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The Savages (2007)
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All reviews for The Savages
The Savages (2007)
by
Kowalski76
in
Rebellious Celluloid
liked it.
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"The Savages subtle brand of humour and thoughtfulness make for a deeply funny superbly acted film. I haven't seen Tamara Jenkins directorial debut 'Slums of Beverly Hills' but if it's half this good I won't leave it long. Hoffman and Linney work brilliantly together, it was a pleasure to watch them tackle the complexities of the subject matter. "
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Movie Journal: The Savages
by
ChrisThilk
in
ChrisThilk Blog
hasn't rated it.
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"A lot less out-and-out funny than the marketing campaign made it out to be, The Savages is still very enjoyable and features one great performance and one pretty good performance from the two leads actors. The great performance comes from Philip Seymour Hoffman while the pretty good one comes from Laura Linney, a rare non-relavatory outing from her. The two play a brother and sister who don’t see each other very often but who are once again brought together by the sickness and impending death of their aging father. The marketing included a focus on the handful of funny scenes from the movie, scenes whose humor generally comes from the very human interactions between the siblings. While I don’t feel the campaign was misleading in any way, it did present a movie that was more in the Juno-type vein than something that’s much more serious-minded. Hoffman’s performance is note-perfect. He portrays the son/brother as someone who is kind of floundering in his life but who is at least ab ... "
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The Savages
by
JimBell
in
JimBell Blog
liked it.
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"JJ79, I enjoyed you detailed and thoughtful review of The Savages (2007). Few people ever comment on others’ reviews on Spout, so I’d like to comment on yours, for a change. Your main point is that neither Wendy (Laura Linney) nor Jon (Phillip Seymour Hoffman) “give us enough to latch onto,” that the movie “never gives us a reason to care about either one of them.” Although I agree the characters can be annoying, the movie does try to make them somewhat sympathetic. We learn in bits and pieces how dysfunctional their family was—mother essentially not there, father physically abusive to the son as the father’s father was to him. Although the movie does not connect all the dots, we see the sorry outcome of this sad upbringing: Wendy, who is smart, talented, and good-looking, has no self-confidence; Jon, who is smart, talented, and emotional, tries to restrict himself to the intellectual in both his academic career interests and in his ... "
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The Savages (2007)
by
JJ79
in
JJ79 Blog
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"It´s amazing how a movie featuring both Laura Linney and Philip Seymour Hoffman--both fantastic actors--turns out to be so devoid of life, so cold and unemotional as to make a supporting character the most compelling person on screen. Forget the sibling pitter patter over the Gugenheim or who has the more demanding schedule. The only thing worth seeing in "The Savages" is Philip Bosco as their estranged father, Lenny. After he uses feces to decorate the bathroom and his lady friend dies, Lenny is moved from sunny Arizona to miserable Buffalo in the dead of winter to be closer to his children, Wendy and Jon (Linney and Hoffman). Both are nutcases unto themselves: she is carrying on a relationship with a married man while he destroys relationships by not being able to commit to anyone except himself. Neither can be bothered to deal with their father, shoving him into a nursing home in an "out of sight, out of mind" way. "The Savages" starts out with a great deal of promise. Ear ... "
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The Savages
by
ShaunHuston
in
ShaunHuston filmblog
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"The good in The Savages has, at this point, been well and duly noted elsewhere. Philip Seymour Hoffman and Laura Linney are utterly convincing as siblings Jon and Wendy Savage. Watching them together is certainly worth the price of admission. Tamara Jenkins' script is refreshingly authentic and low-key in its treatment of big issues ??? family, death ??? although it suffers from a few clunky moments where cheap laughs are bought at the expense of emotional insight. I was not, however, so blinded by the film's strengths that I was able to ignore otherwise sloppy craft behind the camera. When Philip Bosco's Lenny Savage first appears on screen I was stunned to see a microphone bobbing around at the top of the frame. After my momentary surprise, I thought, ???Well, sometimes you just have to go with the best take for the performance, I guess.??? But, then it kept happening. At one point, you can even see the boom pole as it is positioned from the right of the screen. I&# ... "
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A solid, no frills family drama
by
dunedonkey
in
film phlegm
liked it.
1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.
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"Laura Linney can annoy me. Her attempt at playing a blue collar wife in Mystic River fell flat because she's too refined for that. She's doing well in John Adams because she's a very plain and simple actress. However, I really liked her in The Savages because it gave her a chance to push the limits with her personality to make bring to the surface what the average middle-aged, single woman with a dying father would go through.Philip Seymour Hoffman does a fantastic job as usual playing the self-absorbed older brother who doesn't want to deal with anything because he's got his own personality issues.The two of them together generated a great on-scene chemistry as brother and sister because they were both subdued and acting more from the heart without the flare that you might see from them in other bigger budget films. If you were to ask me what made the film, it was this chemistry.The story was rich. I wouldn't say it was terribly original, but Tamara Je ... "
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Come drink my milkshake: This y ...
by
usesoap
in
usesoap Blog
loved it.
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"Even though the writers have apparently settled on a deal to end the strike, there is still a great deal to fear on the Oscar broadcast set for Feb. 24, that can be summed up in three simple words (two if you hyphenate correctly):Oscar-winner 'Norbit'.That's right. While many wrestle with the fact that their favorite films have been left off the nominee list (I understand, though don't agree with, the love-fest called Juno, but even my friends who are the most ardent supporters of the film agree that it has no place in the Best Picture and Best Director category) a film that was universally loathed like 'Norbit' has a shot at earning the most coveted trophies in the biz.Here to give you an edge on the office ballots, I have opted to fill this column with a handy guide to this year's nominees, chock-full of winner predictions. (Plus, you can check out some of the shorts on your computer, links provided, free of charge. You're welcome!)Best picture&ldq ... "
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A "Tragi-Comedy" That is Mostly ...
by
slipofthetongue
in
SlipOfTheTongue Blog
is neutral about it.
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"I hate to be a damp sponge. THE SAVAGES is full of well observed moments. It is rather tonally restrained and is definitely full of terrific acting but...I just didn't have a very good time watching it. The premise essentially deals with a brother and sister who have drifted apart into their own banal adult existences. Laura Linney (the sister) and Philip Seymour Hoffman (the brother) have issues, none so exaggerated that we cannot identify with them. Take a couple of mid-life crises, add in Parkinsons and dementia, death, incontinence and marital infidelity you have something that is not quite my idea of a good time at the movies. Whoopee, get the popcorn!Maybe it's me. I expected enough "savage" humor would be mixed in to take the sting out of staring into a yawning abyss for two hours. God is this film bleak. The wit I hoped would be present is (save for 5 or 6 funny moments) absent from the film. In many cases it feels as if the director has substitu ... "
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Telluride 2007: The Savages
by
paul
in
paul on spout.com
hasn't rated it.
1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.
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"The rite of passage into taking responsibility of another life–having a baby–has been the topic of a lot of popular movies. We don’t see very many movies about another rite of passsage, taking responsibilty over death. Specifically, the death of a parent. Prenatal wards are fun, nursing homes are not. The death of a parent brings far more complexity and reflection. So, when I saw the logline for Tamara Jenkin’s new film, The Savages, I thought this is a movie that will either be great or awful. Wendy (Laura Linney) and Jon (Philip Seymour Hoffman)–both struggling playwrites–are unexpectedly given the responsibility to care for a father (who was not much of a father) as he suffers from dementia in his last few months of life. I don’t know if it’s an easy film to connect to if you’re not somebody who has admitted a parent to a nursing home. Or if you don’t have siblings choosing divergent paths in dealing with a tragi-family. But if you fall into one of those two categories, The Sava ... "
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New in Theaters: Diving Bell, S ...
by
SpoutBlog
in
SpoutBlog on spout.com
hasn't rated it.
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"We didn’t do a New in Theaters last week, and many Thanksgiving releases are expanding this weekend, so this is basically a recap of every film we’ve reviewed that’s been released in the past two weeks. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly: Paul was “blown away” by Julian Schnabel’s latest at Telluride; at NYFF, Karina called the film “an almost excessively beautiful aestheticization of misery [that’s] often a little too good at conveying Baudy???s isolation within his own head.” Check out today’s podcast, which includes an interview with Schnabel from Telluride, and an argument between Karina and Paul. The Savages: At Telluride, Paul called Tamara Jenkin’s long-awaited feature follow-up to Slums of Beverly Hills “a really rich movie, full of dark humor you have to develop when things aren???t funny.” Starting Out in the "
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