boring?


Don't get me wrong, I actually love movies that make you think. American Beauty and Mystic River are in my personal top 10. However, in this movie just nothing seems to happen. I mean the acting is good and some lines are nice, but...NOTHING HAPPENS. I was waiting for this guy to explode, after all he lost his wife and his dougher is marrying a moron. It might be more realistic the way the movie goes on, but watching an old man think for 2 hours is not exactly what I call entertainment.

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Agreed completely... This movie was absolutely awful.

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im a little shocked this movie has an average rating of 7.3 on imdb. i really dont think since 39,000 people voted that it should have a rating higher than a 6.8. come one now. are we putting this movie in the same rating as......nevermind. look up some of the great movies that have gotten a lesser rating that this. im a huge nicholson fan, but 7.3 is a wee tad too high

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i'd call this movie real life. dramatic factors are kept to the minimum. and dramas are of course more interesting and entertaining than real life.
but this movie is so real, no dramatic twists as can only happen in movies (such as if the daughter changed her mind and cancel the wedding in the end, that would have ruined the movie), no exaggerated sadness (or funniness). but it's just so sad, depressing yet beautiful in a natural way. there are very few movies like that it's refreshing. and not to mention how it got me thinking about life and doing something meaningful with my time before it's too late.
so you wanna know why so many people liked it, this is why.

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...you forgot to mention boring too.

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I love it. If you found it boring, go and watch a Chuck Norris flick or something.

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im a little shocked this movie has an average rating of 7.3 on imdb. i really dont think since 39,000 people voted that it should have a rating higher than a 6.8. come one now. let me give an example of why this movie rating is too high. check out LETHAL WEAPON... rating is 7.4. i think we can all agree that that movie is very entertaining. about schmidt is only 0.1 point worse??? im thinking that 7.3 is a wee tad too high and im a huge nicholson fan

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You're kidding, right? Lethal Weapon should only be rated if the scale dips into negative numbers.

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"The fact that nothing is seeming to happen is the point."

How can nothing happening be the point of a movie? I mean it would be more interesting to see the paper bag from american beauty fly around in the wind for 2 hours...

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[deleted]

I guess that to, at least, some of us here, a human being is far more interesting and important than a paper bag. But obviously you don’t agree on that. Fine with me – to each his/her own!

BTW, that paper bag sequence in American Beauty is really good – nice filming and a brim with fascinating symbolic value. AB, like AS is IMHO a great piece of cinematic art.

"Why is it that men are so much more interested in women than women in men?"
Virginia Woolf

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Yeah, as one poster before mentioned that is exactly what the film is about. The boring life of an old man who has lost the person he love most and who doesn't have much content in his life.

And guys...How can a movie with Jack Nicholson acting in it be boring?? This man is brilliant!! I love Jack and I love About Schmidt as well!

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I agree with you totally, marburgerin21. I am the hugest Jack Nicholson fan, and I would be quite happy to sit and watch a film of him sitting on a park bench for two hours. I love him, and he's fantastic in every film he's done, even if the film wasn't that good.

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Absolutely, MeJack-2!! :-))

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This is odd, but I do agree that this movie can be a bit boring at times. Though, I am still a fan of it. I guess you have to be in the right mood to watch it. There are certain moments in this film that makes it worth the watch. For example, Jack Nicholson's face when he sees the shooting star and then the picture that Nimuya (I AM sorry, I forget his name, LOL) draws in the end. Those two parts get me everytime. Priceless.

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Some people relate to "Lots of stuff happening", some relate to human emotion.

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"Some people relate to "Lots of stuff happening", some relate to human emotion."

And that, dear children, is what seperates us from the Michael Bay fans.


"Death to Videodrome! Long live the new flesh!"

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[deleted]

good movie

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Beautifully filmed and acted; the characters are very well observed. However, a film really needs a bit more of a plot in order to achieve anything. Even Jack Nicholson's superb performance is not enough to save this forgettable piece for me.

There are other films that deal with pointlessness and wasted lives without being quite so slow. Also, while the characterisation is well observed, it feels cold and callous. The film has no love for its characters, but mocks them all from an equal distance. I could not feel emotionally involved with any of them. The put-upon daughter came closest.

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Boring? Deuchebag!

Lou Wichita

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i thought this movie was great. i was drawn in by nicholson's acting. it had a few dry funny parts to.

i hate checking a film on imdb that requires more attention span than usual and i always, always see someone bitching about it being boring.

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Boring? This movie could not be farther from boring. It is an actor's movie and in this case the actor is Nicholson. His performance is so nuanced it should be required viewing for students of the craft. I might be wrong but I believe he received an oscar nomination for this role.

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I consider this to be Jack Nicholson's greatest performance. He's already won the Oscar three times (for Cuckoo's Nest, Terms of Endearment and As Good as it Gets). Had he not won in 1997 for As Good...., he would have won for this movie.

This movie proves that Jack Nicholson can play a character. This is not The Shining Jack, or Witches of Eastwick Jack, or Batman Jack. It's not even The Departed Jack. This Jack shows up occasionally (other atypical Jack roles can be found in "The Pledge," "Prizzi's Honor" and "King of Marvin Gardens") and is amazing every time.

And the movie is not boring. Alexander Payne's movies are about real life issues and relationships. I love movies like Batman Begins and Die Hard too, but every now and then I need to see a movie about real people.

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I don't think this movie is boring at all. I thought Jack Nicholson was great in this movie. It's one of my top 5 movies he's ever been in including A Few Good Men, The Shining, Batman, and Hoffa.

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C'MON I MEAN LOOK AT THESE PEOPLE!

and

the stare at the desk when he is losing his job.

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I love Nicholson, but I am by no means an apologist for him.

Still, his performance in About Schmidt was absolutely riveting.

Especially contrasted to the overblown cartoonish evil Leprachaun he played in the Departed. But everything about that film was silly and wrong (even though I'm a huge Scorsese fan also).

Perhaps the dichotomy in appreciation for this film represents some type of a generational gap.

I'm 43. I am much more interested at this stage in my life in character studies than I am in action packed shootouts.

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I didn't find it boring, I found it frustrating!

I just kept on thinking that something interesting must happen soon...but it didn't, it was just about an old man with a rubbish life and a big van.

The only thing I liked about it was how they managed to keep all the interiors in a 1960's-time warp.

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Especially contrasted to the overblown cartoonish evil Leprachaun he played in the Departed. But everything about that film was silly and wrong (even though I'm a huge Scorsese fan also)

Right! I thought I was the only person who disliked The Departed so much (other than the older lady who sat next to me and walked out in disgust).
Everything about that movie rang false. Including Nicholson's throwback to his devil character in Witches of Eastwick. At least that movie was a black comedy.

Human Beings...Wow

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"Don't get me wrong, I actually love movies that make you think. American Beauty and Mystic River are in my personal top 10..."

I saw Mystic River and I'm a big Clint Eastwood fan but that was a film which was over-rated IMO and (in Sean Penn's case) badly acted.

About Schmidt was a fascinating film, not least because it showed that Nicholson could really lose himself in a part and not act 'Jack Nicholson', which he does in most of his roles.

There is most definitely something going on. A guy loses his wife, his job, discovers he has no real friends, and realises nobody ever gave a *beep* about him (other than his wife). And his daughter is a selfish cow, who doesn't care about him either. How is he going to fill his days from then on? This is a situation that many people of mature years who find themselves alone have to face up to.

A depressing prospect wrapped up in black comedy. I found the film uncomfortable as well as humorous, and one of Nicholson's best films. But boring it wasn't. Depressing, yes.

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