 |
|
|
The
Rules of Attraction Movie Review: "Rules of Attraction" and "American Psycho" boggled my mind. I had never read a word of author Bret Easton Ellis who wrote the books which the films are based. What is the author’s mission? What do we take away from these tragic and disturbed stories of tormented people? I may never know. If I hadn’t seen "American Psycho" I probably wouldn’t have had an inclination to see "Rules" but watching a psychotic like Sean Bateman evolve was appealing. Kind of like wanting to see the evolution fellow cinematic psycho Hannibal Lecter. From that perspective "Rules of Attraction" is interesting because you do begin to see why he is the way he is in "Psycho". Van Der Beek also goes quite far out on a limb to do the character justice. I liked these two aspects of the film but other than that this film is a waste of celluloid. There is so much degradation of the human condition in this film that all you can do is shake your head. These people are lost, disturbed, lonely and morally corrupt. You can’t feel sorry for any of them because they seem to need each other. Their only goal is to destroy each other. The most troubled in the film is Lauren who begins her journey in the film by being date-raped. You would think with a film that stars Sean Bateman, he would be but that isn’t the case. The closest you get to normal is probably Mitchell Allen (played by American Pie’s Thomas Ian Nicholas). Mitchell always seems to be caught in the crossfire of his schoolmates’ dementia. "Rules" was an utter chore to sit through. It was such a waste of the youthful talent we have in Hollywood today. Why does a story like this need to be told? I just hope the books make more sense. (1 of 5) So Says the Soothsayer. Dean Kish Mary Harron's adaptation of Bret Easton Ellis's 'American Psycho' was an adequate movie stretched about half & hour too long; it had three or four excellent scenes and some good dialogue, with Christian Bale's incarnation of wall street whacko Patrick Bateman veering on brilliance. 'Rules Of Attraction', the latest adaptation of an Ellis novel, is about the lives and misadventures of drugged-up-psycho-student Sean Bateman (Van Der Beek), his would-be girlfriend Lauren Hyde, played with Winnona Ryder-esque poise by Shannyn Sossamon, his bitch-on-the-side Lara (Jessica Biel---good in a 'Heather's' kinda way) and a whole host of oddball dealers, dregs, dope-fiends and over- privileged twats (i.e. the good people of some New England Arts College). Ridley Scott once said that "…casting is 80% of a movie" and so we come to James Van Der Beek as Sean Bateman: now I don't hate the guy or anything, in fact I think he's a decent actor, but whether he likes it or not, Van Der Beek is, and forever will be DAWSON, seeing him 'do mean' is just plain tiresome and wholly unconvincing: the man just can't pull it off, its like watching John Wayne as a Roman solider in that Jesus movie with Max Von Sydow, (they should've hired Stephen Dorff instead). I sincerely believe that Roger Avary is one of the great writer/directors in Hollywood today, and if Quentin Tarantino is the Shakespeare of screenwriting, then Avary has to be Kit Marlowe. Avary's fidgety and relentless use of spilt screen, rewinds, voice over some excellent jump cuts and the kind of oddball camera trickery soon to be attributed to George Clooney in 'Confessions Of A Dangerous Mind', is a joy to watch (even though he does go a bit '24' with spilt screen at times). Marginally better than 'American Psycho', in that Avary's film has some memorable and visually impressive scenes, but at the end of the day; its little more than an empty box-of-tricks: remember how innovative 'Natural Born Killers' was? But all of Oliver Stone's skill couldn't disguise the fact that it was a bollocks movie, now had this been pre-'Fight Club' 'ROA' would've rocked, but the fact is, that we've seen most of this stuff before and the whole campus setting too often pulls it back into the realms of fraternity farce. That
said, I've heard a lot of bitching about how people didn't
like the characters, well neither did I: BUT THAT'S THE
WHOLE POINT FOLKS they're the epitome of insularity, its
the very thing that makes their whole existence a mockery
of what life is supposed to be all about. I'd say the question
we have to ask ourselves is this: is it Bret Easton Ellis
whose disturbed, or is the world we inhabit so unreservedly
fucked up that someone like Bret can write about stuff that
reviles the masses, but also makes them sit up and say "hang
on a sec, that's not so far from the truth"? Personally,
I think it's the latter, Bret Easton Ellis satirises the
most sickening aspects of society, its not always the kinda
thing we wanna pay to see, but its there and all he does
is put it into words, and though Ellis does have a habit
of going over-the-top, he does have his moments of literary
genius…this isn't one of them, but there you go. All in all 'ROA', much like 'AP', is a selection of good scenes, more than a few clever lines and some OK performances, I wouldn't bother going to see this one in the cinema, but do check it out on DVD, where the extras should compensate for some of the film's shortcomings. An adequate,
very cinematic, but ultimately flawed movie:
Site Contents Copyright© The Z Review, unless used with permission.This site has no intention to infringe on the rights of the film owners of The Rules of Attraction and intellectual copyright holders of the movies mentioned herein & hold copyright over the movie, characters, merchandise & storyline. |
|
|
||
|
||
|