Ogosmith Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.

Kirandeep Yoder The joyful confection is coated in a sparkly gloss, bright enough to gleam from the darkest, most cynical corners.

Lucia Ayala It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.

Billy Ollie Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

Moobee I really feel the splendid ideas of scripts and the good quality of cinematographer and music too. But overall, this s a second-handed-European-kind-of-style film that might be hundreds out there ever year in Europe and all better than this one. This one is not so fell into place. The pace is not nessecerrily slow and dreadful yet the links of 5 senses are too weak and trying too hard to be connected. It's much like it tries too hard, too hard to wanted to fall in 5 senses in order to speak the film's name. I really believe Jeremy could do better with much mature skill after years practice. Mary-Louise Parker is so not acting well this time, really not knowing what's wrong with her depth of acting, it's just as on the surface as the tone and expression she acts. anyway, I love art films like life, this one, really is a well intentions and ideas but so poor in flavor and style.

noralee "Five Senses" is a Robert Altman-like large ensemble meeting "All About My Mother."It has a didactic theme as there's an eye dr. going deaf, a baker constructing tasteless, attractive looking cakes, a lover whose cooking tastes delicious but because of foreign language is perceived as not speaking at all, a cleaner whose job it is to eliminate odors seeking the smell of love, and no shortage of voyeurs of the 5 senses, including a massage therapist.And it all comes down to that in matters of the heart and intimacy you cannot trust your senses. Nothing is what it seems. The cinematography and soundtrack are appropriately lush, but will probably be fine on video or cable. The loose ends are mostly tied up to some satisfaction, though not all happy endings.It was nice to pick out Canadian actors from various little movies and TV shows. (originally written 7/30/2000)

lortiz-2 It's out on rent so, rent it. Man, is really good. It deals with a few stories that are connected if you think about it, mainly by a building. Love, lost, memories and discoveries are the main emotions that drive this movie. Again, another perfect film that's plot-less. This film even has an event, which has been done over and over in film but, just because you are not attached to a plot it seems like the most original event in the movie. Mothers, daughters, friends and fathers are all living their lives, like any of us, not noticing the small things in life. Our sense, specially sight and sound are over stimulated by this beautiful movie. The little simple things is what drives this movie and god that's filmmaking, that's art. Let me tell you how good it is, is so good, the movie was over and I stopped the DVD and started it again, I was it twice last night I think I'll see it tonight again.

Roland E. Zwick In movies, as in most other art forms, the greatest of works often come in the smallest of packages. Such is the case with `The Five Senses,' an independent Canadian production that chooses for its subject nothing less profound than a meditation on what it means to be human. Writer/director Jeremy Podeswa has fashioned a work of great poetic form and insight centered around a group of people who share the universal need to find true love and acceptance in a world where wounded and shattered relationships all too often result in magnified loneliness and despair. Like all of us, each of these characters gropes towards the dual goals of intimacy with others and acceptance of oneself that are essential for human happiness. Some succeed, while others fail – just as in life – but none of the characters is left unchanged by the experience.`The Five Senses,' though it has a plot, is more of an emotional mood piece than a narrative-driven drama. Blessed with an outstanding ensemble cast, Podeswa is able to draw us in to the center of his world through the use of sensory imagery and deliberate, methodical pacing. In fact, one of the strongest themes running through the film is its examination of the part our senses play in defining our world and character. Podeswa understands that we have become desensitized to our senses. As a result, he uses this film to reconnect us to that crucial element of our beings. The quiet, hushed tone, the muted autumnal colors, the slowly moving camera, the haunting musical score all combine to create an atmosphere in which the audience can become conscious of every sight and sound that comes our way. In our effort to establish meaningful intimacy with other human beings, we most typically rely on the sense of touch – yet, this can serve, Podeswa shows us, as much to trap us into a false intimacy as to lead us into one that is genuine and lasting. A number of his characters use sex as a substitute for true closeness, while others make a physical connection on a much deeper level. One of the most moving moments in the film occurs when a gay man – most probably an AIDS patient – breaks down in tears during a massage session, his heart broken because no one has dared to touch him in so long a time. This film acknowledges the vital part that tender physical contact plays in the totality of a person's humanity. In a similar way, the film explores the beauty of sound, as one of the characters – ironically, an eye doctor, a man dedicated to preserving the organ of one sense – faces the prospect of impending deafness and yearns to create a mental catalogue of all the exquisite sounds of everyday life that he will soon no longer be able to hear and that we so routinely take for granted. Yet, like all the other characters, it is his spiritual emptiness and inability to make a meaningful connection with another human being that bring him his greatest obstacles to happiness. Podeswa also examines the part smell plays in making that vital human connection, as one of the characters – a lonely gay man – revisits his former lovers to take a whiff of their scent in an effort to discover if he can smell `true love.'Yet `The Five Senses' is not merely a movie built on a clever `gimmick.' On the contrary, it breathes with the fullness of humanity because each of its many characters emerges as a fully developed, instantly recognizable human being. There are teenagers alienated by their own inability to fit into the accepted norm of society and made to feel guilty by their acts of careless irresponsibility. There are mothers terrified of losing their children, in one case, literally, as her young girl wanders off and disappears and, in another case, figuratively, as her adolescent daughter seems to be slipping away into inexplicable `strangeness.' There are adults unable to comprehend a life filled with failed relationships who strike out in desperation for that one last opportunity for happiness, often with the result that they end up further away from that universally desired goal than ever. One of the most daring aspects of `The Five Senses' is that it does not succumb to the temptation to provide either a `happy' ending or even a conclusive one for all of its characters. The film acknowledges that life is a messy, never ending process of changing fortunes and personal growth and it stays true to that theme all the way to the end.This brave, haunting and mesmerizing film definitely stands as one of the true movie finds of recent years – a true work of art!