Customer Reviews
Movie looks and sounds great/cd content dissapointing 
2008-07-05
The movie looks great...the video has been re-mastered. The 5.1 surround sound is also a great improvement over the original release. If you like or love this movie..I highly reccommend this.
As for the so called "complete soundtrack"... the word complete had me hoping for additional songs such as "You Made Me Love You" and "Fool/Country" by the incredibly talented Olivia Newton-John.
The making of extra was nice and informative..I just wish Olvia would have participated.
What a cult classicx 
2008-07-03
I love this movie. I was introduced to it in the 80's and fell in love with ELO and Olivia. I've had a crush on her ever since. I wore out several copies of the VHS tape and finally got it on DVD. It's campy, but what do you expect for that era. It's stil got some great music and Gene Kelly and Olivia. Olivia considered it such an honor to work with Gene.
Watch it and enjoy. Don't worry about the lack of plot. It's the music and actors that made the film great.
WHY YOU SHOULDN'T BUY 
2008-07-02
i love this movie. i got it on vhs, when that came out, and on dvd, when that came out. the movie, itself, is fantastic! it is well done, the color is beautiful and the score is great! i would certainly recommend the movie, itself! (and the cd.) but....
the original dvd is better because it includes things about the cast.
in this one, it SAYS interviews with the cast, but that means a couple of the dancers and gene kelly's wife. no one even mentions michael beck, why he was cast and why the fantasy number was needed (to avoid controversy?).
if you just want the movie and cd in one package, then fine...but it would be better to buy each one, than this combo.
Suspicious "Magical Music Edition" a letdown for true fans 
2008-06-30
I love Xanadu. It's not a bad film at all (try The Apple, now that's bad), I'd rate this a five but the "Magical Music Edition" DVD is so much less than it could have been. After all these years, true fans were expecting a bit more than this edition offers.
Highly suspicious is the fact that the "Going Back To Xanadu" documentary, while including many film clips, uses NONE of the music from the film. Instead there is a cheesy score of music that sounds like it was created to sound early 80s, which makes the clips come off as indeed something from a bad film instead of how much fun Xanadu really was. Was it that Universal couldn't manage to legally use the music at this time in the documentary? I know back then Universal was tied in with MCA Records, so now who knows what happened.
What was left out that should have been included was a documentary aired on TV called MAKING XANADU ("An ONJ Production") that included interviews by the musical talent involved, as well as a great alternate take on the scene for the song "Suspended In Time."
The so-called complete soundtrack CD included in this edition is just the regular 10 track soundtrack that was on vinyl and released on CD before, with the basic short versions. Fans were expecting at least the inclusion of the 7" b-sides of songs from the film but not on the soundtrack release before... songs like ELO's "Drum Dreams," Olivia's "You Made Me Love You" and "Fool Country" as well as some nice score music like the dancing waitress music. There were also early versions of songs like "I'm Alive" and "All Over The World" that could have been included somehow. Let's hope that there will someday be a special CD release with the extra tracks before the CD format fades away -- if a special anniversary edition of the soundtrack for The Sound Of Music can be released with alternate takes and fuller versions, why not one for Xanadu? There are indeed enough people out there that would buy it and it would be a great seller.
As I said, I love Xanadu. I saw it three times the first week it was released in theatres (as the director said, "They loved it in St. Louis!" which is where I lived at the time). The film always makes me smile and brings back fond memories of that time in my life. As a collector of things Xanadu, I of course bought this DVD edition and enjoyed some of the new features. However, it seems Universal just didn't try hard enough with the "Magical Music Edition." New generations of fans just don't know how much more is out there from this film!
The film? Five stars. The "Magical Music Edition" DVD/CD? Three stars. For a triple-dip DVD of a better edition I hope we don't have to wait another 10 years or so....
"Xanadu" - Redux! 2008-06-27
Well, I was a bit skeptical about this release. I mean, how much money are you going to throw at the remastering of a film that was critically reviled and a box office bomb? The answer is: Not much. Still, I think they did a good job with what they could afford. The picture quality is an improvement over the version released in 1999. The images aren't as low-contrast and there isn't as much dirt on the print. The image quality is still a bit soft, but I attribute some of that to the quality of film stock they used when they filmed it.
This is where it gets tricky-- the soundtrack on the previous version was a bit of a mess. The music sounded ultra-compressed and muddy at times. Other times, it sounded great. The worst offender was the first number, "I'm Alive". For whatever reason, this song never sounded as good in the film as it did on the soundtrack. I'm not exactly sure why that is. I am pleased to announce that the mix is fairly well improved. It still sounds a bit squashed but the lows boom without being overbearing and the highs sparkle. "All Over the World" has a bizarre sound mix where the back up vocals are largely relegated to the back of the mix and are barely audible at times. If you know this song, you'll notice that they are missing. Also blended back are some of the instruments in Olivia's "Suspended in Time" number. It's interesting to compare the 5.1 mix to the French 2-track mix, which is also an entirely different mix. In that mix, some of the background vocals are mixed way up front and some of the harmony lines are more present in tracks like "Don't Walk Away".
The trailer attached to this is the same one as in the previous release. They didn't clean this up at all and, for what it's worth, it's no surprise that no one came to this film. It's a terrible trailer!!!
The high point of the DVD is the mini-doco. There are confessions, revelations and grumbles as well as a bit of celebration and appreciation for the film that won't die. Olivia Newton-John and Michael Beck are sadly absent from this but there are a few dancers, the production crew and Gene Kelly's widow present to help you understand why this movie failed but also succeeded in the afterlife of video rental and late night cable.
One other bit they attached to this is a little photo gallery. The frame isn't very big so most of the pictures are smaller than you'd like. It's still nice to see some production photos and some never-before seen shots from the film.
Lastly, the packaging is embarrassing. I wish that it wasn't quite so tacky. The original release sported a reprint of the original movie poster. It wasn't the most eye-catching packaging but at least it was authentic. The bonus CD is exactly the same disc that was remastered and released on MCA records a few years ago. Not to take away from the Amazon bundle that's currently being hawked, but there's no reason for you to buy the soundtrack in addition to this release. It's already included.
All in all, it's a nifty little re-release. If you are a fan of the film or a fan of the "spec-tacky-lar" musical numbers, I'd totally recommend getting this edition.
the lies about complete sound trak 2008-07-23
the only improvement is the animorphic widescreen. the sound track that comes is exectaly the same as the one they releised as a single cd. the two missing songs that were reliesed as the flip side of the 45's are still missing from the cd that comes with it, making it incomplete.
Michael Beck KILLED "Xanadu" 2008-07-15
The ONLY reason this movie bombed is because of the incredibly horrible casting of Michael Beck as "Sonny," Kira's (ONJ) love interest. Had an ironing board been given Beck's role, the movie would have had more charm.
The movie is a fantasy, yet the very idea the beautiful Newton-John would pine for the unattractive, stiff, non-personality Michael Beck defies the standard suspension of belief fantasy films require of their audiences.
Musicals, perhaps more than any other genre, really need their stars to share -- if not charisma, then at the very least compatibility. In every scene with Beck, Olivia is sweet and perky and bubbly and awesomely beautiful. However, she's still being forced to create enough onscreen personality for both herself and her costar.
Plus, you expect the two stars of the film to sing a duet or two.
But Beck can't sing. No can he dance.
If you completely ignore Beck and soak up the rest of the film, you've got a great movie. It has it all: Olivia Newton-John, Gene Kelly, beautiful and colorful scenery, fantastic music and dancing, and enough kitschy special effects to make this a great energy film.
Xanadu is excellent 2008-07-13
I remember watching this movie originally. It has all the things a teenager needs to enjoy a movie, great music, beautiful people, and most important, it is a tale with a happy ending. The guy does get the girl, and things do go right. There is already too much misery in the world. A lot of these so called reviewers seem to forget that movies were not supposed to be reality. They were supposed to pick your spirits up, bring them down, and get you to feel some emotion. This world is already at a point where nobody wants to feel anything, I say forget the impossible, enjoy the fantastic, and let the disbelief stay where it belongs, in real life. Your kids will love this, and if you can spend 90 minutes trying to be a kid, you will enjoy it.
Wow I forgot the 80's 2008-07-12
This sums up what the 80's was all about. Bad hair, clothing and acting. Get this movie just for those reasons. If you grew up in the 80's you should feel like you are walking down memory lane.
Why did they even bother? 
2008-07-08
The one star rating isn't for the movie. Xanadu is what it is and I'm one of the people who love it. And because of that, I was really excited to discover they were putting out a special edition DVD. The original DVD only had the trailer as a bonus feature and between the movie's status as a cult classic and the success of the Broadway show I figured this edition would give it the treatment it deserved.
Boy, was I wrong.
Yes, it's cool that the DVD comes with a CD of the soundtrack. But most of the people who own the DVD have likely had the soundtrack for years. So now we have 2.
And the bonus features? The original trailer, a photo gallery, and one documentary. That's it. Which wouldn't even be too bad if the documentary was a good one. But it's not, not by a long shot.
For starters, there are no Olivia interviews in the documentary. I find it hard to believe that she wouldn't have sat down with the filmmakers for a few hours, but she's nowhere to be found except in the clips from the movie. And the clips from the movie? Apparently they weren't able to license the music because that's nowhere to be heard either. In it's place is just a bunch of generic synth music that wouldn't be out of place in an E True Hollywood Story.
And the real kicker? There isn't a single mention of Michael Beck in the entire featurette. How on earth do you do a documentary on a movie and completely ignore the male lead? It's just mind boggling.
All I can conclude is that this feature wasn't specifically produced for the DVD, but it was something they just found and threw in.
It's such a shame. There could have been a wealth of extras on this disc to satisfy the Xanadu diehards - a feature on the success of the music, a feature on the fashions, interviews with Olivia and Michael, a history of how the movie evolved into a cult favorite, deleted scenes, outtakes, karaoke versions of the musical sequences, something about the Broadway show and the previous stage versions......
But instead we get a photo gallery, the trailer from the first DVD, the CD that we all already have, and a single lame documentary.
What a missed opportunity.
