The Sopranos: Complete Series 1 (Six Disc Set) [DVD]

The Sopranos, writer-producer-director David Chase's extraordinary television series, is nominally an urban gangster drama, but its true impact strikes closer to home: This ambitious TV series chronicles a dysfunctional, suburban American family in bold relief. And for protagonist Tony Soprano, there's the added complexity posed by heading twin families, his collegial mob clan and his own nouveau riche brood.

The series' brilliant first season is built around what Tony learns when, whipsawed between those two worlds, he finds himself plunged into depression and seeks psychotherapy--a gesture at odds with his midlevel capo's machismo, yet instantly recognisable as a modern emotional test. With analysis built into the very spine of the show's elaborate episodic structure, creator Chase and his formidable corps of directors, writers, and actors weave an unpredictable series of parallel and intersecting plot arcs that twist from tragedy to farce to social realism. While creating for a smaller screen, they enjoy a far larger canvas than a single movie would afford, and the results, like the very best episodic television, attain a richness and scope far closer to a novel than movies normally get.

Unlike Francis Coppola's operatic dramatisation of Mario Puzo's Godfather epic, The Sopranos sustains a poignant, even mundane intimacy in its focus on Tony, brought to vivid life by James Gandolfini's mercurial performance. Alternately seductive, exasperated, fearful, and murderous, Gandolfini is utterly convincing even when executing brutal shifts between domestic comedy and dramatic violence. Both he and the superb team of Italian-American actors recruited as his loyal (and, sometimes, not-so-loyal) henchman and their various "associates" make this mob as credible as the evocative Bronx and New Jersey locations where the episodes were filmed.

The first season's other life force is Livia Soprano, Tony's monstrous, meddlesome mother. As Livia, the late Nancy Marchand eclipses her long career of patrician performances to create an indelibly earthy, calculating matriarch who shakes up both families; Livia also serves as foil and rival to Tony's loyal, usually level-headed wife, Carmela (Edie Falco). Lorraine Bracco makes Tony's therapist, Dr Melfi, a convincing confidante, by turns "professional", perceptive, and sexy; the duo's therapeutic relationship is also depicted with uncommon accuracy. Such grace notes only enrich what's not merely an aesthetic high point for commercial television, but an absorbing film masterwork that deepens with subsequent screenings. --Sam Sutherland, Amazon.com

Six-volume box set containing the entire first series of the acclaimed drama centred around a New Jersey Mafia family. In 'The Sopranos (Pilot)', Tony Soprano sees a psychiatrist when family problems become too much for him. '46 Long' sees acting family boss Giacomo 'Jackie' Aprile seriously ill with cancer, while Tony becomes reluctantly embroiled in a power struggle with Uncle Junior. In 'Denial, Anger, Acceptance', Mickey Palmice stirs up further trouble between Tony and Junior. In 'Meadowlands', Jackie's death forces Tony to decide whether he really wants to make a play for control of the family or allow Uncle Junior to step in, while 'College' sees Tony becoming convinced that he has seen snitch Fabian Petrulio, who testified against the family years earlier before entering the witness protection programme. In 'Pax Soprana', Tony is displeased when Junior begins taxing his associates and keeping the money for himself, but surprises his shrink, Dr Melfi, with a kiss. 'Down Neck' sees Anthony Junior suspended from school for stealing the sacramental wine, with Tony feeling responsible as a result. In 'The Legend of Tennessee Moltisanti', the boys are forced to leave Larry Boy's daughter's wedding early when they discover that they are to be indicted. 'Boca' sees Tony getting even with Uncle Junior after he is humiliated on the golf course. In 'A Hit is a Hit', Christopher and Adriana encounter gangster rapper 'Massive Genius', while Tony feels like an outsider when his neighbour invites him for a round of golf with friends. 'Nobody Knows Anything' sees Jimmy and Pussy arrested in an FBI raid, while Jimmy pays the Sopranos a visit upon his release from prison. In 'Isabella', a depressed Tony seeks solace with Italian student Isabella, but is advised by FBI agent Harris to relocate in order to protect his family. 'I Dream of Jeannie Cusamano' sees Tony warning Dr Melfi that her life is in danger, and a meal at Artie's temporarily staving off the disintegration of the family.