Cinematical Seven: My Favorite Director Commentaries

I'd also recommend Sam Raimi et al on the Evil Dead commentaries. Very funny.

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Aw. Where is Trey and Matt's commentary on "Cannibal!: The Musical"? It's one of the most hilarous things I've ever heard as Matt, Trey, and others just get drunker and drunker as the movie goes on.

When they start arguing about stupid things like where a scene was shot...I just lose it.

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You've got some good ones here but you missed these:

The 2 Shaun of the Dead tracks with Simon Pegg are both really good.

Any of the Evil Dead movies, Sam Raimi & Bruce Campbell making fun of each other

And even though it's obscure the commentary for the Direct to Video film Drive starring Marc Dacascos is really funny too.

I tend to like the more entertaining joking around tracks then the dry informative ones.

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Oh yeah and Robert Rodriguez is really good at just cramming information into his tracks, I wasn't really a fan of Once Upon a Time in Mexico till I listened to his track for it...plus the 10 minute cooking lessons! gotta love them.

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Cool! This makes me want to go back and re-listen to these. And did you notice how on the Goonies commentary, Sean Astin just vanishes at one point? They sort of make an odd joke about it, but he is literally just there and then gone.

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There are multiple commentary tracks on Spinal Tap, across the various Criterion and regular versions. They're all good, but the one with them in character is classic.

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Steven Soderbergh and writer Lem Dobbs on The Limey. Dobbs obviously hates the film Soderbergh made from his script and there's a weird edge of hostility to the whole thing.

Soderbergh is generally good, I also like him with Mike Nichols on Catch 22. Also anything by FF Coppola....

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I like the Donnie Darko Director's Cut commentary where Kevin Smith shows up for no real reason except to keep Richard Kelly from talking to himself for two hours.

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Scott, Scott, Scott ... how could you overlook "Brother Bear" on a list of top commentaries? Rick Moranis and Dave Thomas do the commentary in their moose characters, which turns out to pretty much be a long "Bob and Doug McKenzie" skit.

Jette and I rented the movie, listened to the commentary, and returned the disc without bothering to watch the film.

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Oh...*director* commentaries. Never mind, I'm a dope.

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you've yet to hear Roger Ebert's audio commentary on the Dark City DVD, stop what you're doing and sit down with it for 95 minutes. Even if you already love the movie, Mr. Ebert may help you to appreciate it even more.
So you want to encourage your readers to bring on an aneurysm with a badly-acted, even-worse-edited film? The moment Ebert praised this as a modern masterpiece, I realized he was starting to lose it.

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A commentary that I remember is Ang Lee and Emma Thompson on Sense and Sensibility, really great.

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I know this it's not a movie, but Joss Whedon's commentary for the Firefly episode Objects in Space is the first thing I always think of when I think of commentaries. He just provides so much insight into what went into making the episode thematically as well as what the episode reveals about the characters.

How many TV show episodes are inspired by an existential philosophy and then manage to subtly yet consistently portray it? Good episode, amazing commentary.

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The commentary of the Nightmare before Christmas Is one I have really enjoyed because it went into a lot of detail on how certain shots were created...a must listen for anyone interested in that form of animation.
I am a big fan of the funny commentaries like Kevin Smith's but I miss a lot of the commentaries that you used to get that were better behind the scenes on how certain movies were made. I learned more from some of those about the nuts and bolts of filmmaking than from the film classes I took in college...

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Ebert's Dark City commentary is good, but his Citizen Kane commentary is better. I never understood what the big deal was before I heard that commentary.

Back to the topic of directors, though, Peter Bogdanovich's commentary for Targets is perhaps my favorite. His Paper Moon track is good, too. His Citizen Kane track, not so much.

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any commentary on any movie by john waters...keeps it lively without talking over EVERYTHING, super funny stories and meandering ramblings about what he and his cast/friends were doing at the time they were shooting that are really funny and interesting.

best moment: in pink flamingos, waters says that divine really did take poppers during the birthday party scene..."and THERE! You can see when it kicks in!"

Also, to TheMatt--orgazmo's commentaries (special edition)are just as hilarious as cannibal but listen to the one with trey & matt before listening to the other 2

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Scott, have you listened to the "Kentucky Fried Movie" commentary? It's one of the few commentary tracks John Landis has done, and he's joined by the Abrahams/Zucker trio. At times, it's funnier than the movie. I also agree on John Waters; I enjoyed his commentary track on "Pecker" recently. And of course Raimi and Campbell are delightful.

On non-director commentaries: The "Brother Bear" moose commentary was great, as Chip notes, and I wish Bob Sagat had done something like that with "March of the Penguins" instead of that awful "Farce" movie through which I only managed to last about 10 minutes.

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You are all smoking crack.

The best commentary besides the ones done by Russell and Carpenter is the commentary track done by Fincher, Norton, and Pitt for *Fight Club*.

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Tarsem Sighn's commentary for The Cell is full of information and his art director background shines in manic rants...also some sophisticated J-Lo ass comments for good measure.

Can't believe no one mentioned Carrot Top's commentary for The Rules of Attraction. Can't believ that actually happened.

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Hostile commentaries are always good for a laugh. Soderburgh and Lem on The Limey is an amazing battle of wills as the writer complains about the mess the director made of his script. See also, Clerk II's cast commentary which is laced with so much passive aggressive behaviour that Smith actually seems to step in at one point to calm the mood down.

I love the moment in the commentary to 'A Knight's Tale' when the director and writer suggests the listener goes off and get's a beer.

Or in the LotR: TTT when Peter Jackson suggests they could embellish the existing films with another year's filming instead of making sequels and his wife Fran tells him to stop.

Or the whole of Almost Famous:Untitled which Cameron Crowe delivers with his mom in the room.

Or Vanilla Sky in which he calls Tom Cruise halfway through to ask him some questions.

Or any of the tracks on the Ocean's Eleven remake.

Or the bit on the Star Wars: Attack of the Clones which Lucas tries to make a Kevin Smith reference and gets it terribly wrong.

Or Y Tu Mama Tambien in which the two teenagers deliver the commentary in character, sounding as though they're getting high.

Katie Manning in any of her Doctor Who commentaries. She's daft as a brush. And Peter Davison in any of his because he tends to be so rude about everything.

Or Spinal Tap, again in character in which the band seek to debunk the enterprise.

Or the bit in The Player commentary when Altman says he can't be bothered doing audio commentaries.

Or The Opposite of Sex in which Don Roos and friends talk about how poor some sections of the filming where and how they could have done so much better.

Or Pretty Woman as Gary Marshall sounds like your dad making a film and names names on failed casting choices.

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