The Rodgers & Hammerstein Collection (The Sound of Music / The King and I / Oklahoma! / South Pacific / State Fair / Carousel)

Oh, what a beautiful collection! These 6 films from the most successful writing team in the American musical theater have been available on DVD for years--but not like this! All 6 have now been fully remastered to meet the demands of the latest TV and computer equipment. They have always been great, but they've truly never looked and sounded better than they do now. But wait--there's more! This package includes a generous bunch of extras: documentaries, deleted material, alternate versions, interviews, running commentaries, soundtrack albums, performances by stars from the original stage productions, even a remake of STATE FAIR from 1962. The extras alone are a good reason to upgrade your copies--or to get them for the first time. If you're looking for colorful, romantic stories with brilliant performances and a virtual catalogue of nearly 100 of the very best show tunes in history, you couldn't make a better purchase. These are, quite simply, the finest films of their kind. No serious DVD collection is complete without them. Watch. Listen. Enjoy! PS: You'll also want to add FLOWER DRUM SONG to your collection. It's now (finally) available on DVD, and it's every bit as lovely as these films.

We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time. Little Gidding TS Eliot 1942 Six classive Rogers&Hammerstein films appear superfically light but address deeply important questions. Hopeful optimism in the face of hate and fear (Lt Joe Cable racism South Pacific), envy shame self-loathing (Poor Jud is Dead desperate loneliness Carousel), self-importance (Getting to Know You The King and I), Rogers&Hammerstein's music and lyrics reanimate the human capacity for resilience despite disappointment and the inherent grieving of loss. The 2006 remastered discs include Special Features, EnglishSubtitles and Singalong karaoke. Sadly, the collection omits The Flower Drum Song 1961 with hummable Sunday Sweet Sunday, A Hundred Million Miracles, I Enjoy Being a Girl, Love Look Away, You Are Beautiful. Beginning with State Fair 1945, through Carousel and Oklahoma! western exuberance 1955, curiosity about foreign cultures The King and I 1956 with UncleTom'sCabin Thai ballet, through the awareness of racism in South Pacific 1958 to the passion for freedom from Nazi oppression in Sound of Music 1965, Rogers&Hammerstein offer a buffet of uplifting songs in the face of conflict, regret, shame, self-doubt and challenging bumps in life's journey. Each Remastered movie has 2 discs, 12 discs total for 15 hours and 56 minutes of entertaining yet thoughtful pleasure. The Singalong feature isolates each song scene with karaoke lyrics beneath, so one can hum or belt lyrics aloud to restore one's own spirit during discouraging moments: Our State Fair is the best state fair in the state before entering a competition, If I Loved You for when we choose not to allow ourselves to care or commit, Whistle a Happy Tune when trepidation threatens, Climb Ev'ry Mountain facing difficult decisions, Happy Talk bouncy reminder to laugh, Bali Hai reminder to dream of freedom, of joy, of peace, a musical version of Karakal's Valley of Blue Moon in Lost Horizon by James Hilton 1933. Our small town doctors singing group joined productions of these musicals in the open air amphitheatre of our local community college as Seabees, Billis and Lt Joe Cable in South Pacific. Doctors' spouses sang and danced as nurses in South Pacific, nuns in Sound of Music, wives in King and I. And medical community children furnished South Pacific and Sound of Music. Sympathetic joy allows humans to share in the happiness of another, even the fictional. Via illusion we are transformed by cinema, sculpture, architecture, jewelry, costume, light, art. myth, music, dance, poetry and opera. Happiness is a moment and may be recovered with musical memories. The documentary Alive Inside observes dementia patients waking up from mute immobility listening to favorite tunes from their teens and twenties on iPods provided by attentive SocialWorker Dan Cohen. "Somewhere in My Youth or Childhood, I must have been awfully good" Sound of Music summarizes gratitude for happy moments which furnish memories and is magical. The Rogers&Hammerstein Collection offers music for all ages, and introduces classics from the Golden Age of Hollywood light opera to a new generation. 5* The Rogers&Hammerstein Collection 16 hours of joy for ears and eyes and dancing toes.

I was lucky enough to get this on sale from Amazon for $55. The picture quality of these films very high for a standard DVD and when upscaled to 1920 x 1080 via HDMI, seeing "the King and I" alone that way was worth the purchase. If you have any interest at all in these films I would recommend you buy this beautiful boxed set. You won't regret it. Even more, most of these films will be a long time making it to Blu-Ray, if that even happens at all because of the prep expense and with the economy, studios are mostly focused on doing the easy cheap work first and generating cash flow with recent block busters. Also, be warned, studios are dropping standard DVD titles on the specialty items, so this might be your last chance to see some of these movies in such high quality.

I purchased this boxed set for my mother, age 91. She loves these movies, particularly "the Sound of Music".... For me, they're OK,I'm not a big traditional movie fan. I saw most of them as a child in the theatre, and especially remember enjoying "the Sound of Music" and (to me the far superior "The King and I"....which was the first movie at which I cried at the ending!) I must add I bought the boxed set used. I've never had a problem with buying used CD's or DVD's via Amazon third party sellers. The boxed set was shrink-wrapped, and every DVD is in perfect condition. And FAR less expensive! Someone had an issue with the "letter box" format of the "The King and I". If you think about it, that is the way you see movies in a theatre: rectangular shape. When they "reformat for your TV" as they say, you get a square shape that leaves out part of the original picture to fit the traditional TV shape. The sound quality is good, of course that depends more on your home speakers but even with my mother's tube TV, older model, the singing and the music sound great. She is VERY happy with the set, and replays them often, especially...."The Sound of Music"!!

The Rodgers and Hammerstein Collection is great. I truly enjoy all the musicals. But I wish I had looked in Costco first. I paid $36.75, plus $3.99 in shipping, for a total of $40.74. The set was brand NEW still wrapped in plastic. Believe it or not, that was less expensive than the least expensive "like new" USED one on Amazon, so I thought I was doing well. Then I saw the exact same set in Costco, where it cost $24.98! Oh, well. But my interaction with the seller was fine, and so was the shipping time.

This collection includes much more than was expected. We were expecting one copy of each of the listed titles but found, to our pleasant surprise, that all but one title was inclusive of multiple versions of that title. The Carousel title is inclusive of the American version of the movie, from the 1950s, plus Liliom, the French language, English subtitled, 1934, B&W version, upon which the American version of Carousel was based. Prior to seeing this, we were not aware of the 1934 video. The State Fair title includes the 1945 version, with Dana Andrews, Dick Haymes, Vivian Blaine and Jeanne Crain in the lead roles, as well as the 1962 version, with Pat Boone, Bobby Darin, Pamela Tiffen and Ann Margaret in the lead roles. Those familiar with the title will remember that there was an earlier, B&W version, from around 1933, with Will Rogers, as the family patriarch but I don’t recall the other players. That 1933 version was not included in this DVD set. While the 1933 and 1945 versions retained the venue of State Fair in Iowa, the 1962 version chose to change the venue, to Texas, for no discernable reason. Each of the three versions has its strengths and weaknesses and each kept to the basic plan of the story but with wide variations, in the details and side issues. The South Pacific DVDs includes the Broadway version, at 157 minutes in length, as well as the road show version, which ran for 172 minutes. The first of the two Sound of Music DVDs contains the video, while the 2nd DVD contains a special introduction, by Julie Andrews, as well as additional background info, about the show, the characters, the von Trapp family and, for some reason, a Mia Farrow screen test. The Oklahoma DVDs contain the Broadway version of the video, on disk one, plus the slightly longer and full screen/wide screen, Todd-AO version, on disk two. The King and I also provides 2 DVDs, with disk one being the play and disk 2 providing interviews with the players, plus background info, about the show and performances.

We live in Indonesia where the postal customs place huge "taxes" on anything brought in by post over the value of 50USD...so two grand-nieces were due at our west java home brought in the 12 disc set which had been sent to one of the nieces in Geelong Victoria Australia. The 12 box set had gone from the US to Australia, then with my grand-nieces from australia's gold coast via Kuala Lumpur to Bandung Java........certainly a long way and a long time in getting here. We all sat and enjoyed Oklahoma...yes I agree with other reviewers the transfer from the 35 mm cinemascope version is superior to that taken from the Todd AO print. We then sat through the Sound of music....and after a week my grand-nieces returned....and I've been enjoying selected songs from the King and I, and South Pacific. Sound and picture's are "superb". The many times I'd gone along to the movies even seeing original 70 mm versions on screen in Australia....the DVD's absolutely "sparkle". I had several "letter-box" R and H musicals and despite the 5:1 sound, this latest compilation even in NTSC looks great on our LCD Samsung. Unless you move really close to the screen it is hard to determine if the pictures are standard definition. Computer restoration has meant that there's not a hint that the original medium was film. "Happy Talk" (and her we only have seen some of the songs of South Pacific's road show version) to me is better than ever......computer restorers have excelled themselves in revealing more "shadow" details than the 70 mm print contained. I could go on and on.....however anyone who has this latest R and H collection will not be sorry.....this is a true collector's item not only for us oldies, but for a whole new generation to enjoy! Stephen J Fleay former correspondent for CBS / BBC West Java Indonesia [email protected]

The box contained some of my favorite musicals and some I had never seen before. I am very please with this purchase. The price was also right.

Have not watched all the movies but wanted them as have not seen them since I was a child.

La calidad del producto es excelente, los dvds son Región 1 pero pueden reproducirse a la perfección en una consola blu-ray; Recomiendo el producto a cualquier amante y conocedor de los musicales.

Good quality

Arrived a week earlier than expected! A gift for my Mom, who is thrilled with it!

A good trip down memory lane! A very good product.