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Admittedly, the opening scenes are the best, but alas such simple pleasures are to be short lived. The film tells you right upfront that one of the characters is about to croak, so let's flashback to Atlantic City. There we meet pint-sized CC Bloom (Mayim Bialik), an entirely unpleasant, undiscovered "talent," and spoiled little Hillary Whitney, a rich brat who spends her days riding horses and "thinking." After a single conversation on the beach, these two intellectual powerhouses become instant friends for life. What follows is an excruciatingly long story of friendship, love, rivalry and...bad Bette Midler songs.

As a lover of crap cinema, there is much to cherish in Beaches. Hoping to jump-start a flagging career and appear "middle-aged but sexy," Barbara Hershey apparently had all of the fat sucked out of her ass and injected into her lips. Too bad it went directly to her brain instead, as she ends up giving perhaps the worst performance in an otherwise fine career. Then there is, of course, the unstoppable Bette, whose main talent seems to be a limitless capacity for self-absorption. Okay, so she can sing, but with two characters as whiny, annoying and insipid as these two dingbats, now we know why mothers eat their young.

Directed by Garry Marshall with all the flair of a TV movie - has this man ever made a decent flick? - Beaches quickly settles into the oddly comfortable chick flick routine of comedy scene-ultimate betrayal-catfight-tearful reunion-music montage, repeat to fade. Best of all is the inspired climax, with poor Hershey carted back out to the beach to die. While all the blue-haired women around me in theater were sobbing, I still had to wonder - how would Bette know when she had finally kicked? Wait for the tides to wash her corpse off the shore? Watch for the buzzards? Or listen for the shriek of a poor child building sand castles nearby, suddenly startled by the sight of a decaying Barbara Hershey, her lips still the size of Mick Jagger's? Just curious.

Those of you still reading this might be tempted to think that I'm being a bit harsh on Beaches. Okay, so I can be a little sarcastic in my reviews. But don't get me wrong, I absolutely love the film if only for all the wrong reasons. Yes, I know there are thousands, if not millions of you out there that still hold Beaches near and dear to your hearts. Fair enough. Just please stay away from me. Don't write me letters, don't call, don't send gifts. You scare me.

Video: How Does The Disc Look?

Although presented in a new 1.78:1 anamorphic widescreen transfer, this looks even scarier than Bette Midler's split ends. I suspect someone at Buena Vista found an old print in Garry Marshall's closet, because how else do you explain all the dirt, blemishes and overall icky appearance? Aside from that, colors are fairly well saturated if mushy, with fleshtones veering too far toward the reds. Also disappointing are detail and sharpness, which appear poor and undefined. Luckily, there aren't too many dark interiors or nighttime scenes in the film, because shadow delineation is quite wanting. But wait, there's more. Considerable edge enhancement is present, and a few noticeable compression artifacts top it all off. Not a very pretty sight, but at least it's in widescreen!

Audio: How Does The Disc Sound?

Presented in English Dolby 2.0 surround only, there isn't much going on here sonically. It is a well recorded soundtrack, at least in terms of the music, but watch out when it comes to the dialogue. You'd think with Touchstone anteing up for the star wattage of Midler and Marshall at the helm, they could have found someone better to do the ADR, because oftentimes the looping looks way off. Dynamic range is fine with some of the musical numbers coming through nicely, and low end is average for a non-5.1 mix. Surround use is minimal, barely engaged even for ambiance and the score. A middling soundtrack at best, but perfectly listenable.

No alternate language options are included, only English captions encoded as subtitles and true English Closed Captions.

Supplements: What Goodies Are There?

As part of Buena Vista's new cheapie budget line (it shows), nothing has been included here at all, not even a trailer. Mercifully, we're spared a Garry Marshall audio commentary or a Bette Midler photo gallery.

DVD-ROM Exclusives: What do you get when you pop the disc in your PC?

How odd...there are actually more ROM features on a DVD than DVD-Video ones, although in this case it is only a custom interface and some weblinks. Still, at least it's something?

Parting Thoughts