MovieChat Forums > The Fanatic (2020) Discussion > It's not bad, why all the hate?

It's not bad, why all the hate?


Travolta was good as the disturbed obsessive fan. The mood was dark and creepy, I was bouncing between having sympathy for the pitiful Moose and being horrified at his desperation, driven by loneliness and a need to be validated for his devotion.

It was uncomfortably funny in a few places, a cringy unease, the awkward loser.

You can also enjoy it the way you might like a Nicolas Cage movie, if you like those.

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The movie has some strange plot holes (for example: not finding the woman in the garden?) but overall it's a real entertaining 82 minute long movie. It's just real sad, how everyone is just pointing at it and laughing, when it doesn't deserve it. I think Travolta's acting was fantastic, it also had some real tense moments (when he is in the house), also technically it was just totally solid.

There are clearly tons of more movies nowadays, which should be laughed at instead of this one

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i think the plot hole was less that devon sawa didn't find the maid (he didn't go into the backyard for a day or 2),
but that the gardener found her and immediately called the police, who came down to arrest devon...instead of running inside to see if devon was dead too, or there was an explanation

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Either way, there is no way the actor would be found guilty, with all the DNA left in the house. It will back up his story, as also his son was a witness of the stalker. They just need to find the guy with no fingers...

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Thank you, they were my thoughts exactly! The police just assumed he killed her, it was ridiculous. Also, from what the narrator (Moose's friend Leah) was saying, it didn't sound like Moose was ever held responsible for her murder. She said he wore his lost eye and lost fingers like a badge, not that he went to jail. So that leaves us to believe Hunter was so traumatized by Moose and the events that night, that he took the blame for the maid's murder?? Hunter was a real a___hole but he wasn't a murderer.

Personally I thought the movie was horrible!!

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Yeah the way the police thought the actor was the killer straight away was fuking ludicrous !!!

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Travolta deserves Oscar for his performance here. He did fantastic job! Movie wasn't as bad as people say. Sure it had few mistakes, but all in all, it was interesting movie that doesn't deserve hate.

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''Travolta deserves Oscar for his performance here''

Yes, and Carrot Top deserves an Oscar for... whatever garbage he has ever done!

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No matter how much a movie could be absolutely awful, there will always be a post like this on its board....

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JohnMcCock agrees.

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Just finished watching it! different role for travolta! i enjoyed it.

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JohnMcCock would say that this is quite a terrible film.

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I will say Travolta did a fine job becoming this character and making you forget he was the guy in Pulp Fiction and Broken Arrow, the problem wasn't Travolta's acting, the problem was the script. The script had plot holes galore, unlikable characters, and really bad dialogue, Travolta did his best with what he was given, but no actor could make the dialogue and story he was given work and make it a really good movie.

"Can't talk now i gotta poo" is literally the first thing we hear his character say, i don't blame Travolta for that i blame the horrible script. I mean why do we need that insignificant friend of his narrating the entire movie? she hardly has any role at all in the movie, then the character of Devon Sawa is awful, he's an unlikable prick and then theres the cringey "Yeah you like Limp Bizkit ?" scene that Durst shamelessly put in there. Sawa's character not finding the corpse of his maid for days, the cops for some reason showing up and arresting Sawa's character at the end, the story was horrible and the dialogue was even worse.

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''I will say Travolta did a fine job becoming this character and making you forget he was the guy in Pulp Fiction and Broken Arrow''

Yes, I would agree with that and this is how I would describe his performance: ''fine''. Not outstanding or anywhere near from being Oscar-worthy (like some people here seem to claim), but he wasn't awful at all. Then there's the fact that his character was too over-the-top creepy, approching the level of creepiness of the vilain in Human Centipede 2, which made it hard for me to really appreciate it. But yeah, he was okay, I give him that.

''the problem wasn't Travolta's acting, the problem was the script. The script had plot holes galore, unlikable characters, and really bad dialogue''

THIS, thank you. The script was really horrible and obviously there wasn't much rewritting/polishing done on it. The dialogues were mostly stupid and really poorly written, the events were redundant and felt forced (why in the hell would he RETURN to that house after the threats he received from Dewon ?? even a deranged person should have some natural instincts for his safety... ah well...), the plot holes couldn't be more obvious and the characters were unidimensional and uniteresting. I've seen many school projects which were written way better than that.

''Travolta did his best with what he was given, but no actor could make the dialogue and story he was given work and make it a really good movie.''

Exactly, he simply suffered from the bad script, and an actor alone cannot make a movie go from bad to a masterpiece.

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It's fine. The movie industry has just changed. Everybody expects everything to be huge or profound. Especially if an actor like Travolta is attached. Some movies are just movies.

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"Everybody expects everything to be huge or profound. Especially if an actor like Travolta is attached. Some movies are just movies."

I couldn't agree more.
As just a movie, the Fanatic did a fine job keeping me entertained for its 90 or so minute runtime.

Nothing deep or profound. Nothing game-changing. Just a movie that did it's job keeping someones attention till the end.

Wasn't my favourite, but I didn't dislike it by any means. It was pretty good.

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I really don't think many people expect much from Travolta these days. He hasn't been in anything very good for the better part of a decade.

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I loved it. Even the ending isnt a plot hole. they arrested him on suspicion , but im sure they let him go once they check the blood , evidence, etc.
But who cares about that part .
The interesting part was just how fucked up things got before any sort of resolve.


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