Sinbad: Make Me Wanna Holla - DVD Review

Title: Sinbad: Make Me Wanna Holla

Movie: :3stars:
Video: :3.5stars:
Audio: :3.5stars:
Extras:

HTS Overall Score:61




Summary
You know you’re getting older when you look at someone like Sinbad and say “how is he 57 years old?! I watched him when I was a teenager, and I’m not that old”! Then you have to look at your birth certificate and go “So that’s why”. Man I remember staying up late to watch those old stand up acts on VHS in the early 90s, the afro the jokes about bell bottoms and the 70s. I also remember those horrifying days when Sinbad decided that he wanted to get in on the acting world too. I love me some Arnold, but watching Sinbad in “Jingle all the Way” was pure torture. Let alone his other, less blockbuster work (tries to block the memory from my mind). With him not having a new standup act in a VERY long time I was naturally curious to see just what he had left in the tank after all these years. Surprisingly he’s actually pretty decent. The show isn’t a laugh out loud on the floor experience, but he can still get me to chuckle a good portion of the show at his reminiscence over the past and kids today.

Sinbad is now a whopping 57 years old (I know, what does that say about us who are familiar with his earlier works) and he’s had to adapt his jokes to accommodate his aging as well as his core audiences aging as well. He’s well aware that he’s not going to take the Kevin Hart crowd, and he’s not trying to. He knows his core audience is in their 40’s and 50’s as well and he aims straight for those fans like a bullet, bringing in plenty of jokes about the past, how kids today are different from the good old days, etc. His ability to bring some funk and music into his act is still there and you’ll have a few times where he gets down with the guitar to spice up the act. Overall the show is pretty decent, I had some good laughs, but unfortunately that was only about 50% of the time. Some of the jokes tend to fall a bit flat, but others are a hoot. His going on about this phenomenon of teachers being caught dating students was funny enough to have me rolling the whole time. Especially when he breaks it down to the male’s point of view vs. the female point of view on the subject. He rips through the Treyvon Marin case, Detroit government, who in their right mind would want to be president and even the difference between Back church and white non-denominational churches (which, as a church goer myself always gives me a chuckle).


Sinbad is just one of those comedians that you either like or hate, there’s no in-between. He was one of those comedians way back in the 90’s and still happens to be one of those comedians. He’s a bit different, and it’s always hard to be a clean (or at least 95% clean) comedian in a world that revels in vulgar humor. Clean comedians tend to run out of humorous content a bit quicker it seems and sometimes Sinbad suffers from that tired old Cliché. However, it’s also nice to be able to have a comedian that you can show your kids without having to vett the entire show first from beginning to end or only show them “a few funny parts” because the rest of the show is definitely for mature audiences. Ironically enough I never knew that Sinbad was a pastor’s child all these years, which probably influences his cleaner nature on stage a bit. I did enjoy the show, but felt that he’s starting to run out of material in his later years. He’s funny, but you can tell there’s a few times where he’s struggling to work with the content. A decent rental for those of you who like a blast from the past.






Rating:

Not Rated



Video :3.5stars:
“Make Me Wanna Holla” is presented in its original 1.78:1 aspect ratio with standard MPEG 2 encoding. It’s neither a good transfer, nor a bad transfer, but one that falls somewhere in between. The main issues that I can see is that the DVD wasn’t given a LOT of love. There’s compression artifacting and some inherent video noise due to the digital cameras used for the comedy central special. With this being said, there is still some very good points to the transfer. The colors and lighting is done very well, giving us a very natural looking image that doesn’t suffer from the malady of so many standup acts with bright lights blasting away any contrast or detail that is on screen. Detail is good for the most part, but the DVD is a bit soft, even for a DVD. Black levels are surprisingly solid for a title that I would have expected to have rather washed out blacks, even black crush was almost non-existent. You can tell that the show was shot on the cheap, but it does do its job well despite those downsides.








Audio :4stars:
The audio is the surprise here. Usually most modern stand up acts are shot with 5.1 in mind, but this one has 2.0 stereo track. As much as a 5.1 track would be a nice addition, most shows just DON’T take advantage of the larger soundstage and are just 2.0 or 2.1 tracks in a 5.1 disguise. The dialogue is where the money is in these types of presentations and I have no complaints here. The vocals are locked into the stereo front and has a very nice balance to it. There isn’t a lot of ambient noises besides audience laughter, but Sinbad does occasionally bring in a couple musical numbers to the show and the 2.0 representation is very nice. The musical numbers probably could have been enhanced with a dedicated sub channel but the mild LFE present in the stereo track is pleasing and compliments the music well. As I mentioned above, I would have liked a more robust track, but really it’s doing the best it can with its limited resources and there’s very little fault in the encode, it’s mostly a source issue



Extras

Nada







Overall: :3stars:

Sinbad is a relic of the 80’s and 90s, and while I had some good fun with this show, it’s obvious that the 90s is where he was best. He’s had to adapt to recognizing that his audience has become as old as he is and does a decent job of transforming his jokes to reach that audience, so us “oldies” who grew up with him will definitely get a chuckle out of his references to those times that are in the past, and but some of the younger audience may have some trouble relating. The audio and video on this release are just “decent”, but standups tend to lean heavily on content over presentation so that’s not a wild deal. I’d say that even for veteran fans of comedy this one is best served as a rental. A decent rental, but a rental nonetheless.


Additional Information:

Starring: Sinbad
Directed by: Sinbad
Written by: Sinbad
Aspect Ratio: 1.78:1 MPEG 2
Audio: English Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo
Studio: Paramount
Rated: Unrated
Runtime: 90 Minutes
DVD Release Date: June 17th, 2014


Buy Sinbad: Make Me Wanna Holla Blu-ray on Amazon

Recommendation: Rental​

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