DVD Reviews

Wouldn’t it be nice to jet off to an exotic location the moment your life turned sour? The Holiday, directed by Nancy Meyers (Something’s Gotta Give, Baby Boom), takes on this idea. As Iris (Kate Winslet) and Amanda (Cameron Diaz) simultaneously reach crossroads in their love lives, they find each other on a home-exchange Website and swap houses—and countries—for two weeks. While both women think they’re vacationing from love and all its disappointments, it ends up finding them anyway.

The 1.85:1 anamorphic picture quality is inconsistent. In some shots, the detail is great, with no visual noise; in others, the lighting is dark, and the picture is soft and grainy. The Dolby Digital 5.1 track isn’t the best, either. The surrounds get some use, but, overall, the sound is not as full as desired. Nonetheless, the score carries the film so well, it’s like another character in the story. The DVD doesn’t include much in the extras department. In fact, it only has two, the featurette “Foreign Exchange: The Making of The Holiday” and the usual director’s commentary.

It might seem that this film is Meyers’ tribute to the silver screen’s ancestors and old Tinseltown, with her 1960s-style love montage and classic references throughout the movie. I won’t lie to you: I’ve already watched this five times, not counting the time I saw it in the theater.

Like Iris’ English cottage, The Holiday is idyllic, affirming that romance is not really dead; sometimes it’s just on vacation.