Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2172 in DVD
• Released on: 2005-05-27
• Rating: Parental Guidance
• Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
• Formats: Anamorphic, Dubbed, PAL, Widescreen
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: Hungarian
• Dubbed in: Hungarian
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 103 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
If you spliced Charles Addams, Dr. Seuss, Charles Dickens, Edward Gorey, and Roald Dahl into a Tim Burtonesque landscape, you'd surely come up with something like Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events. Many critics (in mostly mixed reviews) wondered why Burton didn't direct this comically morbid adaptation of the first three books in the popular series by Daniel Handler (a.k.a. "Lemony Snicket," played here by Jude Law and seen only in silhouette) instead of TV and Casper veteran Brad Silberling, but there's still plenty to recommend the playfully bleak scenario, in which three resourceful orphans thwart their wicked, maliciously greedy relative Count Olaf (Jim Carrey), who subjects them to... well, a series of unfortunate events. Along the way they encounter a herpetologist uncle (Billy Connolly), an anxious aunt (Meryl Streep) who's afraid of everything, and a variety of fantastical hazards and mysterious clues, some of which remain unresolved. Given endless wonders of art direction, costume design, and cinematography, Silberling's direction is surprisingly uninspired (in other words, the books are better), but when you add a throwaway cameo by Dustin Hoffman, Law's amusing narration, and Carrey's over-the-top antics, the first Lemony movie suggests a promising franchise in the making. --Jeff Shannon, Amazon.com

DVD Description
• Feature (1.85:1 widescreen) • Commentary #1 with Director Brad Silberling • Commentary #2 with Director Brad Silberling and the Real Lemony Snicket

Special Features
1 HOUR OF BONUS FEATURES - - Building a Bad Actor - A look at the process of creating Olaf’s characters reveals how Brad Silberling and Jim Carrey created the voice, the look and the ‘attitude’ of Count Olaf during the weeks of pre-production. We also see Carrey’s process of inventing Olaf’s alter-egos, ‘The Captain’ and the world’s worst reptile-handler, Stephano. - Behind-the-scenes footage from the director’s own ‘home-movies’. Interactive Olaf - - This interactive feature looking at costumes and character tests enables the viewer to choose from four different Jim Carrey character monologues - two from the ‘Count’, a lively sea shanty from ‘The Captain’ and how to milk viperous snakes from ‘Stephano’.

Making the Baudekaire Children Miserable - - Casting the Children

Orphaned Scenes - - Dismal deletions and Obnoxious Outtakes

Easter Egg - Count Olaf’s Ghost Story - In one of Jim Carrey’s early costume/lighting test as Count Olaf, he entertains cast and crew with an improvised ghost story.

Customer Reviews

A bit like Harry Potter without the magic ...
My first impression of the tone with which both the books and the film are advertised was that it was a bit like J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series without the magical/supernatural elements. E.g. a story about teenage/child heroes who have to cope with truly horrible and strange enemies and events, shot through with some very dark and ironic humour.

Having watched the film this feeling was reinforced.

The introductory sequence shows cute little dancing and singing birds, animals and elves, and then you cut to a warning that this is not a cheerful happy story at all. The author, Lemony Snickett, voiced by Jude Law, warns that it is a tale of three orphans who experience a series of unfortunate events ...

The film is based on the first three books of the series. The three Baudelaire children, Violet, Claus, and baby Sunny, learn at the start of the book that their house has mysteriously burned down and their parents have been killed in the fire. A kindly and well meaning but naive banker called Mr Poe (Timothy Spall) places them with a series of distant relatives as gardians: the evil Count Olaf (Jim Carrey), snake expert Dr Montgomery Montgomery (Billy Connally) and an aunt who is terrified of everything (Meryl Streep.) Count Olaf is a master of disguise who pursues the children around the country in the hope of inheriting their fortune, giving Jim Carrey the opportunity to demonstrate his own uncanny skill in modifying his appearance and mannerisms.

In fact Carrey's ability to appear in several different guises which are similar enough for the viewer (and the children) to recognise that they are all Count Olaf, but different enough that it is just about possible to accept that nobody else recognises him is one of the more impressive parts of the film.

The two elder child actors are excellent and I think we will hear more of Liam Aitken and Emily Browning. (The baby is played by two identical twins.)

This could be moderately scary for a small child. We watched it with our children (both aged five) ready to turn it off if they became upset: they coped well enough but did not really understand what was going on. Don't think I will show it to them again for several years.

Special effects and the spooky music were very well done.

As a family film, where the children are 10 to 14, this was quite well done, and certainly different. But not for those whose tastes run for a stong dose of saccharine ...

A Series of Unfortunate Misinterpretations.....
To describe this as a 'Childrens' Film' is misleading in the extreme. I cannot imagine in fact that anyone, beside a hardcore teenage goth, under 18 would be remotely interested. Certainly my 6-year old son seemed to enjoy the whole thing, but really hadn't a clue as to what was going on, and certainly didn't have nightmares. That is because this is not a conventional file. Bleak, dark, cynical and all that, but profoundly original. Not many films like this get made, and the more the better. Someone previously compared it in passing to Roald Dahl. Absolutely. Since when didn't we like dark and unlikely tales of helpless children in peril. Watch and enjoy. Not many films like this out of the US unsurprisingly. And Jim Carey has made up for many a past blunder in one fell swoop. Watch now!

great for all the family
We rented this film for our 8 and 10 year old boys and we all enjoyed watching it. My 8 year old found it a little scary in places but not too scary. Having a 18 month old in the house we all loved Sunny and her subtitles. I enjoyed this film so much I didn't even mind Jim Carey being in it (I'm not a fan), it helped that he was completely unrecognisable as Count Olaf and it was the child actors who where the star of this film, not Careys usual over-acting. Top marks from all the family.