YouHeart I gave it a 7.5 out of 10

Solidrariol Am I Missing Something?

Limerculer A waste of 90 minutes of my life

Ortiz Excellent and certainly provocative... If nothing else, the film is a real conversation starter.

richard-lee-morris The story is fairly stereotypical. Elements include a rebellious teenager , an overworking father, and mentally unbalanced mother, who was a beauty queen in college! The acting is very good, but the story is contrived.

Reno Rangan The book was from the 90s and the story is about the 60s. Narrated from the father's perspective, that's what I think did not work in this film. This is where a film and the book does not synch. Because books are always very detail when it describes a person. In the films, they are just a simple visual where viewers have to focus on those details to have a perfect impression like the book. So I totally point out to the writer who did not quite transformed the point of the storytelling.It is not the parents to decide what their kids want to be. The film opened with a couple ready to get married, arguing with their elders about something. Soon it forwards to a few years where their relationship with their daughter seems not good. Further, they become more distant and completely lose her for the unrest in the society and the nation. But father never gives up. His love and care for her leads the way and what comes later is even more disturbing before it all ends.It was Ewan McGregor's directional debut. I don't think he would try it again, not any time soon. But I would appreciate his quality of filmmaking. He only needs a better writer and the screenplay. I also think, he should not direct himself. I never considered him a best actor. I yet to see his performance. The film was not strong enough, if you are from outside the United States. Because what they call this 60s revolution was more a misunderstood by the young people. Particularly that religious thing, they were misled and spoiled their lives. So, instead of focusing that, the film centred on a father-daughter relationship. That is why it was a decent film. Otherwise I would have rated even wrose.5.5/10

Michael Really! Talented people choose to be in this Show? I watched it all the way through because of the actors. I assumed at some point their would be a story worth watching. I would be wrong. And in the end, someone phoned in the ending because they didn't care either. I would like anyone from this movie to contact me and either explain why they did it or apologize to me personally.

TxMike My wife and I watched this at home on DVD from our public library. About 26 years ago when we were dating and driving through the Virginia countryside we had a discussion about "pastoral" and "bucolic", finally agreeing that the two terms mean pretty much the same. American Pastoral. American Bucolic. Take your pick.It starts with a narration in somewhat modern times, of a 60- something man who was back home for his class of 1951 reunion. Part of that was meeting the brother of an old schoolmate, "The Swede", an athletics hero of the 1940s. Then most of the movie flashes back to the years in the 1950s and 1960s.Ewan McGregor is "Swede" Levov, son of a garment factory owner in New Jersey. He is to eventually inherit the business. He marries a beauty queen, Jennifer Connelly as Dawn Levov. They have one child, played as a teen and young adult by Dakota Fanning as Merry Levov.It isn't easy to define or summarize the themes here. We see that Swede and Merry had a close relationship when she was small. In a telling scene she asks dad to kiss her. So he kisses her on the cheek. Disappointed, she says "No, kiss me like you kiss mommy." He didn't and was taken aback. So maybe that is just to show that little Merry was to grow up on a dangerous track, which she does. She gets attracted to and involved with the protest groups of the 1960s, and in fact disappears after a post office is blown up and a man is killed. We much later find out how she moved around the country with a number of different IDs. So the story is both about how, in spite of good parenting, a teenager could get on a dangerous track, and how a totally caring parent can hold out forever to try to re-establish relations with a lost sheep. Even if it means losing his marriage and losing his health to die young.