Look us up when you get to Hollywood.
 

The Flick

Jimmy Alto (Joe Pesci: Casino, Goodfellas) just can’t seem to get a break.  Unable to keep a normal job and not content with acting in bit parts, Jimmy is desperate to become a movie star. After Jimmy and his friend William (Christian Slater: True Romance, Broken Arrow) film themselves thwarting a car stereo thief, they end up on the news. This inspires Jimmy to use this new found publicity to escalate him to stardom.  He creates a vigilante group called S.O.S (Save Our Streets) in the hopes of continuing the ongoing press coverage.  He quickly gets in over his head when he’s caught between the criminals he’s exploiting and the cops looking to arrest the vigilante.    
 
The film doesn’t really pick up until after the first hour when he creates the S.OS. Even then it doesn’t really get exciting until the last 30 minutes of the flick when Jimmy finally reveals himself as Jericho to the public.  With his identity known, the police waste no time in trying to capture him and all the “armed and dangerous” members of the S.O.S. Jimmy and William escape into a theatre, creating a standoff lasting several hours between them, a huge crowd of screaming new fans, and the authorities that ends in a classic shootout a la Scarface.  Sorta.

Originally released in 1994, Jimmy Hollywood won’t wow you with technical wonders, but if you’re a Joe Pesci fan, this light comedy will keep you entertained.  Pesci is just as cocky as ever in this one, especially in the scene when he attends the movie audition. His role here feels incredibly similar to the one in My Cousin Vinny.  On the other hand, Christian Slater is completely wasted here.  It feels like anyone could have played the role of William.  He rarely speaks more than an occasional one-liner and there’s no emotion present in his character.  It’s not until the end that we see a deeper side of him and by then it’s too late.

Audio/Video

Jimmy Hollywoodis presented in a 1080P high def 16X9 widescreen (1.85:1) format.  The transfer is okay but features a lot of graininess throughout, especially in the darker colors.  Being that the film is over 15 years old and wasn’t a large release then, what could I expect? Lionsgate seems to be a fan of the 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio track because they have been using it a lot in their recent releases.  Jimmy Hollywood is no exception.  It’s a dialogue-heavy film that will really work the center speaker, but not much else.  Only when there’s music in the background will you hear the track take advantage of the surround sound.

Special Features

Jimmy Hollywood on Blu-ray comes as a single disc collection with the following extras:

• Trailer Gallery of recent Lionsgate Blu-ray releases

It’s a shame that classic re-releases on Blu-ray like this one aren’t receiving any special features or deleted scenes from the vault.  It would have been nice to see some behind the scenes of how Joe Pesci was on set, considering how campy this role was for him.  

Overall

Jimmy Hollywood is a pretty decent film; it has some great dialogue between the main characters along with some funny and exciting moments.  Sadly, those moments are surrounded by some incredibly slow pacing.  Fans wanting to see Joe Pesci in crisp high-def should certainly add this to their collection – it’s worth a rental for the rest of us.

ComicsOnline gives Jimmy Hollywood on Blu-ray 2.5 out of 5 bit parts.

Buy Jimmy Hollywood on Blu-ray at Amazon.com

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