The Movie: Philadelphia stars Tom Hanks as a brilliant young lawyer working for the top firm in Philadelphia. That is, until he is abruptly fired because he is infected with AIDS. This movie is about his attempt to sue his former employer for wrongful termination. After going to 9 different attorneys who would not take the case, Denzel Washington, a homophobic ambulance-chasing lawyer decides to take the case.

This film features an absolutely brilliant (and Academy Award winning) performance by Tom Hanks, and holy cow, what incredible makeup work (also nominated for an Oscar)! Though it gets slow at times, this was a rather engaging film that definitely kept me interested. This film also won an Oscar for Best Song (Bruce Springsteen's "Streets of Philadelphia", and was actually nominated again for Best Song for Neil Young's "Philadelphia". It was also nominated for Best Original Screenplay.

There is a whole lot of commentary in this film about discrimination, the truth about AIDS, and homosexuality, and how different people deal with these issues in different ways, and I found it to be thought provoking and interesting.

Although I think that after a decade of education about AIDS this film isn't quite as relevant anymore, it was still definitely worth watching.

I actually scared myself watching this movie because about 5 minutes into it I commented to myself "this looks like Technicolor"... and it turns out I was right. Oh noes, I'm turning into a film geek!

The DVD: This is an old DVD -- one of the first ever released, back in 1997. There are no special features, but it does have an anamorphic video transfer that was pretty sharp and clean for the most part, but there were some instances of heavy dirt and dust. The surround mix was largely uninteresting (but then again, this isn't exactly a surround sound kind of movie), but was certainly adequate.