Dark and strikingly reminiscent of many aspects of my childhood. I'm not sure I can fairly assign it a grade.

i dunno.

I don't like how funny it was. Seemed far too morbid and cynical and angry and horrible to be laughing at. I dunno. Just wish it had something to like. Content wise, i mean.

Very uneven. Some funny parts that didn't gel with the overall depressing tone of the material. Also, the end with the real person next to actor, is annoying device that should never ever be used. It comes across as incredibly corny.

The real guy was next to Joseph Cross at the end?

You must be one of those people who runs out of theaters the minute the end credits even hint at starting.

It may just be because I feel so incredibly not fucked up in comparison, but I really enjoyed it.

So which one of you ate dog food?

That's privileged information!

HAHA as jujubee said, it was hilarious to see people run out of the auditorium then scamper back to see the epilogue/fate of each of the main characters, which was just like in the book (though for the movie they did not include what happened to Fern and Dorothy).


I *liked* the film but was hugely disappointed (despite great acting and magnificent set decoration of the Finch house)... they couldn't decide what kind of tone to give the movie, and the soundtrack is very grating, sometimes drowning out dialogue.

C

This type of movie gets me. As a film, it wasn't coherent. Director didn't really have any particular style so I agree with what's been said. I think the book probably is better so I'm gonna read it. But I did enjoy the performances and the story for personal reasons.

Joseph Fiennes was totally underused; josh cross was ok. But great stuff from Evan Rachel Wood and Annete Bening of course.

B

This was one of my more-anticipated movies of the year. I thought it looked really funny from the trailer. But alas, I was highly disappointed. I loved the first half hour. It was hilarious and I was expecting to really enjoy this movie. Unfortunately it decides to become more serious (albeit unbelievable) and the transition doesn't work at all. I found myself not giving a shit about what was going on anymore. It's way too odd and goofy for its own good. It doesn't seem to know what it wants to be and feels all disjointed. Towards the end it was excruciatingly hard to sit through and I couldn't wait for it to be over.

Joseph Cross and Evan Rachel Wood were good though.

C

B

A temperamental sort of film that tried too hard.

I... liked this. Unperfect just like its characters. Interesting how the movie itself becomes emotionally unstable, lol. But it actually fits, see?


Sometimes, I like to see movies like this one, that are not cinematically perfect, that don't have a definite tone and therefore can be accused of akward shits in tone, to the point where we don't know when to laugh/get serious. Like some things in life, y'now? To the point where they manage to touch us with their vulnerabilty. I found myself laughing at stuff that I'm not sure I was supposed to. Sometimes, it's great to see a film taking a few risks for once, even threatening to go over the top, just like this one.

Great perfomances from all the cast, not just Bening. Wasn't expecting such a brilliant ensemble, or maybe I still was a little bit - afterall, we're dealing with some very powerful actors here.


(And yes, watching all these crazy people makes me feel less strange )

Having read the first part of the book and a few (necessary) omissions aside, I think Ryan Murphy actually did a good job translating the material!

As for the real person in the end thing, it didn't bothered me as much, really. I actually thought it was a nice touch, heh.

B (?)

B


I think I pretty much spent most of the film thinking "Oh boy, that's just fucked up". However, the movie was actually better than most of the word on it that I read. It's a very interesting story and I think the movie's main unforgivable flaw was to present the material in a much lighter way that it should have been. The whole thing seems really heavy and tragic, but presents itself mostly as a comedy. I won't lie, I laughed a few times quite hard too (especially over the dying cat and the "shit prophecies"), but it just felt a bit out of place most of the time. It often just didn't seem like the fitting tone for this movie.

That aside, I enjoyed it. Burrough's odyssey and the fact that he came out of this rather unharmed is just a unique thing. The movie's tremendous cast definitely helped my appreciation of the film. Annette Bening and Jill Clayburgh stood out the most with the latter sadly being really overlooked for this film. I thought her scenes with Augusten as well as her scene with Annette Bening in the car during the rain are pretty much the very best scenes in this entire movie. I loved her character. Bening is as good as ever and proves once again that she's overdue for that Oscar. Brian Cox does a solid, crazy, yet dedicated impression as Dr. Finch. Paltrow has some really nice scenes, but overall just not enough screentime.

On the whole, it's an interesting movie, with a great cast and some brilliant scenes, but the choice of the film's tone and atmosphere as well as some lack of focus prevented it from being a great drama.