RITA / TROUBLE IN TEXAS - DVD review

"Most men fell in love with Gilda....and wakened with me"
- Rita Hayworth

Appropriately, "Rita", the new documentary film from Playboy--about sex symbol and screen siren Rita Hayworth--starts off with a scene from "The Shawshank Redemption". This is the scene where the prisoners are watching a movie and Morgan Freeman asks Tim Robbins to keep quiet for a moment as the men in the room excitingly anticipates the famous scene from the 1946 movie "Gilda". This is the scene where Rita Hayworth throws up her head and her gorgeous mane of hair to reveal one of the sexiest images of its day. Rita Hayworth's role in "Gilda" forever immortalized her on screen as the sexy siren that most men can only dream about. Therefore, this image of her appearing in "Gilda" is both a fitting tribute and a testament to the longevity of one of Hollywood's most alluring stars.

"Rita" aired on the Turner Classic Movies cable channel in 2003 and is now released as a Collector's Edition 2-DVD set. It is also Playboy's latest foray into the documentary arena. Competently narrated by the sultry voice of Kim Basinger, "Rita" recalls the private but turbulent life of one of Hollywood's most enduring sex symbols and puts various aspects of her career into better perspective. This documentary chronicles Hayworth's life from her early years as a dancer, through the peak of her film career and until her death in 1987 from the debilitating Alzheimer's disease. Throughout the documentary, you will see movie footages and photo slideshows and hear Hayworth's co-stars, friends and family recall various periods of her life in interviews. You will also have the pleasure of hearing Ms. Hayworth herself appear in voiceovers taken from archival interviews.

The name Rita Hayworth may not mean much to the younger generation but in the 1940's and 1950's, she was the biggest star at Columbia Pictures after its studio head, Harry Cohn, signed her to a multi-year contract. Born Margarita Carmen Cansino, Hayworth (which is her mother's maiden name) was originally a dancer in a family enterprise known as the Dancing Cansinos, performing with her father. We are told that her father controlled her early years as a performer and even tried to stop her from dabbling in motion pictures. This pattern of a controlling male figure unfortunately continues for most of her life, starting with her father and through all her five marriages. Hayworth's first marriage was to Ed Judson, a man who was almost twice her age. Judson was credited with helping to jumpstart her acting career, refining her image by playing down her Spanish heritage and redefining her as the quintessential all-American girl.

Rita Hayworth's next two marriages made headlines due to the fact that she was then a big movie star and also to the celebrity status of her spouses. Her second marriage was to none other than Orson Welles and the third one to royalty, Prince Aly Khan, a well-known international playboy. With the Prince, Hayworth had a daughter, Princess Yasmin, who appears in this documentary. When Hayworth married Khan, she left Hollywood behind, hoping to start a family and live a quiet life. However, both her marriages to Welles and the prince were unhappy, due to differing expectations. Her last two marriages to singer/actor Dick Haymes and screenwriter James Hill were equally as disastrous.

At the peak of her popularity in the 1940's, Rita Hayworth was famously dubbed the Love Goddess for her sexy image on screen. The stunning Ms. Hayworth was the star of over fifty motion picture films during her long career. During World War II, Rita Hayworth became the ultimate pin-up girl of every American G.I. serving overseas and she showed her appreciation by appearing in many USO shows, entertaining the troops.

One of the most surprising things about Rita Hayworth revealed by this documentary is the fact that the glamorous star of so many movies is actually a shy and private person; someone who prefers to raise a family and be a mother rather than live the fast-paced life of a movie star. This theme is repeated often when the subject of her marriages come up. After her marriage to Prince Aly Khan failed and ended in divorce, she reluctantly went back to Hollywood. Luckily for Hayworth, the four-year absence from the movie screen did not seem to have dampened the movie-going public's hunger for her. Throughout her illustrious career, Hayworth starred alongside many of Hollywood's leading men, like Burt Lancaster, Fred Astaire, Douglas Fairbanks Jr., Frank Sinatra, Tyrone Power and many more.

With a runtime of almost an hour, "Rita" manages to cover most of the more important points in the private and public life of this Hollywood sex symbol. While "Rita" concentrates more on Hayworth's private life, her career in films is only treated as a peripheral aspect. I would have loved to see all the important highlights of Hayworth's film career covered here but with an extensive list of films to her name, it would probably take a separate biographical piece just to be able to cover her career in a more in-depth manner.

Video:
Presented in fullscreen aspect ratio of 4:3, the video quality is a mix bag that range from good to so-so. This, however, is not due to any problems with the video transfer but actually more to do with the old archival material that is used throughout the documentary. Apart from the older footages and stills, the newer interview footages feature natural skin tones and well-defined colors.

Audio:
Audio is presented in English language Dolby Surround 2.0. Due to the more dialogue-driven nature of documentaries, this is an adequately-produced audio track. The spoken words are clear without any distortion and the background music sounds equally good. The surround channels and the subwoofer stay mostly silent.

Extras:
Disc 1 contains five sets of special features that consist mainly of footages that did not make it into the documentary. In "Outtakes", you will get to see more interviews with the people who already appear in the film. Many of them are brief, lasting for less than a minute. Next is a section titled "Additional Interviews", which is a confusing term to use where it might have been better suited for the previous "Outtakes" feature. This one is actually a set of interviews with Ruta Lee and Robert Walker Jr.--two people that never made it into the actual documentary. In "Archival Footage", there are video clips of Hayworth's appearance on The Carol Burnett Show, her honeymoon with Prince Aly Khan and additional clips from personal home movies. Up next is "Photographic Gallery" which is essentially a slideshow of old photographs. Finally, "Filmography" features a list of all the movies that Rita Hayworth had appeared in, divided into groups of years.

Disc 2, contains an entire movie, 1937's "B" Western titled "Trouble in Texas". This is an early Rita Hayworth black and white movie, one of several that she starred in before signing with Columbia Pictures. The video and audio quality of this movie is horrendous to say the least. Granted that it is almost 70-years old and the source print is probably in bad shape to begin with. What is missing on this disc is any additional information on the movie itself or what significance, if any, it played in Ms. Hayworth's career.

Film Value:
Fans of Rita Hayworth will definitely find this documentary informative and entertaining. It manages to show us a side of the actress that many might not know about--a side that is both sad and to a degree, pitiful. Often times, there are misconceptions about the glamorous lives of movie stars and "Rita" clearly dispels such notions. Given the many trials and tribulation during the later part of her life, it is good that with this documentary, we can also celebrate the long film career of Rita Hayworth and try to understand her difficult private life. Rita Hayworth touched many with her beauty and determination and appropriately, it is this glamorous image that many of us will always remember her by.