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The Rose



Bette Midler exploded onto the screen with her take-no-prisoners performance in this quintessential film about fame and addiction from director Mark Rydell. Midler is the rock-and-roll singer Mary Rose Foster (known as the Rose to her legions of fans), whose romantic relationships and mental health are continuously imperiled by the demands of life on the road. Incisively scripted by Bo Goldman and beautifully shot by Vilmos Zsigmond (with assistance on the dazzling concert scenes by a host of other world-class cinematographers, including Conrad L. Hall, László Kovács, Owen Roizman, and Haskell Wexler), this is a sensitively drawn and emotionally overwhelming melodrama that made the popular singer into a movie star as well.

DIRECTOR-APPROVED EDITION:

• New 4K digital restoration, supervised by director of photography Vilmos Zsigmond, with 5.1 surround DTS-HD master audio soundtrack on the Blu-ray
• Audio commentary featuring director Mark Rydell
• New interviews with Rydell, Zsigmond, and Bette Midler
• Archival interviews with Midler and Rydell, with on-set footage
• PLUS: An essay by music critic Paula Mejia

Wow, I had little interest in this beforehand, but now my interest has been piqued by that murderer's row of great cinematographers working on it. I didn't know anyone not named Martin Scorsese had such access to every legendary cinematographer working at the time.

Midler also gives a great performance here that you wouldn't really expect out of her, but makes sense after the fact. A lot of it is overplayed, but she's smart enough to underplay a fair bit and get at the mundane aspects of even the over the top parts.

Yeeesh, I'm sorry, but I'm not a fan. I do enjoy Kurt Cobain's take on the title tune…