Amazon.com essential video: Carl Reiner (Where's Poppa?) brought comic Steve Martin to the screen in this mostly funny 1979 movie about a relentlessly stupid but innocent man, whom we get to know from childhood (where it never occurred to him that he was white as he was raised by a family of black sharecroppers) to romance (where he doesn't quite know what to do with Bernadette Peters). Martin is game as the moron, and this is the kind of film with funny moments people still talk about. --Tom Keogh
Product Description: Martin's screen debut, as the adopted son of a poor black sharecropper family, whose crazy inventions take him from rags to riches to rags. No Track Information Available Media Type: DVD Artist: JERK Title: JERK 26TH ANNIVERSARY EDITION (DVD) Street Release Date: 05/22/2007 Domestic Genre: COMEDY VIDEO
Funniest movie ever I have watched this movie probably 50 times and it still makes me laugh when he talks about his "special purpose". I would highly recommend this movie to anyone and the special features on this disc are also fun, too.
Classic comedy One of the best ever. Not much off color stuff, so you can watch it with your kids! You will be using lines from this one for years to come.
Steve Martin's best work Steve Martin is at his best with non-stop comedy. This is not a family film but this is adult humor at its best. It's one of those movies you can watch over and over again. A wonderful piece of comedy.
High quality transfer for "The Jerk" This is certainly a Steve Martin classic. Very funny, timeless comedy. The audio and video is the best I have ever seen it on this tranfer. I can only remember the countless times I've seen this on regular TV, with the outdated audio and video. Never again! A must own for "The Jerk" fans that do not have Universal HD from their cable provider.
One of the best comedies ever. Martin and Peters both at their peak. I bought the widescreen version of the DVD and have no complaints. For the most part, all I look for in my DVDs is a quality picture, widescreen and/or the choice of it. I don't necessarily buy for the extras, which didn't come with my early generation wide-screen version of "The Jerk," one of those movies that never gets old. That applies only to the unedited version of course. The successful formula for this movie has been imitated, but never duplicated. Martin was at his comedic peak when this movie came out, and that's obvious throughout The Jerk. And perhaps my favorite female celebrity (yeah, yeah. I get lots of slack for that) of all time, Bernadette Peters plays Martin's love interest, perfectly setting up Martin's unique sense of humor throughout the movie. There are times I merely scroll through the movie just to watch her scenes. Complete infatuation. The whole ensemble in this movie is perfectly cast, as they deliver regardless of amount of camera time. The funniest scenes are gutbusters, many of them embedded in pop culture history. I lost count of how many times we quoted scenes from this movie whenever the opportunity presented itself, often in a drunken delight I'll admit. There's never a moment in this movie where you didn't drink your beverage carefully for fear of spitting it out in sudden subtle, or explicit hilarious moment, and many of those moments have aged well. It's shame Martin has become so reluctant to doing comedic material and given us more paternal roles as years haver rolled by, though it's understandable that he'd stretch himself out. And to be fair, Martin comedies that followed were hit and miss for the most part. They all paled by comparison to the gold standard set by The Jerk. And if that's all you're asking from you're DVD, you'll be more than happy. If you want more extras, I've seen several versions of this since I bought mine varying in content.
Anything Goes Trivia
Trevor
Megaton Man
