make his version of the Las Vegas strip look like the real thing. He’s created his own dreamlike world and given it a style that is so unique I have to applaud this. The sets on this film are pure Hollywood magic, and they are so good with these practical FX I had to re-remind myself that you cannot believe what you are seeing on TV.
The story is somewhat a simple one; it’s about Hank (Frederic Forrest) and Frannie (Teri Garr) who break up on their 5-year anniversary. Hank is happy with his life, while Frannie works at a travel agency and wants more from her life. These characters are far from perfect, but that is what makes them so relatable. It doesn’t take long before Frannie catches the interest of Ray (Raul Julia), a lounge singer/waiter who is ready to promise Frannie everything she seems to be missing from her relationship with Hank. As for Hank, while strolling the strip he comes across Leila (Nastassja Kinski), a circus performer who is mostly the girl of his dreams, and she’s asking him to run away with her. The story feels more like something I’d expect in a Woody Allen film, but the execution is something radically different.
While the film calls itself a musical, the music is supplied by Tom Waits, and in the soundtrack the songs help narrate what is going on with the characters. One of the better moments of the film is when we see Frannie caught up in her emotions and enjoying the moment of experiencing a new “love”; the moment is countered by Hank reeling with sorrow and simply wanting his girlfriend back. Along with the music we get a unique lighting scheme that helps reflect the emotions the characters are going through with harsh reds and greens. But then there are some beautiful tracking and crane shots, and one of my favorite shots sprinkled through the film has the characters in silhouette with the neon lights of Vegas behind them. On a technical level this film is what you’d expect from Coppola. Unfortunately the abundance of style just seems to clash with the story, and honestly, I can’t quite figure out why it doesn’t work, because it seems like all the ingredients are there for this to be a hit. The one thing that did trouble me with the film has to do with the ending. It just didn’t ring true with the story that Coppola seemed to be trying to tell. Perhaps it is the clash of having such a realistic story colliding with the fantasy setting that irks me, but as the credits rolled, I just felt there was something missing.
One thing that didn’t age too well is a scene where Hank throws a half-naked Frannie over his shoulder to take her home. I can see how audiences would really turn on Hank because of this; even when I put on my objective glasses and think about it being an 80s film, I still kind of cringe at this scene … but I do feel this adds to how authentic it is to the character. It can also be argued that Frannie did plenty wrong as well, but I feel getting into that gets in the way of the film’s message. To be honest, I’m not sure what it was anyway.
Video
One From The Heart is presented in its original aspect ratio of 1.37:1. The ultra-high-definition image presentation is arrived at with an HEVC codec at an average of often over 90 mbps. The film was shot on 35mm, so is native 4K. There has also been extensive restoration here, and it shows. The film retains a nice amount of the original grain, so the organic nature of the original film remains. This was a restoration direct from camera negatives, so it’s quite accurate and faithful. Coppola was doing something completely experimental here, so he presents a Vegas that is highly stylized. They used a ton of color filters on the lighting, and the result stands up to this kind of resolution. The HDR helps to bring out those vibrant and vivid primary colors. Reds are huge here, from scenery to Garr’s bright red dress worn throughout much of the movie. You absolutely get the fake, almost plastic look of the backgrounds, but that’s exactly what they wanted you to see. This plays out so much more like a stage production than a film, and it was all intentional. The matte-painting scenery is supposed to look like a matte painting. No one was going for realism here. What you see is what Coppola wanted you to see, for better or worse.
Audio
The DTS 2.0 track is the default. Obviously Coppola expects you’ll want to continue with that original experience. There is a 5.1 track if you want to select it. I honestly couldn’t tell much of a difference. The surrounds are pretty empty, and there’s not a lot of sub here. It’s all merely here to serve the dialog and the Tom Waits songs. That you’ll get with either selection.
Special Features
The extras are found on both discs but are different. There are extras only on the Blu-ray and extras that are only on the UHD. The following extras are found on the Blu-ray:
The Making of One From The Heart: (23:21) This is a BTS look at the making of the film. It has interviews with the cast and crew, but there is also a lot of footage of them making the sets, doing rehearsals, and more. It is a little crazy when you see how big these sets are to the point they had a real plane in the parking lot for the airport set. If you are a fan of how movies are made, this one is worth checking out.
The Dream Studio: (28:24) This is a look into the studio Coppola bought and used to build the elaborate sets he needed to make his film. This also gets into the unique culture he was trying to create outside the Hollywood system. This is another great feature worth checking out for film fans.
The Electronic Studio- (9:34) This pretty much shows how ahead of the game Coppola was when it came to filmmaking. Things that are so commonplace on a film set now he was helping innovate and use on this film. As a film geek, this was interesting to see and learn about.
Tom Waits and the Music From One From The Heart: (13:28) This has a lot of BTS footage of how the music was created for the film, everything from writing the music to seeing meetings with Coppola and his team about what they were looking for.
Deleted Scenes: (34:11) There are 12 scenes here, some of which I believe made it into the 2003 release of the film.
Video Taped Rehearsals: (8:57) There are five scenes we get to see from various stages into the production.
Francis Ford Coppola Speaks to the Exhibitors: A brief clip of Coppola explaining the version of the film he was showing to studio executives.
Press Conference at Studio: (7:31) This is a presentation he showed the press that is a bit of a mix between a demo reel and rehearsal footage for the film.
This One’s From The Heart Music Video
Stop Motion Demo: (3:26) This is a BTS look at the making of the opening credits.
The Tom Waits Score- Alternate Tracks (24:23) Six tracks that were not used in the final cut of the film.
2 Trailers.
The Following extras are found only on the UHD. The UHD also includes the “reprise” version of the film with a few minutes of “restored” footage. Honestly they were seamless and made little difference in the film. The extras on the UHD:
The Look Of One From The Heart: (17:22) Like a few of these features, this is a collection of vintage footage that gives us extremely raw behind-the-scenes material. That means poor audio and video quality, but their historical significance is huge for the production. You get rare footage of Coppola talking with cast and crew, often attempting to give them details of his vision. There are some vintage interview clips, but most of this is someone taking footage during the production and not put together in some clean feature condition. This one looks at the experimental processes that were developed and engaged to make the film.
The Cast Of One From The Heart: (21:46) This continues the raw footage presentation but focuses on the cast and characters. There’s plenty of insight here, often delivered through conversations with each other on the set.
The Choreography Of One From The Heart: (24:51) The last raw-footage segment deals with the dance numbers and other choreographed elements of fantasy in the film. We get to hear actors rehearsing for the parts, and some nice intimate nuggets come out of these moments.
Reinventing The Musical – Baz Luhrmann: (25:03) The Moulin Rouge director talks about the influence and innovation of the film.
One From The Heart – Reprise – Restoration Comparisons: (3:54) Several scenes are shown side by side with the 2003 release of the film.
Final Thoughts:
As a fan of Francis Ford Coppola, I feel this is worth checking out, considering this was the film he did between Apocalypse Now and another classic, The Outsiders. The film is beautiful to look at, but I’m not surprised that this film is mostly overlooked when discussing his catalog of films. What is worth checking out are the bonus materials. This is a solid collection of extras that are worth checking out.
Parts of this review were written by Gino Sassani
