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Intrigued by the premise of the decadent 80s in LA [and all the star names associated with this movie], I decided to rent it. The result however was completely underwhelming, and left me feeling disappointed and annoyed at wasting my time on it. The movie plays out ala “Crash” in the sense that you have all these characters that are kind of linked with each other through certain circumstances. There’s a Hollywood honcho [Billy Bob] who has a tumultuous and strained relationship with his wife [Kim Basinger] because of his dalliances with a newscaster [Winona Ryder]. His son [Jon Foster] is heavily involved in a world of sex and drugs, a world which includes his promiscuous girlfriend [Amber Heard]. There’s a father-son pair who can’t seem to connect with each other [Chris Isaak and Lou Taylor Pucci], a disillusioned rock star [Mel Raido], and a doorman [Brad Renfro, whose appearance in this movie was his last prior to his death] who is forced to put up with his con artist/criminal uncle [Mickey Rourke] and his nefarious activities [which include the kidnapping of minors].
The story arcs seem compelling, but they are never explored with any great level of depth, and the connection between these various arcs are at best, tenuous. I just felt underwhelmed by most of the performances – Billy Bob just seems to have this vacant expression on his face for most of the movie, Amber Heard’s performance highlight was exposing her delectable bits and pieces, Brad Renfro blubbers throughout, and the list goes on. The exception was Kim Basinger who is actually quite compelling and credible in the role of the betrayed wife.
“The Informers” tries its best to engage viewers’ attention and elicit sympathy, but I felt emotionally disconnected from the major players, and felt the movie was shallow and under-developed in its’ theme and characters portrayals. A rental at best.
a good adaptation of an excellent novel. what may come across as a boring and unengaging film actually is a great study on voyeurism and social and moral decay. even though its set in the 80s its still extremely relevant today. fantastic performances from all, especially Kim Basinger- she reminds us on why she won that oscar. If you are a fan of the book i think that you should enjoy this film version, its not perfect but the tone and themes are present and that matters more than anything, to me at least.
As I began watching this movie, the immeidate parallel that I drew was “Less Than Zero.” I didn’t know until it was over, and googled the cast, that I found out that it was written by the same guy. Very similar in mood.
In fact, I think the mood is more the point of the movie than anything else, and in that respect I can testify for it’s accurate portrayal since I was exactly the age of characters at exactly that time. The dress, the look, the “searching”, the feel of opulent loneliness, or exquisite desperation… It really did feel exactly like that in the early to mid eighties club scene.
Others have criticized the story line for being shallow, but hey, we were shallow. There were a couple of places that I thought seemed a bit “contrived”, but even those mirrored some of my own sentiments from that time. I’m speaking of one instance where two of the guys are talking, and one of them is beginning to question his lifestyle and the other is definately not. He begins talking how he needs “someone to tell him what’s right and what’s wrong…” and I’m thinking, “Well, that came out of nowhere…” But when I look back, I did a lot of the same questioning myself, after coming home from a night on the beach clubs.
The movie is a series of pretty much independent character stories, in the same sort of vein as “Crash”, but without the obviously clear connections between all the characters. They seem less connected to each other than in Crash. I’m not sure what Renfro’s and Rourke’s characters had to do with anything, though, and that whole plot line could have been dropped from the movie entirely with no sense of loss at all. Not sure what they were there for other than to perhaps lend a hand to the feeling of depression which I think this movie is intentionally trying to create. Same for Bassingers and Thornton’s character line.
In fact, so independent are the stories from each other that you could drop almost any of them with no noticeable impact. The movie is the sum total of it’s parts, but the sum would certainly be a bit less with any of them missing. Altogether, they create an “air” of emptiness, loathing and desperation that really were the mood of 80’s nightlife. “To Live and Die in LA” has the same sort of grittiness to it.
What will help you survive this movie is to look at it differently than you are accustomed to. If you go in expecting the characters introduced at the beginning are going to be redeemed by the end, you will be disappointed. If you expect this to be a movie where all the knots are untangled by the end, where the rough edges are made smooth, the dillemas resolved, and harsh reality eased and made more bearable… you will be disappointed. This movie goes the other way and makes the smooth edges rough – the closing scene is particularly jagged.
Also of note is the soundtrack. It includes a lot of the “big names”, but it’s nice to see a movie about the 80s that doesn’t neglect to remind you that there was lots of music on the scene other than “Flock of Seagulls”. The soundtrack includes a lot of the other 99% of songs that never really made it to the Top Ten. This has the effect of intensifying the feeling of authenticity. You recall the music being like that, but not necessarily who did it. And that’s the way 80’s music really was. It was ubiquitous yet largely unknown; extremely transient. The only thing I can think of conspicuously missing is any reference to Miami Vice, although a character in the opening scene is dressed much like Don Johnson just before he gets killed.
SPOILER!
The sex is gratuitous and I could have done with less – a LOT less, in fact. But I think it may have been made excessive, but not specifically gratuiotous. I think there was a reason: it was to make a very hard impact on the closing scene. The dying Christie, laying on a cold, sunless beach, pale, ravaged now with AIDS. And on her pale, bruised covered thigh, a fly lands and crawls about for a while, while her former lover looks at her. This is the same beautiful body we were seeing before, now only weeks later cold and nearly dead with flies crawling on it. The contrast between soft and beautiful, and diseased and infected, on the same skin in so short a period of time. That really was a bit of a shock.
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