Cleveronix A different way of telling a story

Helllins It is both painfully honest and laugh-out-loud funny at the same time.

Brendon Jones It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

Phillipa Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.

Phillim Jason Schwartzman, Jonathan Pryce, Elisabeth Moss. Exquisite performers doing fine work, with novice writer/director Alex Ross Perry's rings-true, deeply hilarious, and often astonishing script.Schwartzman's 'Philip', blunt young novelist on the verge of stardom, overthinks and over-expresses his live-in relationship with successful photographer Moss, in a tone masterfully tragi-comic. Meanwhile he takes on an aging mentor in the form of overly-prolific writer and all-round monster Pryce. (Must have been great fun creating the dozen or more satirical fake titles and book covers for Pryce's ouvre. And choosing the curley-queue typeface from 1960s paperback covers for the credits -- suggesting Jacqueline Suzanne and Philip Roth -- warmed my little nostalgic heart.)Moss and Pryce bless the material with their usual raw, unvarnished truth. Pryce's holy terror is no hack movie villain -- he's the guy a lot of us know, admire, and dread. But Schwartzman -- ah, Monsieur Le Schwartzman -- is in a much better movie than the others. He is The Vortex, and when he is not on screen the film's purpose evaporates, like -- poof -- immediately. Perhaps luring the fabulous Elisabeth Moss to the project at the 2014 point in her brilliant career required giving her an extended Schwartzman-free segment. Moss is always fascinating and unrelentingly appealing -- but the material meanders in her 'separate life' sequence -- and it all starts to feel tacked on. Should have developed this as a separate splendid movie for Moss instead (I know -- easily said . . .).There may be structural problems with Alex Ross Perry's script, but his direction of the actors is inspired, and he has a true gift for casting. Location choices, framing choices, mise-en-scene stuff generally prove Perry's is the soul of an artist. Alex Perry knows what a movie is, the way Michael Powell knew, the way Douglas Sirk knew.Alas, the script/edit in the released film breaks a film lover's heart: at times it veers toward greatness, then heads toward what one hopes is mimetic satire of bad writing (appropriate in a story about anguished writers), but, oh dear, after a point we realize the film has lost its way, even though the smart, committed performances keep us engaged.The voice-over narration device creaks to the point of annoyance. Again, it is likely a satire of bad writing; it dawned on this humble reviewer too late that it is the voice of Schwartzman's character from his future as old embittered successful hack, relating the events of the film as reductive and clichéd memoir -- i.e., after he has aged into the Schwartzman counterpart of Pryce's dissipated beast. The tip-off is that the narration is not in Schwartzman's reedy voice, (nor Pryce's whiny growl, ruling his character out), but the seasoned baritone of Eric Bogosian. A lesser film would have spelled all this out for me in the beginning; a better film would have let me in on the joke a lot sooner.But the world is a better place for this film -- it shows us once again that Schwartzman is a thrillingly observant actor. I always feel he is revealing truths you won't learn anywhere else. Like an earthier version of the young Richard Dreyfus, he ruthlessly justifies every action of the -- mostly A-holes -- he plays. I think his best is yet to come.Overall I am compelled to give 'Listen Up, Philip' a ten for its many successes, its gadzooks! casting, its general ambition, and for its deep respect for the audience. Alex Ross Perry is a keeper.

The_late_Buddy_Ryan Writer/director Alex Ross Perry doesn't have much of an ear for natural-sounding dialogue, which is a problem, since "Listen Up Philip" is practically all talk. Jason Schwartzman delivers his lines in a stilted, overprecise way, I guess to convince us that his character really is a "notable" writer and a serious intellectual; occasionally he seems to be channeling in Max Fischer from "Rushmore," but without the irony or humor.It seems to me that someone who writes such clunky, flatfooted prose (he misuses common words like "remiss" and "impart") hasn't earned the right to throw shade on a real writer like Philip Roth, and Jonathan Pryce, as Roth surrogate "Ike Zimmerman," has to struggle to put across some laughably stagy lines. The lowpoint is a cringy scene in which Ike and another alte kocker (who looks suspiciously like Bernard Malamud) pick up two younger women, bring them home and then have to call on Philip for backup. Kudos, on the other hand, to whoever mocked up the jackets for Zimmerman's books, which look exactly like Roth's bestsellers from the 60s… Elizabeth Moss lucked out—she doesn't have to play a nasty, longwinded narcissist, doesn't have to emote like she's reading random pages from a self-published novel (I'm talking about you, narrator Eric Bogosian!), and the few scenes she gets to herself are riveting. The pro reviewers were surprisingly indulgent with this one; maybe they were giving it credit for good intentions—seems like what Perry had in mind was something like "Llewyn Davis" (satirical character study of cranky guy trying to reconcile artistic ambitions with practical demands of life in 20th-century NYC) with a smidge of "Frances Ha" (lighthearted comedy of manners featuring arty Manhattanites, shot with shaky camera and other New Wave flourishes)—but, from our perspective, "Philip" doesn't have much to offer in the way of insight or enjoyment.Perry's new one is getting good notices at BAMcinemaFest; I'll prob'ly watch when it turns up on Netflix or Amazon. Fool me twice, shame on me

howardeisman I should be a perfect viewer for this movie. I know and care about the literary world and the characters portrayed in this film. Yet, I found it boring and pretentious.The story telling style, the focus moving from one character to the other, the narration not quite connected to the screen image, the abrupt behaviors, the dizzying camera work and cutting all pointed to a director who wanted to make a showy splash; the jittery techniques of moving the story along overwhelmed the story itself. The tricks are not only not compelling, but they eventually become silly and boring.Since the Philip character is intrinsically unlikeable, you would either have to hate him so much that you watch the movie to see him get his comeuppance or to laugh at him. But Philip is not that hateful and, while his ferocious self-centeredness might have been quite funny, the Philip character is just NOT funny. All the other characters are inadequately developed, so their self defeating behavior seems mysteriously motivated.The performances are all superior. This actually makes thing worse, as the actors are all saying "something of importance is taking place here". This sense of importance is then sabotaged by gratuitous directorial razzle-dazzle and characters that will never change.Thus, this film is not enlightening, not very funny, and not very interesting.

Liam Blackburn That would sum this one up right there. It begins in a nebulous fashion, with a half- impression of what could be a character. It then begins to gather some steam on the strength of some well-timed comedic moments. Philip's relationship with his mentor is especially poignant. Then about halfway through, just before he starts his new relationship, the story loses steam. It was ebbing and flowing in small climactic patterns up until that point. You lose touch with the character Philip, and he just stops being interesting. Had to fast-forward at that point, to just about the very end....where it continues to be boring. His final encounter with his ex, reveals that she is happy having a cat instead of Philip. Wow. What drama... This movie fails.