Mrs. Doubtfire (Behind-The-Seams Edition)

Review By: Rocco Passafuime
RoccoPassafuime@TheCinemaSource.com

By the 1990’s, Robin Williams had begun to make notably great strides as a dramatic actor with his role in Dead Poets Society. However, almost simultaneously, he began to stumble in the genre that made him huge in the first place, comedy.

While he managed to make a lasting comic impression in Disney’s animated Aladdin as the equally animated Genie, he stumbled in his more comical roles in films like Hook and Toys. However, he managed to still knock another comic home run with the enormously successful comedy Mrs. Doubtfire, now available in an all-new “Behind-The-Seams” edition.

Daniel Hillard is a highly-skilled animated voice actor, whose penchant for childlike impetuousness makes him beloved, yet rather irresponsible, with his children. This doesn’t sit well with his considerably more straight-laced wife Miranda (Sally Field), who has had enough of Daniel’s childishness and insists the two divorce.

Daniel is heartbroken by this and determined to still maintain a close relationship with his three children Lydia, Chris, and Natalie (Lisa Jakub, Matthew Lawrence, Mara Wilson). He soon comes up with a plan when he enlists the help of his older brother Frank (Harvey Fierstein) to transform him into an elderly British woman named Euphegenia Doubtfire, when he finds out Miranda is resorting to needing a housekeeper to help her with the kids.

Daniel soon becomes a hit with both Miranda and the children as Mrs. Doubtfire. However, he soon feels incensed when the more dashing Stuart Dunmire (Pierce Brosnan), Miranda’s old college-acquaintance-turned-client-and-boyfriend, begins making an impact on the family, making it more difficult for his two identities to remain completely separate.

Mrs. Doubtfire borrows more than a page or two from Dustin Hoffman’s similarly drag comedy classic Tootsie. It’s directed in typically bland and syrupy fashion by Home Alone director Chris Columbus and often straddles a rather uncomfortable line between romantic comedy and family film. And while Williams is not always completely convincing as an elderly British nanny, it’s the delightfulness he inhabits as the character and his hilarious energy that makes the film one of his best.

The DVD’s picture quality is in the original anamorphic 2:35:1 widescreen aspect ratio, with the sound quality in Dolby Digital Surround 5.1. This all-new “Behind-The-Seams” edition of this DVD comes packed with plenty of special features, spanning over two discs.

The first disc has a “Cutting Room” section. The first feature is eighteen deleted or extended scenes, most of which are surprisingly extraneous and revealing, including how initially bigger actress Polly Holiday’s neighbor character was before it was almost completely cut. The second feature is alternate scenes.

Disc 2 contains the bulk of special features divided into different sections. The first section is “Production Office” and the first feature is that is the behind-the-scenes featurette “From Man To Mrs.: The Evolution Of Mrs. Doubtfire”.

Various cast and crew are interviewed and it’s divided into five separate sections. They cover the film’s conception, casting, make-up work for Mrs. Doubtfire, Robin Williams’s on-set as her, and balancing the ...