The Andy Griffith Show is coming to DVD--Finally! (Review)

IGN.com ^ | 11012-2004 | Steve Butts

[silent_jonny]

November 12, 2004 - You can't grow up in North Carolina without being subjected to endless reruns of The Andy Griffith Show. Though the show was a bit harder to find once I moved to San Francisco, I still made a point of seeking out the reruns wherever I could find them. The nostalgic show, produced by Sheldon Leonard and Danny Thomas, looks back to an idealized time and place that never really existed. The popularity of the show lasted a full eight seasons and it was, along with I Love Lucy and Seinfeld, one of the few shows to ever end its run while still at the top of the Nielsen ratings. Though the show has thrived in syndication ever since it went off the air (or morphed into the decidedly unfunny Mayberry R.F.D.), fans have long been waiting for a comprehensive DVD version of the show. Thankfully, Paramount has finally consented to release the entire first season in a remastered DVD format, available November 16.

[Diana in Wisconsin]

Thank you so much! It's not on Netflix, but I reserved it from my Library on VHS.

"Lonesome Rhodes, a big ol' teddy bear of a man, sits in a dusty, squalid Arkansas jail, swapping stories with his fellow drifters and plunking on his guitar. It's not much of a life -- until a chance encounter skyrockets Lonesome to more fame, money, and power than even the greediest man can handle."

Additional Authors: Griffith, Andy, 1926-
Remick, Lee.
Kazan, Elia.
Warner Home Video (Firm)

Andy? Lee Remick!?!?! Elia Kazan? Oy! THANKS! Don't know how I've managed to miss this one...

[TexasCajun]

Sang gospel hymns..

That's Jim Nabors, great voice.

[shattered]

I would check either

www.amazon.com to buy or

www.netflix.com to rent

[TexasCajun]

Ernest T. Bass!

[TalBlack]

The nostalgic show, produced by Sheldon Leonard and Danny Thomas, looks back to an idealized time and place that never really existed.


This is not true. The Andy Griffith Show was the world the way it looked to KIDS who grew up at that time. ADULTS were of course more sophisticated but that depiction of that NC town, to this very day puts me in mind of the old settled towns around my post war built town of Oakdale NY. Specifically: Bohemia Ny and Sayville NY.

The people talked like that. They dressed like that. The same amount of sexuality and or vulgarity heard on the show is what we all saw heard in or lives in around town and in school..

To this day when I am in the contemporaneous (1962)post office in Sayville I hear the whisteling of the show theme. The idea that the show magically fails to reflect the time in which it was made is a leftwing canard.

[freedom1st]

You're right. Helen Krump (or maybe Frump) was Andy's "squeeze"

[freedom1st]

You're right. Helen Krump (or maybe Frump) was Andy's "squeeze"

[highflight]

Face in the Crowd - he was a con artist - much like Burt Lancaster in Elmer Gantry,

My favorite was Gomer Pyle in "CITIZEYN ARREYST"

[Diana in Wisconsin]

Sorry if I'm boring anyone, but I also found this DVD at my library that looks like a winner!

TV time comedy. Disc 2, Andy Griffith show (DVD)
Brentwood Home Video, c2002.
Subjects Television comedies.

Format: [videorecording]
Edition: DVD ; fullscreen.
Description: 1 of 5 videodiscs :
Illustration Details: sd., b&w, col. ;
Dimensions: 4 3/4 in.

Summary: Forty-two episodes of television comedies. Andy Griffith show: Side A.: 1. Mountain wedding -- 2. Opie and the spoiled kid -- 3. Andy discovers America -- 4. Aunt Bea's medicine man. Side B: 1. Barney's first car -- 2. Andy's English valet -- 3. Dogs, dogs, dogs -- 4. The rival.

Contents: 1. Beverly Hillbillies -- 2. Andy Griffith Show -- 3. Dick Van Dyke Show -- 4. The Lucy Show, Petticoat Junction -- 5. Ozzie and Harriet.

Technical Detail: DVD, double-sided, standard version.
Notes: Each side ca. 100 min.

I'm hoping I get the flu this winter and can stay flat on my back for a week! Wa-Hoo!

[don-o]

There is a fairly recent Billy Bob Thorton film that Andy is in. He is the patriarch of an alcoholic family. Who can name that flick?

[silent_jonny]

Sang gospel hymns..

That's Jim Nabors, great voice.

You've never heard of Andy's gospel CDs? There are two that I know of: "I Love To Tell The Story - 25 Timeless Hymns" (1996) and "Just As I Am: 30 Favorite Old Time Hymns" (1998). Both are bestsellers.

[mdmathis6]

I'll bet your insights were profound at the time or was it the aide clumsily pulling on your urinary foley catheter?......That would "incite" me to wrath!

[don-o]

The genius of the show was that Andy was actually the only adult in Mayberry.

He was the Daddy who always made everyhing right, in the end, no matter what.

Remember when Barney, as acting sheriff, had jailed the whole town?

[silent_jonny]

The genius of the show was that Andy was actually the only adult in Mayberry.

I never thought of it that way, but your right! Excellent point.

[Diana in Wisconsin]

"Daddy and Them." Ding-Ding-Ding! What do I win?

[silent_jonny]

"Daddy and Them"? Never heard of it. When was it made?

[yarddog]

"A Face in the Crowd" was interesting.

For the first half it was an extraordinary movie, easily one of the best I have ever seen.

For some reason it seemed to sort of lose it's drama in the last part.

[don-o]

My eternal admiration is the prize for this round.

[silent_jonny]

Here's one of Andy's movies you might have missed--"GRAMPS"

A very dark role for Andy. He kills a man with a shotgun, burns down his own house and visits a prostitute--not necessarily in that order.

[Austin Willard Wright]

Now, I can't see it (though I could before) Let me try again: