MovieChat Forums > Last Exit to Brooklyn (1990) Discussion > Not impressed

Not impressed

posted 16 years ago by frog18
9 replies | jump to latest

I don't want to get into a slanging match with those who rate this as a classic, but for me it's laboured.

Badly put together and hollow. Performers struggle not to look two dimensional, while almost resorting to shouting 'look how deprived we are'. Not very subtle. The policeman sticking his face out and waiting for the punch from one of the strikers was truly woeful. All in all, this poorly shot, loudly over the top nonesense did nothing to help me care about the poor of America's underbelly, rather that I actually felt more like they deserved every moment. Shame.

The face-spotting and parts of the score that didn't sound recycled from The Princess Bride(vastly superior), just about kept me engaged, but I'll gladly forget about this film now that it's over.

[–] jerseyboynorth 15 years ago

Ok.

[–] lord-god 13 years ago

ditto

I'll torture you so slowly, you'll think it's a career.

[–] Storm23S 12 years ago

I agree with you OP. I just watched this movie earlier today for the first time and I was not impressed. The movie is in fact one dimensional and I felt not one ounce of empathy for any of the characters. All of them were nasty, awful people except for Donna (Ricki Lake). She was the only likeable one for me but then again she hardly had any lines in the movie.

The gay character was interesting but can't say I liked him much. The rest of the characters were absolute scum.

I'm sorry I bought this dvd. I've never seen a more depressing, one dimensional movie in my life. Some of the scenes in the movie were really pointless and over the top. Many of the scenes were hard to watch actually. On top of that, the ending was awful and left a lot of things unresolved.

This is one movie I have no interest in ever seeing again.

"And when the groove is dead and gone, love survives, so we can rock forever" RIP MJ

[–] 12 years ago

[deleted]

[–] michaeljcummings 10 years ago

Ditto, aka what you said. Who said literature and cinema needed to have 'likeable' characters?

[–] derek_sayre 10 years ago

I'm totally fine with unlikeable characters. I wouldn't go so far as saying this was a classic but it is a pretty good movie. Some of the acting was sub-par, some of the acting was good, mostly from the leads (Arquette, Young, Leigh and Lang) and it was too melodramatic at some points, like Lifetime levels but it was an interesting little movie.

Check out the far superior Requiem for a Dream if you're interested in Selby (the book is great too even though it's a tough read) or the director's much grittier Christiane F (probably the most horrifying drug addict film I've ever seen).

[–] willjohn 9 years ago

Having read the book I expected much more from the film.

it was like a Reader's Digest form of the book. So much was omitted.

[–] Sandoz 9 years ago

That was my beef with the film, too--having read the book, I just found the film to be a pale imitation of the grittiness and degradation that the book conjured in my mind while reading it. To me, the movie never felt authentic; I never believed I was watching a story that took place in the 1950s--I was always aware that it was a late 80s movie trying to recreate the 1950s. But to be fair, I think only a few directors could have pulled this subject matter off and done justice to the book...Scorsese definitely, maybe Cassavettes if he had lived.

Hey look--I won an award for just showing up! Yay!!!

[–] benGsboat 9 years ago

Just finished watching it (haven't read the book), and while some of it was melodramatic, most of the film felt very real to me. The area of Brooklyn where the exteriors were shot had a genuine run-down bleakness to it.

Interestingly, in the commentary by the director and writer, it's mentioned that Scorsese was once attached to the project (as was Stanley Kubrick). Still, I think Uli Edel made quite a good film -- at times powerful and moving.

Edel also talked about getting a phone call from Amblin after the film opened to meet with Steven Spielberg. He claimed that Spielberg told him that so much could have been done wrong in the film, but he got everything right. Edel said to this day it's one of the best compliments he's ever gotten.

By the way, Summit did a nice job with the dvd -- the transfer is basically flawless, and there's a great 45 minute documentary on the making of the film.

Definitely one I'll watch again in the future.