PENNIES FROM HEAVEN [1981] (1 Viewer)

[TonyD]

TCM had this on last week.
I’m watching it now.
Looks pretty terrible.
Has this ever been released properly on disc?

Despite the depressing nature of this movie I bet a proper release would look beautiful.

I wonder, and it probably defeats the purpose of the movie how it would be if they just sang all the songs instead of using old timey prerecorded original versions of the songs.

In any event this isn’t the awful movie that it’s sort of remembered to be.

 

[Worth]

TCM had this on last week.
I’m watching it now.
Looks pretty terrible.
Has this ever been released properly on disc?

There's a DVD from Warner Archive. It's also available in HD on iTunes (or Apple TV or whatever it's called now) and looks decent, if unspectacular.

 

[TonyD]

I don’t expect it looks any better then what tcm aired

 

[Stephen_J_H]

I recently bought the iTunes Apple TV version somewhat blind and watched it. The PQ can be described as suitably grimy, as grain is quite present and the dark look of the film enhances the grimy elements of the plot. It is a real downer, but the musical numbers are great, including Christopher Walken's tapdancing striptease.

 

[Dick]

Some of the best choreography I've seen in any Hollywood production. It's a downbeat story, but those musical numbers....

 

[Matt Hough]

Because the framing story is so unrelentingly grim, the buoyant, spectacular musical numbers (each one in a different style from the others matching the vintage and varied songbook used in their creation) are such a contrast that they make the story seem even more desperately tragic than it might otherwise have been. I wasn't surprised at the time that the movie didn't catch on, but it's certainly fascinating to watch now. Amazing that Herbert Ross got it greenlit. And then Steve Martin did another odd duck just a short time later with Carl Reiner's Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid. I love it, too, but at least we got it on Blu-ray!