TROOP BEVERLY HILLS – The Blu Review

TROOP BEVERLY HILLS is an amiable comedy from 1989 about a Beverly Hills mother (Shelly Long) who becomes the leader of a troop of local girl scouts. The catch? Their Beverly Hills lifestyle somewhat interfere with the rugged outdoors, and it all comes down to a halt when they enter an outdoors competition and the local girl scouts adversary tries to cheat to win.

Everyone has their guilty pleasures, it’s inescapable. Sure, as film lovers we want to see good quality film-making, but who doesn’t love a good piece of fluff now and then? The 1980s were filled with these kind of movies from the likes of CANNONBALL RUN to every Ernest adventure. None would win an award for best direction or screenplay, but they all have a certain charm. They’re a good way to kick back for 90 minutes or so and escape your problems. Shelley Long, known for her role on the TV show Cheers, made a few movies considered to be guilty pleasures including TROOP BEVERLY HILLS, a film that’s kind of a statement on the overindulgence of the 80s and is pretty silly when you think about it, but it’s such harmless entertainment and the cast is so much fun that it makes it all worthwhile.

Pros: Spirited performances from the cast. Cute premise. Fun score and soundtrack. Some of the humor hits. Pace just zips right along. Teaches some good lessons like team work, friendship, and never giving up, which makes for a few genuinely sweet moments. Has a certain campy charm, which is helped by Betty Thomas’ over-the-top performance as the villain.

Cons: Very dated. Totally predictable. Has the potential to be a good satire, at times coming close, but sadly never makes it. I’m no prude, but this is supposed to be a kids movie and it’s loaded with unnecessary profanity.

Now TROOP BEVERLY HILLS is on Blu-ray from Sony and We Are Movie Geeks has had a peek

TROOP BEVERLY HILLS is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Sony with an MPEG-4 AVC encoded 1080p transfer. While the film has a pretty standard 80’s film stock look to it, the image is nicely crisp and very well detailed and the transfer benefits from the elements being in very good condition. Colors are beautifully saturated, though I personally found flesh tones occasionally on the ruddy side and the greens a bit unnatural. Midrange shots tend to offer some relative softness but the bulk of the film consists of a stable and very clean and clear looking image, and the film’s many fans should be extremely well pleased with the results on display here.

TROOP BEVERLY HILLS’ lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track may not be an immersive sonic showcase, but this very well wrought mix offers nicely nuanced aural pleasures.

The Blu-ray offer up a few new extras:

Shelley Long Remembers Troop Beverly Hills – is a current 14 minute interview with star Shelly Long, in which she talks talks about the making of the film

The Real Phyllis Nefler: Ava Fries – Producer Ava Fries discusses for 9 minutes how the project developed from her own experience with divorce and leading her daughter’s Girl Scout troop.

Deleted Scenes  – 7 minutes of outtakes of scenes that are already in the movie.

Trailer