Product Description

Willy Loman has spent his entire life believing he and his family are bound for greatness. Struggling day to day as a traveling salesman, Willy begins to lose touch with reality and drifts away into the past. Meanwhile his family, including wife Linda and sons Biff and Happy, attempts to cope with Willy's self-destruction and the still-lingering ghosts of the past. Arthur Miller's timeless Pulitzer Prize-winning play is brought to the screen with a powerhouse performance by Academy Award-winner Dustin Hoffman, who earned Emmy and Golden Globe Awards for this role. The stellar supporting cast features Kate Reid, Charles Durning, Stephen Lang, and in his first breakout role, John Malkovich as Biff, all guided by internationally-acclaimed director Volker Schlondorff (The Tin Drum) and a haunting score by legendary composer Alex North (Spartacus).

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #14504 in DVD
• Released on: 2003-01-28
• Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Color, DVD-Video, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 136 minutes

Amazon.com essential video
German filmmaker Volker Schlöndorff's 1985 production of Arthur Miller's most famous play appeared squarely and quite hauntingly in the middle of the go-go economy of the Reagan-Bush years. Miller's story, set during the post-war boom period of the late '40s, concerns an aging, traveling salesman named Willy Loman (Dustin Hoffman), who despairs that his life his been lived in vain. Facing dispensability and insignificance in a heated, youthful economy, Willy is not ready to part with his cherished fantasies of an America that loves and admires him for personable triumphs in the marketplace. But the reality is far more pitiable than that, and the measure of Willy's self-delusion and contradictions is found in his two sons, one (Stephen Lang) a ne'er-do-well gliding on inherited hot air and repressed feelings, and the other (John Malkovich) a mousy, retiring sort unable to reconcile--or forgive--the difference between his father's desperate impersonation of success and the truth. Schlondorff's remarkable cast explores Miller's rich subtext to great effect, though Hoffman--despite giving us a new model of Willy to contrast with Lee J. Cobb's definitive portrayal a generation before--is a bit insect-like and shrill in his approach. Malkovich, Lang, and Kate Reid (as Willy's long-suffering wife) are perfect, however, and the production is atmospheric and strong. --Tom Keogh

Customer Reviews

A piece of art
Death of a salesman is one of the best samples of the american drama that reflects the real life of the dream that is not even reached by american people.

I love Dustin Huffman play but all the characters are amazingly builded which make the sense of being at the teather.

Obviously a collective dvd.
Death of a salesman is the show, which is being put on somewhere in the world almost every day of the year. It's so multi-dynamic and close to real life that it can hurt you for real. Beside the genius playwriting, this movie is an excellent performance of that. Dusting Hoffman, John Malkovich, Kate Reid, Stephen Lang they all have done superb job portraying their characters. Although I am not into literature, capable enough to pay homage for a play like this one, I for certainly recommend this movie for everyone to collect. A must have movie.

This is an utterly classic dramatic work
Sparse sets set-up the huge dramatic energy of this deceivingly simple story. Every actor and actress is outstanding and
the power, range, and depth of the performance is incredible.
Bristling with raw force, the drama digs through the layers
of mid-america near mid-century, creating a powerful historical
testament. The stars were aligned for Miller, Hoffman, Malkovic and the rest for this dynamic theatre. Pathos.