![[box cover]](../../reviewimgs/j/jerrymaguire_se.jpg)
Jerry Maguire: Special Edition
Columbia TriStar's original Jerry Maguire DVD was published in 1997 and was therefore one of the earliest discs ever released. It had but one supplement: Spanish subtitles. It didn't even have the film's own trailer on it, much less a panoply of others, as is common now. The audio selection was DD 2.0 Surround, but the box couldn't be bothered to tell you that. That was then, this is now. The 2002 Jerry Maguire: Special Edition release is a typically big SE package with time-consuming menus and an abundance of extras, faux and otherwise. Now that nearly all of director Cameron Crowe's oeuvre is available digitally, some might wonder if it's worth such lavish production, particularly Jerry Maguire. Those who find Almost Famous smug and unctuous and Vanilla Sky disastrously incomprehensible, should be reminded that Jerry Maguire was nominated for five Oscars, winning one (for best supporting actor). At root, it's a fine romantic comedy with some visual flair (provided by the usually cold Janusz Kaminski ) that introduced such catch phrases into the culture as "Show me the money!" and "You complete me." The film made stars of several "new" cast members, including Renée Zellweger and, briefly, Cuba Gooding, Jr. It's also a romantic movie that touches on something unusual in such fare, the reality of romance. Jerry is dating, and even marries, a woman he has ambivalent feelings about. That's the great thing about Jerry Maguire — it has mystery to it. Unlike Crowe's other films so far, there is complexity beneath the surface sheen. In contrast to its first release, Columbia TriStar has truly celebrated Jerry Maguire with its two-disc SE set. The feature film has a good anamorphic transfer (1.85:1) that looks much like the transfer on the previous iteration of the movie, while audio comes in Dolby Digital 5.1 and Dolby 2.0 Surround in English, French, Spanish, and Portuguese (also here are an array of subtitles). The biggest addition to Disc One is the audio commentary by Crowe, Cruise, Zellweger, and Gooding, in which the foursome praise each other, and praise everyone else who worked on the movie. Disc Two, meanwhile, is packed. The bulk of it is a video version of the audio commentary track available on the first disc. The screen is divided into two: on top is the footage of the foursome watching the movie, while below is a small version of the movie itself. Also here are five deleted scenes, rehearsal footage, a commercial from the film, the video bit "How to Be a Sports Agent," a photo gallery, a "making-of" featurette, trailers, Bruce Springsteen's "Secret Garden" music video, the complete "Jerry Maguire Mission Statement," filmographies. and the screenplay as DVD-ROM content. Dual-DVD digipak.
—D. K. Holm
