Wyatt Earp (Two-Disc Special Edition) (DVD)

Many people loved the story of Wyatt Earp that was brought to life in 1993 in the popular movie Tombstone starring Kurt Russell as the mustached man along with Val Kilmer, who turned in one of the performances of his life as Wyatt's sidekick Doc Holliday. Well, in 1994 Kevin Costner decided to bring the story of Wyatt Earp back to the big screen in a sprawling epic film lasting over three hours boasting a HUGE cast of names as you can see above.

Now that story of Wyatt Earp comes to DVD for the first time in a 2-Disc Special Edition, but is it really worth buying?

I have got to be upfront about this and tell you that this film does not have anywhere near the cinematic appeal that Tombstone had, and it is no real fault of its own as much as it is a result of bad timing. The fact that the film was released only one year after the highly successful predecessor really hurt its chances along with the fact that the second half of the movie is almost the exact same film as Tombstone with a few subtle changes for authenticity sake.

This special edition comes with the full film across two discs along with three special features and the first two I would like to focus on first.

Here you have a new behind-the-scenes documentary created for this DVD release titled "It Happened that Way" and also a "making-of" TV Special from 1994 hosted by Tom Skerritt. In both of these features the primary focus is on authenticity and bringing the true story of Wyatt Earp to the big screen, and the movie succeeds on all levels, but where it succeeds also ends up being its failure, as it is not always the straight-forward facts that people go to movies to see.

As for the third special feature it is a deleted scenes montage, which I particularly liked for one big reason. Most often with deleted scenes each one is titled a certain way to give you an idea of what it is about, but with this disc before each scene is shown to you it gives you that title again along with an explanation for the scene. It adds a lot to the viewing of the scene and takes you back to the movie to let you decide where it would have or would not have fit in to the film.

As usual you also get the theatrical trailer, which I have said before, I love these things.

Overall, Costner's Wyatt Earp is a great film, but unfortunately if I am going to watch an Earp film I am going to have to fall back on Tombstone as I find it much more entertaining and the performances can not even be beaten by the big names in this picture.