Linbeymusol Wonderful character development!

RyothChatty ridiculous rating

FrogGlace In other words,this film is a surreal ride.

Doomtomylo a film so unique, intoxicating and bizarre that it not only demands another viewing, but is also forgivable as a satirical comedy where the jokes eventually take the back seat.

leplatypus Well, i should try for a spot of Hollywood screenwriter, as this movie is just full of absurdities that it's hard to believe that people believe in it. To put it simply, a clean and young graduate is anxious with his future. So far, it's OK as classic did it before ("the graduate" for example). To bite the life, he hangs up with a free couple during his summer break. Still nothing to blame as this age is indeed for this kind of experience. But, then, crash: the father is Pittsburg's Maffia Don: Why ?? Is it again the problem to be respectable? In all cases, Nolte is a poor godfather and all the clichés are abused. Worst, this triangular friendship evolves not into a threesome but in another homosexuality struck! Even if he "does" Sienna, he finally discovers that he prefers his boyfriend and ready to live as a couple of thugs!!! Well, all this homo silly stories by straight people is like having a debate about feminism with only men: it's just unbelievable. However, Sarsgaard is always good for this misfit character and Sienna is sympathetic with her gentle, soft, smiling spirit. And it was good to come back to Pittsburg and unlike "Flashdance", this time we have a taste of its rural beauty.

Thomas Engels I don't know if you ever saw Threesome, a humorous story about an atypical triangle relationship. It's certainly not a masterpiece, but it does what it does with panache. It's fun to watch the confusion and somehow it's believable that two boys and a girl all have a thing for each other.The Mysteries of Pittsburgh also touches on the dilemma of bisexuality and sharing the same lover. However, here the setup is so bland that it seems to (involuntarily, of course) echo the clichés of people who have issues with homosexuality, namely, gays are confused/immoral and have too much libido for their own good.The film lacks clarity. Especially the beginning is a messy collage that fails to properly introduce the main character. The confusion becomes greater when more side characters show up. Nobody seems to know what he or she is doing in this story. The actors caught on to this, because their performances are colourless. Considering the 18 karat cast, the director is to blame.I add Mysteries to the long list of movies that failed because the people who made it thought that going off the beaten track would be enough to make a good movie.

Twins65 I must 1st admit I've not read the book, which apparently is way better than this film adaptation according to the general consensus here at IMDb. I was warned to stay far away from this movie.But I FINALLY saw it anyway, almost 7 full years after Sienna Miller made entertainment headlines trashing Pittsburgh in an interview while filming there on location. The film wasn't easy to track down, as I found a DVD through an interlibrary loan. I'm glad I watched it, but can't really recommend it.As indie movies go, I thought it had decent production values, including respected actors (Nolte, Sarsgaard, Suvari & Miller). I was unfamiliar with the work of Jon Foster (but his brother Ben can really bring it at times), and thought he was just OK as the lead. Perhaps a more dynamic young actor would have brought more to the production, but he's not the reason I'm giving this a below-average rating.The story was decent enough, but it just never really felt like I was watching a movie set in '83. Outside of Sienna's beat up VW Beetle and Sarsgaard's convertible, there was nothing to peg this as "early 80's"! I realize Pittsburgh has had roughly the same look for years, but couldn't they at least have thrown in some more "visuals" or music from that era to bring home it was 1983? The producers could have used more early 80's indie rock during the movie if they couldn't afford the rights for major label material from that era. And that punk club scene looked more like something you'd see in a retro themed inner-city dive in Chicago these days than a packed bar in Pitt. 30 years ago. I'm giving this 1 extra star (4 instead of 3) for having the punk band play a cover of The Replacements' God Damn Job off their '82 EP "Stink". I never, ever thought I'd hear that cut in movie! This movie is worth a look only if it pops up on IFC or Sundance at some point, but I've never seen it playing there.

sampotter25 I am quite a fan of novelist/screenwriter Michael Chabon. His novel "Wonder Boys" became a fantastic movie by Curtis Hanson. His masterful novel "The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay" won the Pulitzer Prize a few years back, and he had a hand in the script of "Spider Man 2", arguably the greatest comic book movie of all time.Director Rawson Marshall Thurber has also directed wonderful comedic pieces, such as the gut-busting "Dodgeball" and the genius short film series "Terry Tate: Office Linebacker". And with a cast including Peter Saarsgard, Sienna Miller, Nick Nolte and Mena Suvari, this seems like a no-brainer.It is. Literally.Jon Foster stars as Art Bechstein, the son of a mobster (Nolte) who recently graduated with a degree in Economics. Jon is in a state of arrested development: he works a minimum wage job at Book Barn, has a vapid relationship with his girlfriend/boss, Phlox (Suvari), which amounts to little more than copious amounts of sex, with no plans other than to chip away at a career for which he has zero passion.One night at a party, an ex-roommate introduces Jon to Jane (Miller), a beautiful, smart violinist. Later that night they go out for pie, and she asks Jon a question that begins to shake him from his catatonic state of existence, "I want you to tell me something that you have never told a single soul. If you do, it will make this night indelible." Jon then tells her a reoccurring dream of his in which he wanders about town looking at the faces of strangers passing him by, yet none of them look him in the eye. "I imagine it must be what death feels like," he says.The next day Jane's wild boyfriend Cleveland (Saarsgard) kidnaps Jon from work and takes him out to a hulking abandoned steel mill, and soon Jon, Cleveland and Jane are spending every waking moment together going to punk rock concerts, doing drugs and drinking lots of alcohol. This doesn't sit well with Phlox, who pushes Jon for a more personal relationship, namely letting her meet his new friends and his father. The film then attempts to take us on Jon's journey as he shakes off the shackles imposed on him by his father, Phlox and his dead-end job as he finds freedom and expression through his relationships with Cleveland and Jane.There is a problem having us follow Jon throughout the film: he's completely uninteresting. He has no ambitions, passions or goals. He walks through life like the invisible wraith he described to Jane the night they met. At the outset this isn't a problem. But he never gets any more interesting. He's a completely passive character. He simply follows along the bohemian Cleveland and Jane, but he never once gives us any inkling as to what he cares about or wants to to do with himself.Consequently, the film and its supporting characters have nowhere to go and little to do other than party, have sex and get in arguments. In other words, much ado about nothing. What we have here is the shallow skin of a good movie without anything on the inside. Sweeping cinematography, ponderous voice-over with characters staring off into the distance, lots of sex scenes both straight and gay, big arguments, more angry sex, a chase scene and a tragic death... but it doesn't seem to matter. Ironically, at one point Jane, confused at a number of Jon's aimless actions, asks him, "What's going on, Jon? What is this all about?" Yes, Jon, do tell. We in the audience are dying to know, too.The title "The Mysteries of Pittsburgh" must refer to the characters themselves, because that's what they are. They are all facades, one-dimensional stand-ins for actual people. The film never lets us in. We never know what makes any of them tick. We see them do lots of things, but we don't know why. And the absence of "why" is one of the worst things a movie can have.