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Visitors Review

puffynyc 2012-05-19 22:21:21

loved this movie, Travolta is back in great form

I don't usually write in, but I enjoyed the film so much I wanted to goon record. This movie is great, it looks great, the performances are great and itsdirection is great. It introduces you to a life you don't know but havealways felt could be yours, living on the edge just outside of thebubble. The characters become your friends, you get to know them andunderstand them. John, Scarlet and Gabriel did a fantastic job. I don'twant to give anything away but you really feel for them. You becomeangry, frustrated and sad just to name a few of the emotions covered.This is a true drama.Everything brings you into this world from the dialog, to the way itwas shot, to the music. Layer upon layer, folding you in only lettingyou go when the end credits role.WOW, nice flipp'in job Dude!

2012-05-19 08:41:21

A Love Song For Mediocre Movie Endings.

PLOT: Purslane Will's (Johansson) mother has recently died. Purslane returns to her mother's home as the new owner but discovers two men, Bobby Long and Lawson Pines, living there. Within a few encounters, the three begin to bond and as Bobby divulges more and more insight into the life of Purslane's mother, they discover that there were indeed some things that all of them did not know about one another. Reasons you should watch: * Travolta and another humorous overacting job * Scarlett Johansson looking stunningly gorgeous* a fun little storyline that may or may not keep you engaged Reasons not to watch: * characters you likely won't care about * a forced ending in which you wonder, "What the heck just happened and why do I feel like they want me to cry right now?" * Travolta and another humorous overacting job

Tonny2029 2012-05-13 19:40:57

this could have been better

I never read the book, so I saw this movie as a movie, not a bookadaptation. Anyway, I loved it, the story, the slow speed of it all,the careful unfolding of all the lives and secrets, the atmosphere inthe whole movie...Except for one thing: the main role. And that's a really big thing,because this movie so leans on the characters. The others were great, Ican't say anything else, down to the smallest role, but alas for JohnTravolta. He starts out alright, but soon it's all about his mannerismsinstead of Bobby Long. Maybe because this is a relatively new directorhe lets Travolta get away with it? It's a shame, because the rest ofthe movie is really, really great. And because Travolta CAN act... sowhat went wrong here???? Still a high mark for all the rest! Tonny

plumeracopia 2012-05-13 09:39:54

A waste of time

After reading the book Off Magazine Street, for which this movie wassupposedly based, this movie was a huge disappointment. The book wasentertaining and full of rich characters, which were mostly left out ofthe movie. The only consistency with the book was a character namedBobby Long. The plot was predictable and unfortunately, not even closethe the original story intended by the author. Perhaps if I had neverread the book, the movie would not have been so bad. As is, I recommendit to no one. There was so much potential for this story when it hitthe big screen with such a great all star cast. I am sorry that it didnot come to fruition.

mahmud abudaber 2012-05-13 15:58:08

A great artistic movie

Great movie, well written script and beautifully directed by a newdirector Shainee Gabel with top performances by John Travolta andScarlet Johansson. We need more artistic movies like this. Way to goand thanks Shainee Gabel. Unfortunately Hollywood was hijacked by amoney hungry lazy dumb heads who'd rather not hire good writers insteadthey pocket the fees and put out stupid sequels, and crappy specialeffects movies with disgusting flesh, blood and gore. Hollywood isfollowing the footsteps of television production and it's stupid whatthey call it realty TV, which nothing more than prostitution andpimping on what it suppose to be a family television.

2012-05-13 02:54:03

A love song of life

This review is from: A Love Song for Bobby Long (DVD) This was one of the most spellbinding movies I've seen in a very long time. You are watching art come alive and you cannot look away. The words that are spoken, and the words that are not, the characters, the setting. It is a masterpiece of perfection in human tragedy and triumph and it is one of the small beautiful cinema jewels that I will keep in my memory always. Thank you for this story.

bg_mind 2012-05-10 10:49:08

Well made film for people who can understand it

Great movie!!!It touched my soul and if you have the heart to seebeyond the beautiful actress you will see- a movie that shows you apicture of a family crushed by the life and its hardness and how thelove and friendship can save you and your soul.The movie gives theopportunity to see John Travolta in a new drama character and to showus how great one alcoholic can be.I was sick by the perfect characterswith gorgeous bodies and perfect smiles.This movie touches you not witheffects and perfect heroes but with touching story and a lot of cleverjokes.It has it all pain joy happiness love and friendship.I love thismovie- see it.Perfect choice of characters and great script.Well madefilm for people who can understand it.

2012-05-09 21:54:03

different at best?

it seems most reviews want to describe this film in detail, for those who want a quick summary, i watched this when i saw "john travolta" as the star, along with Johansson, and as a big fan of Johnny,this is a movie and a role he should be pleased with, a touching drama, well acted by all, but a must see for any Travolta fan

eht5y 2012-05-01 07:52:49

An endless string of clichés.

'A Love Song for Bobby Long' has its moments, but is unfortunatelymired by the all-too-typical tendency on the part of New York/Hollywoodfilmmakers to draw the South as a place where everyone 'tawks lah-ckthe-yus' and spends their days in a sweat-slick haze of booze andcigarette smoke.Filmmaker Shainee Gabel is clearly in love with New Orleans, but that'sa big, big part of the problem: she films the place like a tourist,projecting the typical Yankee's 'local color' view of the CrescentCity, complete with a guided tour of New Orleans clichés and touristattractions. We get rainy days in the French Quarter, a couple snackingon beignets on the shores of Lake Pontchartrain, a group of drunkengood old boys strolling along the levee, boiled crawfish and dixielandjazz, a ride on the St. Charles streetcar line, and countless name-dropreferences to everything from Mardis Gras to gumbo with andouillesausage, all of which is meant to rather bluntly remind us that we'rein Storyville, as if we couldn't already tell. The classic failure ofNortherners trying to make films about the South is their patentcompulsion to treat the region--especially its more excessivelyromanticized cities, like New Orleans, Charleston, and Savannah--as anexotic wonderland of tragic decay. Tennessee Williams already wrotethat play, five or six times, fifty or sixty years ago, so films like'A Love Song for Bobby Long' just seem lazy in their flat, unoriginal,post-card view of how people live in the South.Bobby Long (John Travolta) is a disgraced English professor who hasmigrated from Alabama to New Orleans to drink himself to death. Helives in an old, dilapidated slum house with his protégé and formerstudent, Lawson Pines (Gabriel Macht), an allegedly talented writer whoseems to have been more or less commissioned to write a grand Southernepic based on his mentor's allegedly grand and tragic life story. Whenthe woman whose house they've been flopping in dies (presumably fromthe physical toll of her alcoholism), Bobby locates her long-lostdaughter, Pursy (Scarlett Johannson), who decides to escape her life ofwhite trash squalor in Panama City, Florida by moving into her mother'shouse in New Orleans with Bobby and Lawson, who falsely inform her thatPursy's mother has left the house to all three of them. At first Bobbyseems determined to run Pursy off with his vulgar insults and drunkenbehavior, but she has nowhere to go, and eventually the three form abond, with the two men attempting to get Pursy back into school andeventually to college and Pursy attempting (with little apparentsuccess) to get the men off the sauce. This format might work if itweren't for the fact that the dialog runs like an 'intro to SouthernLit.' course at a big state U, with plenty of thickly accented loftyquotations by Bobby, tired, purple descriptions of New Orleans voicedby Lawson (whose name itself is yet another cliché), and shots of Pursysitting around reading Carson McCullers (whose 'The Heart is a LonelyHunter' seems to bear the brunt of the blame for the formulaic story)or Flannery O'Connor.Travolta is typically charismatic as Bobby Long, but for his painfullybad Alabama accent and the fact that his character is as cliché as theycome. Gabriel Macht acquaints himself better as Lawson, the aspiringwriter following his mentor into oblivion, though he looks a bithealthy for a guy who lives on screwdrivers and beer. The finestperformance comes from the young Scarlett Johannsen, who is subtle andbelievable (the accent is actually passable, though for Georgia orNorth Florida rather than New Orleans) as Pursy, managing anappropriate balance of tough-girl sass and vulnerability. The plot isthin and a bit predictable, and hinges on a rather unsurprisingrevelation about Pursy's parentage, but Johannson, Macht, and, to alesser extent, Travolta, are engaging and entertaining enough that Ididn't consider the film a waste of time.Still, I couldn't help but roll my eyes at the endless string ofheavy-handed, cartoonish clichés about life in New Orleans, and theplot and characters are treacly and unoriginal. A DVD extra in whichdirector Gabel pontificates about New Orleans with such insights as 'inNew Orleans, there's a church on every block and a bar on everycorner,' etc., only exacerbate the fact that she only knows the placeas a tourist and is only feeding the audience the most superficialimpression of life in New Orleans. Here's a flash for you: we've gotour quirks, but most folks in the South live pretty much the same wayfolks live everywhere else. They don't sit around by the leveeslistening to delta blues and waxing poetic about the weather, theydon't drink any more than New Yorkers or Angelenos, and even when theydo act the part, they don't celebrate their own eccentricity. They justgo about their lives like anyone else does, with or without beignets,streetcars, boiled crawfish, and gumbo. If you're from the South, youknow what I mean; if you're not, trust me: the only people in NewOrleans who behave the way these characters do ain't from there, and ifthey 'tawk lah-k the-yus,' they're equally full of you-know-what.

Robyn Lovell 2012-05-01 03:13:58

Best of 2004

I think it is original, funny, endearing, and has a great soundtrack. Scarlette Johansson's talent is comparable to Meryl Streep's. The relationship between Dawson and Persalily was true to life. The culture of New Orleans is not often portrayed so positve in movies, which is unfortunate. I was pleasantly suprised when I felt compelled to visit New Orleans. I can't think of anything dissatisfying about this film. I could have watched it twice that night, I can't wait to watch it again.

2012-04-25 21:16:07

Truely a wonderful movie

This review is from: A Love Song for Bobby Long (DVD) I am a tried and true John Travolta fan but I had never heard of this movie. I watched it on t.v. one night and I was hooked. I bought it immediately and I watch it religiously....at least once a month. I think that it is his best performance to date. And the rest of the cast as well. The characters that they played were brought to life. You feel like a part of it..a bystander, an unseen character on he side lines.

stensson 2012-04-25 13:14:16

Worthy of the love song

This is a movie about two alcoholics. One middle-aged and the other onhis way to that age. It's difficult to say which company they prefer,the bottle or each other.Than the young girl arrives and shakes their world. You've seen thattheme many times in movie history, but this is for once done in a veryintelligent way. Gabriel Macht is very good and Scarlett Johansson, thegreatest talent of her young generation, too. But Travolta is probablydoing the part of his life so far. Travolta is now a character actor,if anyone is.American movies don't always tell about these kind of losers in such asympathetic way. But this one does. The end is sentimental, but nevermind. The ride towards that is really worth seeing.

2012-04-24 07:31:52

Great New Orleans Film

This is a must-see movie if you are from New Orleans, or if you like New Orleans. It has been much underappreciated, but it is a wonderful story with interesting characters and lessons. The scenes of New Orleans stray from the typical Hollywood shots of Bourbon Street, and include many scences shot in Old Gretna on the West Bank of the Mississippi, a few French Quarter scenes, nice shots of the river and the Crescent City Connection (during the time when it was being stripped of its lead-based paint and repainted), views of New Orleans from the levee in Old Gretna, the most beautiful tree in New Orleans (the ancient sprawling oak tree in Audubon Park- the one hidden to the left of the zoo), and more. The music is great and really carries the movie from one point to the next.

george.schmidt 2012-04-23 19:30:27

The Heart Is Truly a Lonely Hunter

A LOVE SONG FOR BOBBY LONG (2004) **1/2 John Travolta, ScarlettJohanssen, Gabriel Macht, Deborah Kara Unger.What is it about movies down south, specifically The Big Easy, NewOrleans, that evokes a certain Southern Gothic laziness that isrefreshing for the most part in its colorful atmosphere and usuallyborderline characters near caricatures? I suppose it is the quaintnessof what Yankees think in general about the redneck culture and itssubcultures or hybrids if you will. The latest cinematic gumbo is a picaresque shades of the '70sstorytelling with newcomer filmmaker Shainee Gabel's adaptation ofRonald Everett Capps' slightly eccentric tale about a somewhatindependent young woman named Pursy Will (Johanssen continuing to be aninteresting screen presence in her eclectic roles to date) whoreluctantly returns home for the funeral of her estranged localheroine/folksinger Lorraine Will (who is never depicted on screen onlyin fond recollections) where she discovers her late mother's house isinhabited by Bobby Long (Travolta in his Southern accent mode) acantankerous aging drunk and former professor of literature who hasholed up as a latter-day squatter of sorts with his young protégé andwanna be author Lawson Pines (Macht in an underplayed turn). Theyinform her that Lorraine would want them to continue to share the homewith her daughter should she arrive and begrudgingly the trio form anunlikely family of ne'er do wells and dreamers. Pursy learns from the local inhabitants that her mama was practicallyroyalty in their local hamlet while also discovering some secrets abouther own past. Pursy has the intelligence for better things but not thewill to return to school despite Lawson and Bobby's urgings until sheeventually caves in despite a few pepperings of disagreements andarguments particularly from an ever peeved Bobby who also nurses a fewskeletons in his closet.If the viewer can't grasp the final act's set up with its so blatantset-up than I don't know what else to tell you but in spite of some ofthe predictable traces to the eventual climax the acting is a mixedbag. Normally I dig Travolta having a good time chewing scenery but I'malways perplexed whenever he does a Southern character; it's just neverbelievable to me. Macht has some quietly affecting moments as he fallsin love with Johanssen's feisty Pursy and she too has a nice moment ortoo herself. The direction does seem to meander a bit and sometimes the nextsequence doesn't transition so smoothly as it may have in the book. Thegeneral appeal is the interplay between the three leads who do seem tocoagulate nicely as a distaff family of misfits. Overall the folksy-ness does rub off but in a good way; with bonhomieto spare.

2012-04-22 00:38:00

Gabriel Macht shines with his performance in this!!!!

This is one of the best movies I've seen in such a long time! What amazingly convincing performances from all three principal actors! This movie is so much better than the book!!! And I am so glad that so many changes were made for the movie! I am soooooooooooo glad that the character of Byron was changed for the movie to Lawson (portrayed by Gabriel Macht). The movie's Lawson (aka Byron) is a much younger, much more grounded non-perv, but he still drank too much. Gabriel Macht's take on the character is so much better than the character in the book. He made the movie for me! The same for Scarlett J's character Hanna (Pursy in the movie). Scarlett made her character so much more likable. Glad I bought this on DVD! I LOVED Lawson's reaction to seeing Pursy getting ready for her date and he kindly told her that the dress zipper needs to stay up. AND I LOVE the sweet tender scene in front of the fireplace with Lawson and Pursy! It was deep, emotional and yet tender as they drifted off to sleep. I can't wait to see Scarlett Johansson and Gabriel Macht together again in their next movie The Spirit! They have wonderful chemistry together!!!I highly recommend buying both this movie and the soundtrack. Heck, I've been buying both of them for everyone I know when it's their birthday. I include the movie Because I Said So and American Outlaws and I write in the card, "Have A Very Happy Gabriel Macht Birthday". :-)

Henry Fields 2012-04-21 18:25:34

Nice movie.

"A love song..." is nothing but a kind and tender story about a girlwho goes to the village where she lived when she was a child to assistto her mother's funeral. A movie about identity crisis and about beinglost in this world. Sometimes it's kind of sentimental, and it's way too long, but thepresence of Scarlett Johansson makes everything a little bit easier. Asfor Travolta, this may be his best performance since "Pulp Fiction".The city of New Orleans, the Mississippi, and a nice soundtrack roundthe movie off. *My rate: 6.5/10

MovieAddict2011 2012-04-16 23:07:16

Wait, wait, wait. John Travolta giving a good performance?

I saw this film on a trans-Atlantic flight from the UK to the States.Being a long trip, I didn't want something entirely boring, so Istarted watching this, hoping it would at least be entertaining.Well, I hadn't heard much about it, but I was pleasantly surprised bythe performances, even if the film itself isn't so great.Scarlett Johanssen plays Purslane, a young woman who returns to NewOrleans after hearing of her mother's death, expecting to reclaim herold home. Unfortunately two of her estranged mother's friends now livein the house - Bobby Long (John Travolta), a drunken former professor,and a younger guy named Lawson Pines. They are hard at work on a novelabout Bobby's tumultuous life, and have no intention of leaving, whichcreates a strong tension.Although the movie is not particularly special and its "low budget"appeal certainly gives it that air of pretentiousness many indie filmshave today, the performances are great. I was wowed by Travolta becauseI haven't seen him give a good performance in a long, long time.It is a bit long-winded and slow-moving at times, but if you canappreciate the talents in this, I'm sure you'll enjoy at least someaspect of it.

2012-04-16 08:57:39

Great film!!!

I actually didnt know what to expect..i just had a feeling it would be good. Scarlett johanson was great in the movie..and the combination of her and travolta and all the rest of the actors..it was wonderful! The story really got me hooked..not boring at all!!! Travolta was hilarious at times and other times he was serious, he played his character so well you actually felt like you were part of the movie! Everything was well acted throughout the whole thing!!! I think that everyone should go and rent this film, it will be worth your while!!!

eric262003 2012-04-15 06:58:06

Where the Bayou Comes to Life Here

"A Love Song for Bobby Long" is the essential film one can trulyappreciate. The story is compelling, the script is an editorialdelight, the ensemble containing a talent pool of outstandingperformers and characters that are three dimensional interesting toenjoy. Purslane Will (Scarlett Johansson) travels to New Orleans toattend her mother's funeral, oblivious to the fact that she inherited ahouse from her will. But she must also share the abode with two otherpeople; a greying literature professor Dr. Bobby Long (John Travolta)and his young assistant Lawson Pines (Gabriel Macht). Both areattempting to usurp each other with quotes and booze. As Pursy cleansup their acts and the house, a bit of a bond ensues between them eventhrough their quarrelling. As the three live in peace and harmony (yeah right!), more secrets arediscovered in Pursy's late mother's will that only Bobby and Lawsonknow of and another secret that all three don't know about. It was an all-around emotional roller-coaster ride. It contains humor,intelligent dialogue, sentimental moments and scenes that will lift upyour hearts if only a tad bit obscene in some areas. Sure it was afrugal budget, but I've seen high budget movies turn into god-awfulclunkers before. I admired the transformation of the house going from acondemned house whose makeover could've been solved by a wrecking ballto an artistically crafted piece of architecture. Where they got thedough is a mystery since the triad are jobless. The bayou setting inNew Orleans never looked so sophisticating and the neighborhood theylived in was a landscape's paradise. John Travolta was terrific from the the likable tough guys he's playedlike Tony Moreno and Vincent Vega to a more subtle Southerner likeBobby Long, though he was still a bit tense at times. The other leadingcharacters were amazing here too. Scarlett Johansson was really intothe character she played and it was hard not to sympathize with her andstill looked good, even in shabby apparel. Gabriel Macht shows what hecan do with a clever script and at times can out-perform the other twoleading performers. And the chemistry between Macht and Johanssondidn't feel forced or scripted, but real and natural. This is a moviefor the intellects and one to watch if you are a true movie fan.

2012-04-14 17:58:00

Excellent Film!!!

I won't go through a scene by scene description of the film since others have already done that. I will say that this is an excellent film with real characters and complex personalities. There is no sex, nobody is blown up, not an once of blood and still it's vastly entertaining! Who would have thought it? Bobby and Percy and Lawson are all very real and earthy people with real and earthy problems that aren't washed away in an instant by miracles. I've read that this movie went on too long.......In my opinion it wasnt long enough. Great Work!!