Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2232 in DVD
• Released on: 2001-05-07
• Rating: Parental Guidance
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: Black & White, Dubbed, Full Screen, PAL
• Original language: English, German
• Subtitled in: English, French, Italian, Danish, Spanish, Portuguese, German, Romanian, Bulgarian
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 113 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
In 1941, when Frank Capra filmed Arsenic and Old Lace, he was in the midst of his string of social-concern pictures. So this uncharacteristic property must have seemed like a vacation; it's a straight farce, played at full tilt and closely adapted from the Broadway play. Almost all of the action takes place on a single set: the old home of the Brewster sisters (Josephine Hull and Jean Adair), those dear, dotty old ladies who mix up a very special elderberry wine. Very special. As their nephew Mortimer (Cary Grant) discovers on the eve of his wedding, the two ladies have been spiking the wine with poison and sending lonely gentleman callers off to the great beyond. More specifically, they've been burying them in the cellar with the help of nutty Uncle Teddy, who thinks he's Teddy Roosevelt (and thus digging the Panama Canal down in the basement). The ominous happenings are made more sinister with the arrival of another menacing relative (RaymondMassey) and his quack doctor (Peter Lorre), who look and act like refugees from a horror movie. Played completely over the top, this movie offers up lots of bracing slapstick, with Grant run to near exhaustion by the galloping insanity of his family. Although Capra shot the film in 1941, prior to his making military films during World War II, the film was not released until 1944; the contract stipulated that the movie not come out before the play ended its enormously successful run. --Robert Horton

Video Description
DVD Special Features:

Interactive Menus
Scene Access
Trailer
Languages in Mono: English, French, Italian
Subtitles: English, French, Italian, Dutch, Arabic, Spanish, Portuguese, German, Romanian, Bulgarian, English for the hearing impaired, Italian for the hearing impaired.

Synopsis
Beware nice old ladies offering elderberry wine! A mild-mannered drama critic discovers the shocking truth about his two elderly aunts: The seemingly harmless old ladies have the most disagreeable habit of poisoning their gentlemen callers and burying them in the cellar. One of the all-time great black comedies.

Customer Reviews

Utterly delicious!
You would have to be suicidal or made of granite not to warm to Frank Capra's finest films. Everybody loves It's a Wonderful Life for its life-affirming humanity, but Arsenic and Old Lace is just a good old-fashioned farce which by 1944 standards must have seemed inky black in its treatment of death. The years have been kind to this film - it has matured beautifully and simply leaves a big wide smile on your face.

However, there is plenty more on offer: Cary Grant may be gloriously over the top, but the splendidly observed supporting performances can be treasured. In particular, Josephine Hull and Jean Adair at the two aunts, Raymond Massey as the homicidal brother and Peter Lorre as his fussy and fragile plastic surgeon.

This is simple escapist entertainment relying on age-old virtues of good script, timing, acting ability and top notch direction - who needs computer-generated special effects anyway!

Good but better in original black and white
This is a classic farce masterfully directed by Frank Capra and starring Cary Grant as a lifelong batchelor trying to get married but having trouble with his literally insane family. That's about all you need to know to want to buy this movie BUT the big dissapointment with this movie is that it is in colour when it was shot in black and white. Why do they do this? Most people want to see a movie as the director meant it to be seen and before his death Frank Capra himself expressed his displeasure at the adding of colour to his classic movies and it is a classic. The choice is yours...

****Perfect viewing on a cold and wet winters afternoon****
This is a classic farce masterfully directed by Frank Capra and starring Cary Grant as a lifelong batchelor trying to get married but having trouble with his literally insane family. If you like old movies, love old Cary Grant movies and enjoy nothing better than watching them on a cold, wet winters evening or afternoon, you'll love this. If you don't like Cary Grant you wont like this. If your looking for It's a Wonderful Life, you wont find it here but you will find an old fashioned farce that looks like it was adapted from the stage (and was adapted from the stage). But it's great fun and that's about all you need to know to about this movie BUT please don't buy the colour print of this movie. Why do they add colour to a movie that originally shot in black and white? Surely most people want to see the original versions of their favorite movies on DVD and it doesn't need colour to enhance it. It's fine as it is in good old fashioned black and white... it's a good old fashioned classic that'll make you reminisce about how "they don't make films like that anymore"...Enjoy!