Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1693 in DVD
• Released on: 2004-04-05
• Rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
• Number of discs: 3
• Formats: Box set, PAL
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 396 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
It feels both inaccurate and inadequate to describe The Office as a comedy. On a superficial level, it disdains all the conventions of television sitcoms: there are no punch lines, no jokes, no laugh tracks and no cute happy endings. More profoundly, it's not what we're used to thinking of as funny. Most of the fervently devoted fan base that the programme acquired watched with a discomfortingly thrilling combination of identification and mortification. The paradox is that its best moments are almost physically unwatchable.

Set in the offices of a fictional Slough paper merchant, The Office is filmed in the style of a reality television programme. The writing is subtle and deft, the acting wonderful and the characters beautifully drawn: the cadaverous team leader Gareth, a paradigm of Andy McNab's readership; the monstrous sales rep, Chris Finch; and the decent but long-suffering everyman Tim, whose ambition and imagination have been crushed out of him by the banality of the life he dreams uselessly of escaping. The show is stolen, as it was intended to be, by insufferable office manager David Brent, played by cowriter Ricky Gervais. Brent will become a name as emblematic for a particular kind of British grotesque as Alan Partridge or Basil Fawlty, but he is a deeper character than either. Partridge and Fawlty are exaggerations of reality, and therefore safely comic figures. Brent is as appalling as only reality can be. --Andrew Mueller

On the DVD: Series 1 is tastefully packaged as a two-disc set appropriately adorned with John Betjeman's poem "Slough". The special features occupy the second disc and consist of a laid-back 39-minute documentary entitled "How I Made The Office by Ricky Gervais", with cowriter Stephen Merchant and the cast contributing. Here we discover that Gervais spends his time on set "mucking around and annoying people", and that actress Lucy Davis (Dawn) is the daughter of Jasper Carrott; as well as seeing parts of the original short film and the original BBC pilot episode; plus we get to enjoy many examples of the cast corpsing throughout endless retakes. There are also a handful of deleted scenes, none of which were deleted because they weren't funny.

Series 2 is a single-disc release, but the extra features are enjoyable nonetheless. Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant feature in a gleefully shambolic video diary--highlights of which include Gervais flicking elastic bands at his cowriter and taping their editor to his swivel chair. The ubiquitous Gervais also mockingly introduces some outtakes (mostly of him corpsing throughout dozens of takes) and a series of deleted scenes, notably of Gareth arriving in his horrendous cycle shorts. --Mark Walker

DVD Description
Series 1:

• Episode 1 - David Brent learns that his branch of the paper merchants might be closed down. But he promises his staff that under his regime there will be no redundancies.
  
• Episode 2 - Donna arrives on work experience. But her first day at work is dominated by a dirty picture of her boss that's been e-mailed around the office.
  
• Episode 3 - It's Tim's birthday. But it's also the annual quiz night. Will Brent and Finchy be able to beat the young pretenders Tim & Ricky?
  
• Episode 4 - Rowan, a management consultant, has come to Wernham Hogg to give the staff a special training day.
  
• Episode 5 - Even though some of the staff may be made redundant, Brent decides to take on a new secretary. Naturally, he chooses the prettiest woman.
  
• Episode 6 - It's judgment day on whether the office is to be downsized.

Series 2:
Change can be stressful, but manager David Brent reckons he can cope. He’s got a new boss, he’s been recruited to give motivational lectures and has to integrate the serious and dull Swindon lot with his own crazy brigade. Elsewhere, Tim’s got a new office romance and Red Nose Day gives the whole office a chance to unwind – Finchy’s still a riot, Keith still has eczema and Gareth has a talking cookie jar – and is still a tosser.

Special Features
Series 1:

• A 40-minute documentary, "How I Made The Office" by Ricky Gervais including the following:
  Out-takes
  Pilot and pre-pilot footage
  Cast interviews
  Full length Peter Purves "Staff Training Video" as featured in Episode 4

Series 2:

• Out-takes
  
• Video Diary
  
• Deleted scenes

DVD Technical Information:

• Subtitles: English SDH
  
• Audio: Dolby Digital Stereo
  
• Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  
• PAL
  
• Disc Type: DVD-9
  
• Region Code: 2, 4
  
• Total Running Time: 180 minutes approx. (Series 1)/173 minutes approx. (Series 2)

Customer Reviews

It is genius, but is it comedy?
......... The real genius of The Office lies with the characters. Each one is superbly written, excellently cast and perfectly acted. It is filmed in the style of a fly-on-the-wall documentary, the self styled star of which is a tragic character named David Brent (Ricky Gervais). Brent is a wannabe superstar trapped in a middle-manager's body. The Office charts, his desperate struggle for recognition whilst he slowly loses his grip on reality, and his job. Alongside Brent stands Gareth Keenan (Mackenzie Crook), a kind of brown-nosing jobsworth who despite all my better instincts, I can't help feeling sorry for. However, from my perspective the greatest facet of The Office's storyline comes from the other two central characters, namely Tim Canterbury (Martin Freeman) and Dawn Tinsley (Lucy Davis). Their unspoken feelings for one another, played out through little more than furtive glances, form one of the most enthralling and well observed on-screen romances of recent times.

The Office tracks the lives of the four main characters, but their stories are played out in an environment of superb supporting actors, who bring an air of authenticity to the program. Most notable of these are Chris Finch (Ralph Ineson) as the loud-mouthed bully, and the unsurnamed accountant Keith (Ewen Macintosh) who manages to provide a lot of comedy despite only having about 10 words to say across both series'.

The DVD includes some pretty good extra material with some deleted scenes, some of which are very funny, and were - according to Ricky Gervais - removed because they were too much like a traditional sitcom. The deleted scene where Gareth squirts lemon juice in a girl's eye could have ranked alongside Only Fools and Horses' funniest moments.

I could happily extol the virtues of the office for hours, but the only way you'll know for sure is by watching it. All I ask is that you give it a chance. I didn't like it when I first saw it, but I was made to watch it again and I haven't looked back. Now I'm just waiting for the two feature length Christmas specials to come out on DVD. If any of you Office fans missed them (shame on you!) they were brilliant and concluded the story perfectly (I nearly shed a tear!).

The Work Place Never Sounded So Funny
I give this DVD/VHS series 10/10

It feels both inaccurate and inadequate to describe The Office as a comedy. On a superficial level, it disdains all the conventions of television sitcoms: there are no punch lines, no jokes, no laugh tracks, and no cute happy endings. More profoundly, it's not what we're used to thinking of as funny. Most of the fervently devoted fan base watched with a discomfortingly thrilling combination of identification and mortification. The paradox is that its best moments are almost physically unwatchable.
Set in the offices of a fictional British paper merchant, The Office is filmed in the style of a reality television show. The writing is subtle and deft, the acting wonderful, and the characters beautifully drawn: the cadaverous team leader Gareth (Mackenzie Crook); the monstrous sales rep, Chris Finch (Ralph Ineson); and the decent but long-suffering everyman Tim (Martin Freeman), whose ambition and imagination have been crushed out of him by the banality of the life he dreams uselessly of escaping. The show is stolen, as it was intended to be, by insufferable office manager David Brent, played by codirector-cowriter Ricky Gervais. Brent will become a name as emblematic for a particular kind of British grotesque as Basil Fawlty, but he is a deeper character. Fawlty is an exaggeration of reality, and therefore a safely comic figure. Brent is as appalling as only reality can be.

Top British Comedy!
Without doubt The Office series 1 and 2 is one of the best British comedies for years.

All the cast are superb, as is the script. It is simply hillarious. I can't wait for the Christmas Specials to come out.

The digital transfer is flawless in every way.

I've watched The Office over and over.