The Royal Tenenbaums is the kind of movie that you either get or you don’t. If it is your brand of offbeat comedy, it will keep you laughing nonstop. But if it’s not, chances are you’ll be pretty bored throughout. When I saw this film in a theater, five people walked out by midpoint. On the other hand, I loved it.

The Tenenbaum family is fictitious, but you’d swear by the detail poured into this film that they’re real. The eccentric family’s happiest time occurred 22 years ago when each of its three children were considered prodigies -- Richie (Luke Wilson) was a tennis champ, Chas (Ben Stiller) was a financial whiz, and Margot (Gwyneth Paltrow) was a playwright (and also adopted at age two, something her father never let her forget). Unfortunately, these glory days were short-lived. The parents separated and the children disbanded, going on to live individually troubled lives.

The patriarch of the Tenenbaum family is Royal (Gene Hackman), a now-disbarred lawyer who can justify most any of his shady dealings, including stealing from his own children. Since he’s been separated from Etheline (Angelica Houston), he’s been living off his past wealth and his former good name. When we meet Royal, his money is running out (he likes to live in hotels), and this alarming condition causes him to devise a plan to reunite his family by faking a terminal illness

Director and co-writer Wes Anderson loves poking fun at seemingly in-control, but obviously messed-up people. His previous film, Rushmore, centered on Max Fischer (Jason Schwartzman), an overachieving student with little inherent talent to pull off any of his ambitious tasks. The Tenenbaums do have talent -- or at least they did -- but their apathetic nature and self-centered states won’t let them achieve success. Ironically, it’s the worst of the bunch, Royal, who has the ambition (even if it’s for misguided reasons) to pull them together.

Wes Anderson was only about 30 when he made this movie; it proves that he is an enormous and consistent talent (this is his third film) who can pull off large ensemble pieces. If The Royal Tenenbaums has any real fault, it is that there is almost too much thrown in. For many, it will be information overload, something you don’t often get from comedies. You have to watch this movie a few times to really see and hear all of it. Fortunately, this DVD release can allow that, and at each viewer’s own pace.

The DVD release is a collaboration from Touchstone Home Entertainment and The Criterion Collection. The interesting corporate pairing results in an exhaustive two-DVD package at a run-of-the-mill-DVD price. Besides the digital doodads on the discs themselves, there are some noteworthy tangibles included in the packaging. The expected plastic box comes encased in a cardboard jacket made to look like a book, a little detail that ties into the film. There are also elaborate paper inserts: one that gives more information on the film and filmmakers, and the other that includes detailed drawings of the Tenenbaum house, including floor plans of the rooms and descriptions of the items in each one.

The first disc contains the movie, presented with various sound options, including Wes Anderson’s commentary track. It’s obvious that care has been taken to do a high-quality transfer from film to digital disc. The colors are punchy and vibrant when appropriate (Chas’ bright red Adidas tracksuit, for example), and the level of detail is impressive. The sound is also very good and shows off what good home-theater sound can be like without resorting to bomb blasts or explosions. Vocal clarity is excellent, and the mix of diverse musical selections is wonderful. I particularly liked Alex Baldwin’s voice (as the narrator) -- it’s placed dead center and made to sound very full and warm.

The second disc has lots of stuff that will keep avid fans entertained. I liked the attention given the artwork that shows up throughout the film, as well as the inclusion of the short, behind-the-scenes video clips. The main section has a "With the Filmmaker" portion that lets the viewer watch Wes Anderson at work. I found this eye-opening. Deleted scenes are always fun to watch. The odd thing here is that only two are included, with no commentary to explain where they would have fit and why they were left out. Strange. There are good interviews with the cast, but an interview segment with Peter Bradley falls flat and seems odd. It’s obvious that the interviewer doesn’t know much about Anderson or his films, and the supporting cast members, likely not all that experienced with interviews, don’t have much to say. These two ancillary sections are small wrinkles in an otherwise feature-rich release.