Welcome to Collinwood DVD: Review By mikestickel

This is one of those films that I haven't heard much about, which is weird considering George Clooney is one of the producers. Anyway, I mainly picked this one up because of my joy from watching William H. Macy movies, with the exception of Jurassic Park III.

The main storyline is about a thief that hears about an amazing job from a lifer while he's in prison. Of course the thief needs to get out of jail so he tells one person about the job and slowly but surely the word gets spread through the various other criminal elements in his neighbourhood.The thief is cleverly dooped into giving up the plans to the heist and we are now treated to this rag-tag bunch of criminals trying to pull off this job.

I found this as an interesting way to portray a realistic thief. Everyone has their own motivation for getting in on it but the motives aren't Hollywood motives. The group is made up of poor, rundown guys who need desperately need to make some cash for things they need, one of which is to bail out a wife to help take care of the daughter she left behind with dad.

The special features on this DVD were right along the lines of what I like to see in DVD's.

Behind-the-Laughs Mockumentary "Welcome to Collinwood: Uncensored"

This is where we get treated to Sam Rockwell grabbing someone with a camcorder and running around the set interviewing cast and crew alike. There are several bits of hilarity that ensue and the whole time Sam is interviewing people he's going under another name.

Extra Special Celebrity Intro

I'm not going to spoil the surprise, watch it and find out for yourself.

Viewers Guide to Hilarious Collinwood Lowlife Lingo

Throughout the film there are ton's of slang terms used that are sometimes hard to figure out what they mean. This little section is great for the ones that you don't understand.

Technically speaking the film is presented in widescreen format and the image is very well done. There is a lot of color on the screen and it almost looks like it could have taken place in an earlier era (ie. the 50's).

Presented in Dolby Digital 5.1 on my system the sound was great. There isn't a lot of big explosions going off like most action movies do but all the dialogue was very clear.

My final word is good. As I mentioned above, I hadn't heard much about this film at all until I picked it up. This is one of those films that didn't have a big impact on the box office but when the word gets out it will kill on rentals. All the different characters in the film are fantastic and you'll laugh out loud when you watch it.