MovieChat Forums > Head Over Heels (1982) Discussion > Never could find a copy, but saw it agai...

Never could find a copy, but saw it again on NetFlix the other day.

posted 14 years ago by bruce-129
5 replies | jump to latest

I am really not quite sure why, but I really love this movie.
It is so personal and intimate, and human, and so not-Hollywood.
I don't know what I would do if they had given it the happy ending, but
I would not have seen it so many times.
I think I have seen this or watched it with others like over 20 times
now. It is as close to a perfect movie as I can think of, in that it is a
classic in the sense of a universal work of art anyone should be able
to relate to.

The whole thing is just perfect, the perfect mix of comedy and
tragedy.

I cannot believe that this is not on DVD.

I was blown away it is on Netflix, but only online, you cannot rent it,
you cannot find it. This is very sad.

This is absolutely the best work and a work of love of many people
in their careers, and I wonder how it was every conceived of or made.

I wait in hope for the day when someone has enough brains to release
this, just on general principle ... a Blu-Ray copy would be great!

I even saw this in the theater when it came out.

There is another John Heard movie I was waiting for too, not as good, just
just as memorable and off-beat .... "Mindwalk".

If more people could appreciate these kinds of movies we would have
a better world.

[–] WarpedRecord 14 years ago

Thanks for the details. So when you view this on Netflix online, is it in fullscreen or widescreen, and is it a high-quality picture of VHS quality? I suspect Netflix has just uploaded a copy of the VHS to the site. I wonder how they get the legal clearances for that, or is this in the public domain by now? And when you "rent" it to watch online, can you watch only once or make a copy? I'm pretty low-tech with this.

Regardless, I wish there was a quality DVD release, widescreen with bonus features including a trailer and Siskel and Ebert's review.

You were lucky to see this in the theater when it came out. How big was the audience? I read the book and interviewed Ann Beattie when she came to my college campus in the early '80s.

"Mindwalk" is a excellent existential film that bears repeated viewings. Another great John Heard film is "Cutter's Way," which like this and "Mindwalk" is tragically overlooked. I've found all of these films for a buck or two on VHS in various thrift and record stores. There are so many great castoffs out there, but it's a shame they're forgotten, if they were ever even remembered.

[–] bruce-129 14 years ago

The picture on NetFlix seems as good or better as a VHS cassette ... the resolution of a VHS cassette is very low.

>> VHS is roughly equivalent to 333x480 pixels luma and 40x480 chroma resolutions (333x480 pixels=159,840 pixels or 0.16MP (1/6 of a MegaPixel)).[19]

The image has been compressed, but this is not a high action movie with lots of detail - it looked good to me, and that was expanded on my 1080p HiDef LCD screen.

Somehow I tried watching "Cutter's Way" but never could get into it.

[–] WarpedRecord 14 years ago

Thanks for the details. I'm more into the quality of the writing and acting, so I'm generally not particular about picture quality. But I hate when films are cropped for fullscreen.

I also liked John Heard in "Cat People" and "The Trip to Bountiful." I see one of his first films was "First Love" in 1977, which I actually saw in the theater but I don't remember his role.

[–] PenTheater 12 years ago

Amazon, now avail..
with Cutter's Way!

[–] bruce-129 12 years ago

It's also showed up on NetFlix too, making buying it now moot.