| Critic |
Review |
Quote |
Analysis |
This Week's Verdict |
Carina Chocano,
Los Angeles Times |
Running With Scissors |
"The movie would have been much more involving if all but two of the
characters (one, not counting the guy telling the story) weren't completely bonkers. But there are no sane people in Augusten's life; no functioning
adults, no school officials, no social workers, no teachers, no concerned neighborsÑreally, it's like a mainstream suburban version of
Marat/Sade." |
Wait, there was somebody in this movie who wasnât bonkers? Was it "Restaurant Waitress #2"? Or "Man at Bus Stop #1"? Otherwise, a pretty good
skewering. |
|
Anthony Lane,
The New Yorker |
Marie Antoinette |
"Manolo Blahnik, with his precise grip on fantasy, seems to be the only person to have recognized the project for the confection that it is. Coppola films Versailles with a flat acceptance, quickening at times into eager montage, and declares, in her notes on the film, that she sought to capture her heroine's 'inner experience.' Her what? This is like a manicurist claiming to capture the inner experience of your pinkie." |
Poor Anthony Lane. They made him review a movie made by a giirrrll, so he has to talk knowingly about Manolo Blahnik, manicurists, and fantasy. Elsewhere, he discusses Paris Hilton and shooting things with your cellphone and mailing it to friends. Too bad Hollywood doesnât have more female
directors: We could have forced Lane to buy a Hello Kitty purse and invited him over to watch Project Runway. Cause, y'know, that's what girls do, right? That, and make movies about themselves? |
|
Armond White,
New York Press
|
Marie Antoinette |
"Coppola specializes in stories that mope, 'Poor, Poor, Pitiful Me.' If Coppola had an informed sense of pop history, she might have included the 1976 Linda Ronstadt song of that title, but then its pampered chick ironies were actually composed by Warren Zevon, which would prevent Coppola from
claiming the Trousseau Feminism that is her cultural capital." |
Of course, Armond White, who can show you a racist conspiracy in the fall of a sparrow, wouldn't know anything about how to manipulate cultural capital to get your point across. |
|
Lisa Schwarzbaum,
Entertainment Weekly
|
Running With Scissors |
"Watching Running With Scissors the movie instead of reading Running With Scissors the best-selling memoir by Augusten Burroughs is like running with a spatula, or maybe some weird toast tongs. The experience is unusual Ñzany, evenÑ but not nearly as dangerous or exhilarating as one would hope from the recklessness the title implies. [Ryan] Murphy, a first-time feature filmmaker, lacks an equivalent voice of his own Ñ or the confidence to influence through understatement; instead, he goes for the shorthand of ornate retro-'70s production and costume design, bumping up against arch kitsch; [Annette] Bening is elegantly
unvain in her ferocious performance as a bad, sick mother, but in this standing-still adaptation she's bested by kitchen decor." |
Actually, the metaphor we were thinking of was running and falling with scissors. And accidentally gouging our eyes out with the scissors. |
|
Manohla Dargis,
New York Times
|
Flicka |
"Alison Lohman stars as Katy McLaughlin (a boy named Ken in the original story), a boarding-school student on the verge of flunking out because her head is in the clouds, where she has apparently been huffing pure oxygen since last semester. [She] spends much of her summer break flouncing around the male help with jail-bait insouciance, sassing her parents and almost killing the object of her sublimated desire. [Director Michael] Mayer dutifully draws lines between Katy's efforts to tame her wild horse and her father's more cumbersome attempts to corral her, but he can't spin this metaphoric hay into gold. What he does do very nicely, however, aided and
abetted by an expression of unfettered ecstasy on Ms. Lohman's face that gives her the aspect of St. Teresa of Avila, is confirm that nothing should ever come between a girl and her horse, especially a saddle.ä" |
Alison Lohman as St. Teresa riding bareback? Great, Manohla. You just made us want to see this blasphemous movie. One note, however: In what country does a 27-year-old qualify as jail-bait? Or, for that matter, a boarding school student? Is she retarded or something? |
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