Matialth
Good concept, poorly executed.
Spidersecu
Don't Believe the Hype
KnotStronger
This is a must-see and one of the best documentaries - and films - of this year.
Aneesa Wardle
The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.
jackgdemoss
A film bursting from the brim with friendship, charm, and emotion. The directors set the bar extremely low in the first moments of the film with some absurd fart jokes, but then it is all uphill from there. Weeks after viewing, I still find myself humming the best parts of the score. Swiss Army Man evolves over its 97 minute run-time into a beautiful peace that we can all learn something from.
theresamgill
I recently watched Being John Malkovich and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind; both are unbelievably strange, even surreal (especially Mind), and both very well done and refined and entertaining. I won't say tonight's movie is more entertaining, but I will say it certainly is stranger. Harry Potter meets Brian Wilson-- we're somehow reviewing Swiss Army Man.
If you watched the trailer, that gives you a good, brief overview of the absurdity that takes place. Paul Dano is stranded on an island and is about to commit suicide when a body washes ashore. It's a dead Daniel Radcliffe, but as soon as Dano returns to trying to hang himself, the weird starts happening. Perhaps it's just his imagination, more likely it's a hallucination from his starvation, but Radcliffe's body starts acting in only the ways the writers could think up while I assume certainly intoxicated. There's certainly a very juvenile aspect to his motorboat farts and regurgitated water, but enough is done to provide ample laughter that doesn't die down as much as I first assumed it would.
Dano realizes he has a chance to get back to civilization with the multi-purpose titular Radcliffe body, and this is the thread to propel the story. But if all you get or all you assume you'll get from the movie is physical comedy with a simple story of trying to return from the wilderness, then you sir aren't looking deeply at all.
As he returns back to life, Radcliffe is hilariously rude and ignorant because he doesn't remember society at all, so Dano begins teaching him. The topics of family, friends, girls, etc. is all light-hearted and fun, and it also provides the time to reflect on Dano and how he himself never totally fit in with society to begin with. It brings about a little more existential problems, and adds a couple threads to story. It's not the most developed and it doesn't have to be because that's not what the movie is. And anybody who has seen the film can and will agree with me that there's no way to say what exactly this movie is.
Dano is charming, but the gold star goes to the derpy-smiling Daniel Radcliffe. His childish antics never loses wit and lust as he determinedly wants to learn the ways of society and how to be happy. It's surprisingly funny and endlessly charming, but it is also so incredibly strange and that is a huge reason why it never really went to mainstream theaters-- it just doesn't have that kind of audience. Really I think it's much more individual-based on who would like the film.
I will end with the ending (no spoilers, don't worry). I've heard complaints about how it ends, and the more I have thought it through, the more I am willing to defend it. The movie ending any other way just wouldn't be fitting strangely enough. It's a jigsaw piece that doesn't match any puzzle, yet it fits in with this film. Truthfully, the only question this movie will have you asking at the end will be, "What did I just watch?" Take that as you may, whatever I watched, I actually enjoyed it.
You can find this review and dozens of others at gillipediamoviereviews.blogspot.com
Ali Ahmad
This movie was a bit but good as well. I enjoyed the performance of Paul and Daniel. They were great.
AngelaMHouston
Swiss Army Man is the tale of healing through a very creative method. The way this film deals with pain and the will to live takes my breath away. I have never understood a character so well.
My only critique would be that some parts of the film get a bit confusing such as the phone and the name mix up in the ending, but really other than that it is the best film I have seen in a very long time.