Closer

I've been hearing lots of negativity about this movie. I think a lot of people have been shocked, frankly, by the raw and rough nature of the film. Having read the play, I've been looking forward to it for about a year now, and it's honestly one of the best plays I've ever read. Mike Nichols presents it in an amazing way, very faithful to the words as they're written (and they should be, for the movie is also written by the man who wrote the play, the brilliant Patrick Marber).

It's a brutal topic, sex and love, especially when they're combined. I thought the movie was amazing. It captured all of the vulnerability, caustic harshness, and acerbic flirtation that the play vibrated with. All of the cast brought the movie alive. It uplifts and then brings you way down, but that's the point, and yet at the end, I didn't feel depressed or saddened, just really really awake and curious. It's the feeling you get when you get "closer", I suppose.

Natalie Portman, in a tour-de-force performance, is the standout by far. Maybe it's because she's the youngest, and not expected to be that awesome, but she is. Anyways, her Alice is flirty and sweet, caustic and manipulative, evasive and yet very open, sexual and gloomy all in one character. She has the best chemistry with the men - whether it be purely sensual with Clive Owen, or innocence and affection with Jude Law. She comes alive with the two guys, and their scenes are ones to look forward to.

Julia Roberts, whom everyone looks towards, is not bad in this film. She's very understated and good, but she is outshone in nearly every scene by whomever she's acting with.

Clive Owen is absolutely astounding, and he's definitely on everyone's radar screen. As the man of experience and "simplicity", as Jude Law's character comments, he's brash and hotheaded, but also extremely clever. Owen perfectly plays the sleazy, unlikeable character, but somehow manages to appeal to the audience and even though he's a disagreeable character, I think many managed to find something all right about him - Owen's human sense in Larry.

Jude Law is simply very very good; neither astounding nor bad. The only reason he does not stand out is the fact that we've all expected him to do a good performance. And he does, he has a great performance. He and Portman have amazing scenes together, and he's always on par.

Simply put, the movie is not for everyone (especially not for seeing with a parent or young child); it's a mature adult flick, and does not back down from anything. It's high drama - with all the uplifting romance and brutal arguments of relationships. It's a story about people.

Dan (Jude Law), an obituary writer, falls for stripper Alice (Natalie Portman) who is new in London. Later Dan writes a book about Alice, and meets photographer Anna (Julia Roberts). Alice knows she's losing Dan. Dan tricks dermatologist Larry (Clive Owen) on an internet chat, and Larry meets Anna. Larry marries Anna but the wander eye strikes again.

Director Mike Nichols is going minimalist with Patrick Marber's play. This is a movie with four incredible performances. Clive Owen is brutal. Natalie Portman is hurt. Jude Law is childish. Julia Roberts is wonderful. They are doing some of their best work here. Don't come for a rom-com. This is emotionally vicious, damaged, pathetic human relationships.

While I thought the characters were interesting, I found it very difficult to watch, as my own marriage disintegrated in a fashion too familiar to these characters. The lies, the half-truths, the inability to distinguish truth from lie after being told so many lies. I could completely relate to the characters in this movie.

Though I could laugh with it, it was nevertheless painful to watch. I couldn't recommend this movie to anyone except my ex-. Even then, I have trouble believing she's understand any part of it.

This particular film was more like a documentary shot without the shaky hand-held camera. But, like the still photographs the movie mocks as being false, Closer allows only glimpses of the truth behind the myriad lies.

I want to be entertained at a movie and I cannot think of a single person to whom I'd recommend this movie. It was very well acted, scripted, and executed on all parts. But it was more painful than pleasant or enlightening.

Mike Nichols directed, in my opinion, one of the three best adaptations from stage to screen. "Who's afraid of Virginia Woolf" (The other two being Sidney Lumet's "Long day's journey into night" and Elia Kazan's "A Streetcar named Desire) After the extraordinary television adaptation of "Angels in America" I also would have pleaded with Mike Nichols to do "Closer" Sorry I'm rambling. What I'm trying to say in a rather convoluted way is, simply, thank you Mr. Nichols. Adult themes, conceived and performed by adult artists. I hope it makes zillions of dollars so we can have more of it. Jude Law is a Peter O'Toole without the steroids, Julia Roberts a Jeanne Moreau with an American passport, Clive Owen is a child of John Garfield and Peter Finch and Natalie Portman a Jean Peters with a college degree. I saw the film twice in a row, I hadn't done that in years. Not since "Drugstore Cowboy", "Apartment Zero" and "Sex Lies and Videotape" The unfolding of the dark happens in front of our eyes and it feels chillingly familiar. Lies we tell each other with so much conviction with so much honesty. The only real thing is the pain and the loneliness. It doesn't sound like a very entertaining night out but believe me, it is. Go, see for yourself. You may have to confront something you didn't want to confront. That's part of the process call growing up. Who's afraid of that?

This movie is a big game of narcissistic people who treat each other as puppets. There is no love, no truth, no good. In the beginning we all try to find a hero in the story, someone to sympathize with only to realize what we have is a bunch of mentally ill people making themselves suffer. Dan (Jude Law) is just a big kid longing for attention and a new toy, which he only cares for about 5 mins. Anna (Julia Roberts) is also desperate for attention and love since her ex left her for a younger girl. She is confused and unreasonable, her ego makes all the decisions instead of her mind. Larry (Clive Owen) is an agressive jerk, playing along Dan's little game, while Alice is just a naive, traumatized, young girl who falls in love and decides to avoid all the red flags and becomes part of this sick 4 some. Brilliant movie. Honestly not the ending what I hoped for tho (I just wanted all 4 of them together in a room while Slim Pickens rides the atom bomb there).