Film Credits

Directed by: Bob Henry

Starring: Nat "King" Cole, Ella Fitzgerald

Review

The Incomparable Nat "King" Cole is a collection of 22 of Cole's greatest hits, compiled from his own live 1950's television series. The wide variety of material is presented in Cole's own laid-back manner of delivery, and it's easy to see why his work continues to be popular to this day. While much of what appears is sung by Cole himself, a couple of instrumental pieces ("I Want To Be Happy" and "Diga Diga Doo") are included, and Ella Fitzgerald has a guest appearance/performance. In the disc's neatest moment, Ella sings "Dancing On The Ceiling" while Cole is literally up there doing Fred Astaire's Royal Wedding bit. Ella also hangs around for Cole's rendition of "Too Close For Comfort.

Aside from the previously mentioned numbers, also included on this disc are "That Reminds Me," "Little Girl," "I'm Gonna Sit Right Down And Write Myself A Letter," I've Grown Accustomed To Her Face," "Ballerina," "Pretend," "It's Only A Paper Moon," "Sweet Lorraine," "With You On My Mind," "Stompin' At The Savoy," "But Not For Me," "You Are My First Love," "Just You, Just Me," "Raintree County," "Where Or When," "The Christmas Song," "A Blossom Fell" and, of course, "Unforgettable."

The clips shown on this Warner Reprise laserdisc release aren't in the greatest shape. The jacket doesn't mention what the original source materials are, but judging from the quality and appearance of the clips, they could only have come from a couple of places. The clips were either mastered from a kinescope (a process whereby live TV shows were filmed off a TV screen during the broadcast) or they come off a very early and really poor videotape source later transferred to film for preservation sake. The resulting image is fuzzy, grainy, often blurry, and has muddy and nearly non-existent contrasts; the film source itself is often dirty, and one segment exhibits thin vertical black scratches throughout. For two numbers ("Raintree County" and "Unforgettable"), the source materials are such that Cole has a distorted "flattened down" look (like a cartoon character that's suddenly gone short and very squat); another number, "The Christmas Song," has the jitters. Even though the image quality is of poor shape, you must also remember that short of someone inventing time travel, this is the best it is ever going to get. The CX-encoded digital mono has cleaned up well and sounds fine, but the audio is limited in range due to the original recordings and equipment used. The Incomparable Nat "King" Cole was pressed at Nippon Columbia (Japan), is Table of Contents encoded, and has 22 chapter markers.

Video Recap

• I Want to Be Happy
• Diga Diga Doo
• Dancing on the Ceiling
• Too Close For COmfort
• That Reminds Me
• Little Girl
• I'm Gonna Sit Right Down And Write Myself A Letter
• I've Grown Accustomed To Her Face
• Ballerina
• Pretend
• It's Only A Paper Moon
• Sweet Lorraine
• With You On My Mind
• Stompin' At The Savoy
• But Not For Me
• You Are My First Love
• Just You, Just Me
• Raintree County
• Where Or When
• The Christmas Song
• A Blossom Fell
• Unforgettable