Whitech
It is not only a funny movie, but it allows a great amount of joy for anyone who watches it.
Teddie Blake
The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.
Brennan Camacho
Mostly, the movie is committed to the value of a good time.
jrahn
Insomnia was acting up late one night and I started channel surfing and happened on this flick on Cinemax ... there was only about thirty minutes left of the movie but even at that point it SUCKED me right in.It's a great flick to watch on a Sunday afternoon - watch it closely. Gabriel Byrne and Ben Kingsley are excellent. I think this was the first movie I saw Jason Lee appear in.The multiple stories coinciding into one single story of rich scumbags tearing into other's lives for their own gain.Illeana Douglas's character (and her husband) ... their story ... the secret histories of the rich scumbags ... a lot going on in this movie ...HIGHLY recommend it.
jd110
What Robert Altman did for Vietnam with M*A*S*H, Stephen Surjik (director)and Larry Gelbart (writer) do to modern media corporations with Weapons of Mass Distraction.If anyone wants to know how the mega rich owners of big corporations are "screwing the little guy" and getting away with it, then you HAVE to watch this movie. The film uses biting satirical comic writing to deliver its message about how money and media power dominates the political process to the detriment of all but a very few people at the top. Imagine the screenplay being written by Voltaire or Jonathan Swift. Gabriel Byrne and Ben Kingsley's performances as the two greedy media moguls who will do anything, no matter how sleazy or illegal, to get their way, are brilliant. Jeffrey Tambor is fantastic as Byrne's personal assistant whose morals are as ambiguous as his sexuality.A wonderful film, a savage attack on what happens when too much power is vested in the hands of too few. Watch it and wince.
manuel-pestalozzi
This movie has a brilliant, intelligent script (starting with the title!) which makes a very interesting connection between the famous Renaissance Princes and present day Media Moghuls. I will check out other movies based on scripts by Larry Gelbard as soon as I can!Remember the Borgias, the Medicis, the Viscontis, the Sforzas and all those other guys who came from nowhere and rose up to seats of great power and founded lasting dynasties in Renaissance Italy? Those so called Condottieri were brutal and ruthless, yes, but they also furthered the arts and sciences. Maybe they did it solely for their own glory, but in the end the larger community could profit from the result. This came to my mind when I watched Weapons of Mass Distraction.Lionel Powers and Julian Messenger are two testosterone driven characters who rose out of the gutter to establish international media empires. In the movie they are contesting for the ownership of a football team. They both don't really need it, they just have this constant urge to confirm their potency to themselves. A game of power and betrayal unfolds which becomes more wicked as it reaches deeper an deeper in to the hidden corners of different people's biographies. The electronic media is used to discredit and destroy anyone who could stand in the way of the «big boys». And no quarter is given.Despite of all the modern gadgets, it becomes quite clear that it is a timeless story that is told here. Almost every character seems to be a reflection of court life in past centuries: there are crown princes, jesters, courtisans etc. etc. Thanks to the mass media these characters zap through real and virtual space until it is impossible to tell the one from the other and truths multiply - but all remains profoundly human.There are direct references to the Renaissance age - to me it seems I detected gestures and postures who come out of paintings of the period. Then there is Powers' family crypt, where the big man retires to in times of distress ... The two big guys are contrasted by a small guy, a «peasant» who is at the mercy of those who wield power. His outlook on life is in its entirety conditioned by TV - but whose is not? - and you feel that Weapons of Mass Distraction is a movie about a post democratic society.Gabriel Byrne and even more so Ben Kingsley are fabulous in the leading parts, so is Chris Mulkey who plays the «peasant» very convincingly. Also memorable are Jeffrey Tambor as the really sleazy adjutant and Paul Mazursky as the owner of a potency clinic. Ladies play second fiddle throughout but several of them are very pretty. The jokes are generally coarse but intelligent and well placed in the story. The most memorable moment is the the owner of the potency clinic explaining the different kinds of enlargments he has to offer for the male sexual organ - it's very detalled and really not very appetizing!Friends of Architecture watch out. It seemed to me that Julian Messenger's office was installed in Louis I. Kahn's famous Kimbell Art Museum in Fort Worth. If my guess is right, they did not use those wonderful spaces very well.
JKpplger
A great story about the "silent" (if you count out the use of their media) attacks that two television tycoons carry on each other; all to determine who will be the owner of an important football team. While the two are "having fun" in destroying one another, the middle class is living through (and watching) the consequences.It deserves at least 7 out of 10.
