REAL LIFE 4K Review: Birth of a Comic Legend

Uncompressed monaural audio sounds phenomenal in 4K.

Real Life (1979)
The film is available as of August 27, 2024, from The Criterion Collection in separate editions: 4K+Blu-ray (2 discs) and Blu-ray only (1 disc).

In 1975, Albert Brooks was introduced to a young nationwide U.S. audience via his short films on Saturday Night Live. As a teenager, I can testify that the shorts were hilarious and made me want to see more.

Born into a show business family in Los Angeles, Brooks attended high school with the likes of Rob Reiner, who became a lifelong friend and recently directed Albert Brooks: Defending My Life, a very good documentary that covered his early life and developing career in comedy, starting in the late 1960s with appearances on variety and talk shows.

Brooks made his first short film for PBS in 1972, made a couple of comedy albums, and then started making shorts for Saturday Night Live. As he explains in a new special feature included on Criterion's new editions, David Geffen, then head of Warner Bros.' music and film divisions, was impressed by Brooks' comedy albums and asked if he had a film pitch. Brooks' idea for Real Life was born at that moment.

Inspired by Craig Gilbert's landmark documentary series An American Family, which aired on PBS in 1973, Real Life begins with a text scroll declaring its intention to be "the next step" in cinema by revealing, not only a typical family, but also what happens to the filmmakers during the course of making the movie.

Brooks plays a fictional version of himself, a character he had played in some of his short films, and a variation on the character he had developed in his variety and talk show appearances. Charles Grodin, who was carving out a steady career as a droll comic presence, stars as Warren Yeager, alongside Frances Lee McCain, a lesser-known actress whose work had sparkled in dramas and comedies, as Jeanette Yeager, wife, mother, and a woman whose patience is constantly being tested by the men in her life.

The idea is that Brooks and his crew, outfitted in wearable digital cameras that fit over their heads and make them look like astronauts, will film Warren, Jeanette, and their two children for one year, observed by two doctors (J.A. Preston and Matthew Tobin). The resulting footage will then be edited into a movie and released in movie theaters.

The idea goes hilariously awry from the get-go, and Brooks and company milk it for all that it's worth. Written by Albert Brooks, Monica Johnson, who would become a frequent collaborator, and Harry Shearer, a friend and comedy colleague, the 98-minute film works best in its individual segments, becoming patchy in its second half, while still scoring big laughs. The individual segments are frequently very, very funny, bolstered by Grodin and McCain, who are both terrific actors and expertly deliver their lines.

The supporting cast also features talented players, notably J.A. Preston as a doctor who quickly becomes exasperated with the show and the filmmaker. James L. Brooks, who would later direct Albert Brooks in one of his signature roles in Broadcast News, makes a cameo appearance as a driving instructor.

After decades awashed in reality shows, it is quite refreshing to experience a time before the explosion of shows that, personally, I can't stand watching. Everyone on a reality show is a performer now, and most of them aren't very good at it; otherwise, they'd become professional actors playing someone other than a variation on themselves.

In contrast, Albert Brooks shows everyone how to play a variation on yourself without wearing out your welcome. He's been doing this for more than 50 years. Real Life is the birth of his legendary career as a feature filmmaker.

Produced by Penelope Spheeris, who produced Brooks' short films and whose great documentary The Decline of Western Civilization was released the same year, Real Life was made independently. (The Warner Bros. deal never happened.) Eric Saarinen served as director of photography, beginning a collaboration that would stretch through Brooks' Modern Romance (1981) and Lost in America (1985).

The film landed a distribution deal with Paramount Pictures, who didn't really know what to do with it and gave it a scant theatrical release, which is my excuse for not seeing during its original run. I caught up with it later, in late 1981 or 1982, on a double-bill with Modern Romance in a Los Angeles repertory theater, and it made me a fan for life.

Watching Real Life in 4K on the new Criterion Collection edition, my first thought was that 4K was overkill. The higher resolution amplifies the limitations of the 35mm print. On the other hand, it looks amazing. And the mono soundtrack sounds truly phenomenal.

In watching 4K, I'm usually so blown away by the increased resolution, soaking in the spectacular colors and increased accuracy in skin tones and the total absence of light in pitch-black scenes, that I don't notice the sound. Here, though, I was blown away by the soundtrack, as quiet as it is.

Three special features are included on the Blu-ray:

-- New interview with Albert Brooks. (30 minutes) He talks about his life and career, cites the inspirations for the film, and provides many of the details you'd expect from a feature-length audio commentary. In the postscript, he also points out that his film came five years before his friend Rob Reiner's This Is Spinal Tap was declared the first 'mockumentary.' Just sayin'.

-- New interview with Frances Lee McCain. (15 minutes) She talks about her career before making the film, pinpointing the role that likely brought her to Brooks' attention. She remains absolutely thrilled that she had the opportunity, and speaks very warmly about her experiences with Brooks and Grodin. She also highlights her favorite moments in the film, and why they stand out for her. They are quite subtle moments, and, frankly, I didn't appreciate them fully until she pointed them out.

-- 3D trailer directed by Brooks, shown only in theaters, that I'd never seen before. It's awesome.

Also included in the package is a print booklet, featuring a great essay by film critic A.S. Hamrah that is insightful and personal. The cover is based on the original theatrical poster.

Summary: A great package for a film that I didn't appreciate fully until watching it again.