Cleveronix A different way of telling a story

Casey Duggan It’s sentimental, ridiculously long and only occasionally funny

Ava-Grace Willis Story: It's very simple but honestly that is fine.

Allissa .Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.

LeonLouisRicci James Woods is an intense Actor and Larry Clark is an intense Director. Here they combine their intensity into a Mainstream Story through an underground lens. Although Woods is the nucleus in this radiating Movie he is not without the support of the other three Leads spinning around His sometimes over exposed explosive Performance.The Director also flourishes here with some Artful restraint (as in the drug deal gone bad) as its realism connects with the Style of the Film. This is a slick looking Movie despite the Director's intentions. It also has a downbeat rhythm that is enticing in its exposure of low-life druggies and assorted other dregs.This is an underrated Film that holds up fine and is a disturbing but engrossing look-see at those other People that inhabit the underbelly of our Streets. It is a hard watch at times, but you asked for it and you get it with an uncompromising and Guilty Pleasure ambiance. After all, if Audiences weren't interested in this sort of uncomfortable, gritty, diversion, there wouldn't be so much of it.

dan_allegre From the name of the movie to the not too ambiguous ending, we're in Hollywood. The premise is pretty familiar if you've ever seen more than 5 movies that are rated 'R'. It's a shoot-em-up (lots of heroin and guns) with the familiar sexy antihero couple roaming around the American southwest playing a high stakes game and dealing with character issues (though in this movie we get a new twist because there are two couples instead of one and one of them is old, so you can watch it with your parents).That said, the cinematography is really easy on the eye and the acting is excellent. James Woods gives a great performance even though he plays the same character he plays in other movies he's been in (casino, once upon a time in America, the onion field). Many of the reviews of this film include some comparison to Lary Clark's other big film, "kids". To me, it's hard to compare these movies because the intentions are so different. Which one you like better depends upon, well, what kind of movies you like (you probably would't like them both equally). I'm more of a 'kids' type of guy.Over all, a pretty decent flick. There's a lot of art and subtlety to the acting and there are some pretty powerful scenes. It could have used to loose some of the stanky Hollywood chiche's (how many brains have you seen get blown out in the movies in your lifetime?), but they can be fun I suppose. Maybe VH1 should have a 'top 100 brains getting blown out scenes' show.

amesadamson-2 First off, I am curious about the lack of credit for Lou Diamond Phillips as Jewel. I am wondering what the back-story was or is. I thought he did fine and was a bit more interesting as Jewel than in other films. At least he was trashy and trashy is good.I read with interest in the plot summary, about the scene in the woods between Bobbie and Mel and reviewing it I didn't think it was the 'piece of resistance' that was implied...I personally see the actor Kartheiser being surprised not Bobbie, shocked and a bit amused by the improv by Woods who is very much Mel at the moment. But it registers to me as only that an actor response. Without being too critical I hope, a more mature actor might have stayed with it, but this fellow was young and inexperienced and it shows in that scene. Woods is tremendous in his role.Griffiths I was surprised, I don't mean to sound mean...was really interesting to watch. I thought she was just perfect thru much of the film.Clark's films always leave me a bit depressed overall, but often grateful for having seen it and that my life ain't as much of a mess as the characters portrayed.Kudos all the way around overall.

mram16 It wasn't until quite awhile after I read the novel by Eddie Little that I realized there was a film adaptation. I'm usually skeptical of adaptations, but I'm glad I saw this movie. It takes an unflinching look at the lives of lowlife criminals, living only for the next big score. James Woods and Melanie Griffith are great as Mel and Sid, the unconventional and unintentional parent figures to lovers Bobbie and Rosie (played by Vincent Kartheiser and Natasha Gregson Wagner), and all of them are junkies. These four people come together to form a strange kind of family, but a family that is doomed to fall apart. A great film with an ending that is both hopeful and sad.