Genres

Visitors Review

gradyharp 2012-05-25 10:40:26

Another Crisp and Controversial Film from the Gifterd Sally Potter

Sally Potter takes chances. There are so many unique aspects of thisfilm that reviewing it is difficult. The major aspects of the filminclude the very au courant 'rage' of blogging as a means ofcommunication, the 'rage' to stay young and in fashion (that almostdaily changing series of fads of what is in and what is out), the'rage' of focusing everyone's attention on celebrity antics includingdrugs and death, the 'rage' to buy everything (if you don't own it andit looks like it is going to be popular then buy it), the 'rage' ofclimbing into the media world, be it film, fashion, televisionsearching for that promised 15 minutes of fame, the 'rage' of PR,minding the selling promotion of a product without concern of itsvalue, the 'rage' of creating new fragrances with a special name forfame, and the 'rage' for maintaining a wealthy or famous class and apoor or service class. Potter manages to take us through all of thesephases with brilliant writing, fascinating character studies,experimental lighting and photography, and one of the best uses ofcolor fields ever on film. The premise is simple yet strong. A blogger named Michelangelo followsthe backstage proceedings of a New York Fashion Show: we never see him,we see only his daily blog entry and the images of the intervieweesthrough his cellphone camera - the individuals all are part of thehyped fashion show cum ramp walk of fashionista Merlin (Simon Abkarian)who designed the clothes, Miss Roth (Dianne Wiest) who owns thecompany, Mona Carvell (Judi Dench) the fashion critic who writes forthe media coverage, Otto (Jakob Cedergren) who works managing PR, Mr.White (Bob Balaban) who directs the show until he is replaced by theovereducated image builder Dwight Angel (Patrick J. Adams), Frank(Steve Buscemi) a hard nosed photographer who has spent better time onthe war fronts in the Middle East taking 'meaningful pictures',financier Tiny Diamonds (Eddie Izzard) who buys everything he wantsincluding his bodyguard Jed (John Leguizamo), models Minx (Jude Law indrag) and Lettuce Leaf (Lily Cole), pizza delivery boy transformed into model Vijay (Riz Ahmed), and Anita de Los Angeles (Adriana Barraza)the seamstress who simply wants to remain invisible. Two deaths occur -one car accident and one shooting - and that brings in Detective Homer(David Oyelowo) who investigates while displaying his own brand ofShakespeare to the blogger's cellphone camera. All of this complex story happens in the form of interviews - each staris dressed in well designed clothes and each poses in front of variouscolored screens. The ending of the interview brings the wholeexperience together. Potter's immaculate and imaginative script giveseach one of these gifted actors room to shine in a one person act. Itjust simply works and never for a moment does it become dull. SallyPotter gave us 'Orlando', 'Yes', 'The Man Who Cried', and 'The TangoLesson'. She is one of the most imaginative and skilled writer/directorunits in the business. Grady Harp

2012-05-24 19:00:54

A New Cinematic Experience: One That Royally Sucks

Don't waste your time or money. Seriously, don't. I just watched this movie online and I want the last 98 minutes of my life back. They way this movie was advertised to me, it seemed like a murder mystery that is solved by the interweaving interviews of everyone there. It's not. Don't think it is. This movie is about a dozen or so people involved in the fashion industry, whining about their problems to a boy with a camera. This boy then puts these interviews on the website. Then, an accident happens with a model at the show. They try to put on the show again. Then a model is apparently murdered. Then, the next time they attempt to put on the show, some sort of a riot happens, which is filled with children thanks to some marketing attempt by one of the characters and the popular website by the camera operator. People get hurt. This is the extent of the information given by the people on camera. There isn't really a plot, aside from these three events we don't even see, but we somewhat hear. Only snippets of information are given. It's a waste. We never find out who killed who. We never find out who died in the final 10 minutes. We don't know. It was so unsatisfying. There was no resolution. There was no conflict. This movie was basically people talking and just barely alluding to the events that happen off screen. The dialogue doesn't give any description of it, at all. It was abysmal.The one thing that may make this movie worth watching, if you have absolutely nothing left to do with your life, at all, is the acting. The actors in this movie made the characters seem to have depth, even with the lackluster dialogue and barely-there plot. Jude Law's portrayal of Minx was incredibly amusing, and Steve Buscemi was great as always. And Dame Judi Dench stole the show. But I couldn't even enjoy any of this because, well, I grew tired of just watching people talk. The backgrounds were great and contrasted with the looks of the characters, but if I'm just sitting there, watching people talk, it has to be interesting. This wasn't. All in all, don't watch it. There's an accident, a murder, a riot, and Jude Law in drag. It's tiring after the first 10 minutes. This movie was supposed to be a 'new kind of experience'...It was a new experience; a mediocre one at most.

marinostattaris 2012-05-20 05:09:46

a film experiment gone wrong

The blue screens combine well with the characters lipstick colours ,the performances at some points are really good but halfway throughthis movie i just couldn't wait for it to finish. I actually watched iton fast forward. For one thing you cant have a movie on people justtalking in front of the camera. Its just hard to believe that this weredone by a teenager. And those questions that coming straight from afashion experts mouth were really hard to buy. Coming from the sameperson that made "Orlando" i was deeply disappointed since i wasexpecting much more. The aesthetic result is quite good but nothingmore than that. This is one of my favourite worst movies ever. This isa film experiment but it just doenst work. Leave it for film schools oreven museums but i wouldn't recommend this as entertainment

hans_germany 2012-05-19 15:08:03

Too much, too inconsistent, too little effort

I don't post here often, in fact this is my very first comment, andwish it was a better film I felt I could say something about...Please,if you feel differently, explain it too me. This has been my firstexposure to Sally Potters work.In Rage, we see a host of characters involved in a fashion show, beinginterviewed by and speaking with a student working on a school project.Throughout his seven days with the fashion designer, the models, theinvestor, the marketing consultants, the company owner, the pizzadelivery guy, and others, several deaths occur, an investigation islaunched, and public opinion is formed and voiced. Stylistically, wesee see talking heads, declaring their thoughts and describing theirown and others' actions.In my view, the film tries to be a bunch of things, but fails at mostof them, miserably. First and foremost, it lacks a plot. Stuff happens,but there is no discernible character development (with a couple ofexceptions, rounding up), no new or challenging views on topics weshould care about, no discussion on why bad stuff happens to goodpeople, or why people end up as bad people. This is notable, as filmsas Babel even Crash, and TV fare as The West Wing have taught us thatissues have more than one side. Rage fails at that for the most part,focusing on illustrating that the fashion industry is bad, the mediaindustry is bad, marketing folks anyways, and that those poor kids inChina and on the runway that suffer. The film seems to work through alaundry list of things you ought to get upset about, had you not heardof them before and discussed them with your friends 10 years ago.Secondly, I straight out blame lack of directing skills for a set ofinconsistent, seemingly badly enacted characters. Frank (Buscemi), MonaCarvell (Dench) and Miss Roth (Wiest) come across as at least assemi-credible, non-farcical, at times even multi-layered, or torn.Contrast this with Homer (Oyelowo), Merlin (Abkarian) and (don't shootme) Minx (Law) - shallow monologues, farcical as far as I could tell,or plain out unbelievable and embarrassing. Either way, I dare say,could be fine. But please, don't mix! Help me understand if the filmtries to be funny, or if we see an actor's most horrid performance todate. Ideally, help me understand this without the help of a pamphletas required reading.Thirdly, try to maintain a shred of plausibility in the set-up. A kidwith a cell phone camera being asked by Otto to please, not leakinformation, again? Diamonds trying to strike a behind-the-scenes deal,talking to said camera? Anita, doing the same, asking for anonymity?Cut that kid off, throw him out, sulk, but do not do what we see onscreen! It renders the story implausible, as this asks the viewer tofollow along with the cheap-looking declarative approach, no matterwhat. This in turn allows the makers of the film to skirt the hard workof story-telling - creating a believable universe of topics, charactersand contexts.We saw the film as part of the Berlinale competition program. It didreceive applause, especially Jude Law and Dianne West, but it alsoreceived applause when the words "last day" appeared on screen, andseveral people, possibly those more critical of what they saw, leftmid-film. We wondered if Tilda Swinton is too good a friend of Potterto not invite her to this festival.3 stars, for Wiest, Dench, Buscemi, and 1 laugh/half hour.

Coventry 2012-05-17 07:20:29

The fashion industry is tough ... Big deal!

Maybe it's me … Maybe I'm too unlettered to comprehend the eloquentcontent or too dumb to appreciate the profound and innovative conceptof Sally Potter's "Rage". I am, however, honest enough to openly andunashamedly proclaim that this was, in my humble opinion, one of thedullest and most purposeless movies I've ever seen in my entire life.That is particularly hard to fathom considering the names of some ofthe cast members involved, like Steve Buscemi, Jude Law, Judy Dench andDianne Wiest. What were they thinking? Were they also missing the pointat first but then decided to accept the offered roles after all becausethis type of experimental film is good for your career? "Rage" isone-hundred boring minutes of uninteresting people talking directlyinto the camera and the only damn thing that changes occasionally isthe color of the background! The thing they have in common is that theyare all working for a fashion house in one way or another, and theyvent about all their job-related frustrations against a student/amateurblogger. One tiny little problem, though … nobody is freakinginterested in the rants of eccentric, vainglorious, naive andself-indulgent fashion snobs. The raised topics aren't the least bitcontroversial and none of the monologues are even remotely provocative.The only thing that Sally Potter accomplishes here is stating theobvious. The fashion industry is a tough and competitive, the world'seconomy is in recession and all people are selfish bastards and tooeasily blinded by the idea of fame & glory. Big deal! So What! Whocares? Many interviews and monologues are implausible and preposterous.For example, it's very ignorant to assume that everyone working for asupposedly acclaimed fashion company (and only a few days prior to thelaunch of a new clothing line) is prepared to free some time and talkto a student with a webcam. As a student I had to coordinate an HRinitiative for a big company, but I definitely never had theopportunity to have a chat with the general manager, journalists orsecurity personnel. Oh, and Jude Law is the ugliest transvestite I'veever seen. Big fat fail.

2012-05-17 00:58:31

Interesting and unique

This review is from: Rage (DVD) The movie was pretty interesting since it is done completely in interview style. The end was a bit odd and didn't feel it fit into the movie but otherwise it was good.

2012-05-13 23:29:34

subversive and sly

I read the reviews first before seeing the film. I understand the frustration viewers have with this film. It is an infuriating film that only reveals a very small bit, piece by piece, and only at the pace that the filmmaker sets. Its spare style offers little context, unlike traditional film form which is typically rich with imagery. Spare sets; talking heads. If you can get past the first half, you are drawn in. It's getting used to the film's format that is the challenge. The cast is extraordinary; the range of performances truly astounding. Watching Jude Law in drag is worth it alone! A blogger uses his phone camera to interview a range of characters involved in the production of a fashion show. Each interviewee has their own point of view. Collectively, they represent the cast of characters both behind and in front of the camera. Each character is only a part of a whole; each interview is a piece of a puzzle. At first, it is your typical low-production-value documentary. But as events unfold, the interviews take on more layers of meaning, more complexity. Slowly, with each ensuing interview, a picture emerges of what actually took place off camera. By the end of the film, we come to understand the pivotal role of the interviewer/ blogger -- how media, however amateurish and non-mainstream, influences art and outcomes. This is a sly film. It obliges us to reflect deeply on the nature of popular culture, popular media, and the emerging role of non-mainstream media, e.g., teenage bloggers.

2012-05-13 05:30:38

Visionary

Rage is a brilliant performance movie that pushes all the boundaries inform and distribution (first film ever released on a cell phone), butunfortunately, not for everyone's eyes. If you are amainstream-blockbuster kind of viewer don't even bother to watch it,'cause you'll almost certainly be bored to death. It's a back to the basics in a series of monologues, where you have,actually, to use your imagination to figure out the whole action,throughout noises, emotions and other clues. Which is kind of attentiongrabbing (at least for me), because it ends up being your own personal"movie"/ interpretation of the story. What I found so fascinating about this movie was the whole irony behindit. Do not expect a normal plot, cause it was made out of randomness,clichés, effective close ups and absurdity. Which also feels verygenuine, intriguing and captivating. And I don't know if you noticed, but the colors of the backgroundchanges accordingly with the personality and mood of the characters.And you can also tell by the colors that some of them actually changeemotionally during the "week". It's not a typical fashion business movie. It talks about the power ofnew media relationships (bloggers/audience/networks), the ugliness offame obsession, naivety and capitalism - there is nothing new about thesubjects, to be honest - in a series of intimate interviews at thebackstage of a fashion show, shot by a schoolboy on his cell phonecamera for a "school" project. However, what started as a schoolproject ends up as a murder investigation (not going to spoil). Sally Potter is also a visionary and very clever in understanding thepower of giving power away in this New Millennium paradigm.

2012-05-11 17:42:27

Another Crisp and Controversial Film form the Gifted Sally Potter

Sally Potter takes chances. There are so many unique aspects of this film that reviewing it is difficult. The major aspects of the film include the very au courant 'rage' of blogging as a means of communication, the 'rage' to stay young and in fashion (that almost daily changing series of fads of what is in and what is out), the 'rage' of focusing everyone's attention on celebrity antics including drugs and death, the 'rage' to buy everything (if you don't own it and it looks like it is going to be popular then buy it), the 'rage' of climbing into the media world, be it film, fashion, television searching for that promised 15 minutes of fame, the 'rage' of PR, minding the selling promotion of a product without concern of its value, the 'rage' of creating new fragrances with a special name for fame, and the 'rage' for maintaining a wealthy or famous class and a poor or service class. Potter manages to take us through all of these phases with brilliant writing, fascinating character studies, experimental lighting and photography, and one of the best uses of color fields ever on film.The premise is simple yet strong. A blogger named Michelangelo follows the backstage proceedings of a New York Fashion Show: we never see him, we see only his daily blog entry and the images of the interviewees through his cellphone camera - the individuals all are part of the hyped fashion show cum ramp walk of fashionista Merlin (Simon Abkarian) who designed the clothes, Miss Roth (Dianne Wiest) who owns the company, Mona Carvell (Judi Dench) the fashion critic who writes for the media coverage, Otto (Jakob Cedergren) who works managing PR, Mr. White (Bob Balaban) who directs the show until he is replaced by the overeducated image builder Dwight Angel (Patrick J. Adams), Frank (Steve Buscemi) a hard nosed photographer who has spent better time on the war fronts in the Middle East taking 'meaningful pictures', financier Tiny Diamonds (Eddie Izzard) who buys everything he wants including his bodyguard Jed (John Leguizamo), models Minx (Jude Law in drag) and Lettuce Leaf (Lily Cole), pizza delivery boy transformed in to model Vijay (Riz Ahmed), and Anita de Los Angeles (Adriana Barraza) the seamstress who simply wants to remain invisible. Two deaths occur - one car accident and one shooting - and that brings in Detective Homer (David Oyelowo) who investigates while displaying his own brand of Shakespeare to the blogger's cellphone camera. All of this complex story happens in the form of interviews - each star is dressed in well designed clothes and each poses in front of various colored screens. The ending of the interview brings the whole experience together. Potter's immaculate and imaginative script gives each one of these gifted actors room to shine in a one person act. It just simply works and never for a moment does it become dull. Sally Potter gave us 'Orlando', 'Yes', 'The Man Who Cried', and 'The Tango Lesson'. She is one of the most imaginative and skilled writer/director units in the business. Grady Harp, July 11

jeremyemmet 2012-05-10 23:31:04

Ambitious artistically, but flat in delivery.

There's a tricky decision the you have to make when you choose to do afilm examining the controversial elements of an industry.You have to choose whether to fix the film in a place and time, anddiscuss real historical events, or to allow the film to examine broadertopics through fictional constructs, thus freeing the movie to betimeless.Both choices can be fraught with peril, and Sally Potter braves thosewaters with Rage, choosing to create a fictional context for examiningthe class disparity, sweatshops, and unrealistic beauty standards thatare at the heart of most of the Fashion Industry's major controversies.Potter uses a bare-bones film technique, fixing a camera at a greenscreen, and shooting a series of documentary-style still-camerainterviews with actors playing fashion industry archetypes.There is a fundamental premise, and a story arc complete withacceptably dramatic events of a shocking nature, but these are neithercompelling, nor believable in any context. The story here is secondary,and is a means to an end.This film is, essentially, an acting exercise. It is an opportunity forSally Potter and her actors to explore a character's arc in the broadercontext of a (largely silly and contrived) fashion industry disaster.The film never answers any of the poignant questions it asks, and itnever really allows any one character to follow a satisfying arc (withthe possible exception of Jude Law's character, the high point).For the most part, theatre and film geeks will enjoy the effort, if notthe execution, but mainstream film-goers will be bored to tears insideof five minutes.

2012-05-10 12:36:04

An utter disaster - 99 minutes of inane tosh about nothing at all.

This was billed as something groundbreaking and exciting. Live Premiere, London's BFI/Southbank linking up with screens in cinemas all over the place, big name cast, new type of genre. As we sat, we waited, we watched and we waited some more. This is 99 minutes of absolutely mind numbingly boring schlock. Interviews set to a blue/red/green screen. Not a single line has any meaning, is well acted or engaging. Big names such as Judi Dench, Jude Law, Dianne Wiest and Eddie Izzard appear almost as if they have been held hostage and forced to read garbage from an autocue to secure their release. Apparently writer/director Sally Potter's film is about how 'fashion wrecks lives' and she aims to expose the shallow world of fashion in a lighthearted way (it's billed as a comedy). In reality, we are treated to one pathetic interview after another, no outside shots, no story, plot, nothing. The reviews are consistently bad, and as one reviewer wrote on the IMDB "one of the dullest and most purposeless movies I've ever seen in my entire life". The audience in my cinema agreed, they began to walk out in such numbers, that at one point I began to wonder if this was some kind of hoax and we were being filmed as part of an experiment about the staying power of a cinema-goers. Rage shows how ugly and downright wrong it is to allow the production, fiance and distribution of 'anything goes' cinema.

Terrell Howell 2012-05-09 21:41:19

Very flawed but much better than people give it credit for

So it's no secret that experimental filmmaking is a necessity of cinemaand some experimental films succeed and others don't. Rage is one ofthose that doesn't quite succeed in its experimentation on narrativestyle. Rage is about a New York blogger named Michelangelo, a characterwe never see or hear. Michelangelo is documenting a New York fashionshow by interviewing various people behind the stage in front ofvarious neon colored backgrounds. The entire film is just individualcharacter interviews intertwined to create a story. There is nocharacter interaction and no sets whatsoever. The entire film is donewith actors, sound effects, and a blue screen. And believe it or not,the film does actually end up telling a cohesive story, just in themost inconvenient way possible.Simply put, you can't tell a story like this. You just can't make thiskind of narrative work without some extra flair or nuance to spice itup. You simply can't tell a unique enough story with just actors infront of a blue screen. The film, for the most part, kept my attentionthe whole way through, but it is not something that I would watchrepeatedly. It is good for one viewing, and the most you can take outof that one viewing is that this is a narrative style that just doesn'twork. This film could make an interesting contemporary stage play witha few tweaks, but as a film it is missing key elements that make cinemawhat it is. I commend Sally Potter, the director, for coming up withnew and inventive ways to tell a story through the film medium and Iwould never discourage her from continuing to expand herexperimentation, but I do hope she realized that this attempt was afailed one.Moving on from the narrative style, I really can't complain about thestory itself or the characters within it. That is really the tragedy ofthis film is how much potential its story and characters could havehad, if told in a more effective manner. The story takes unexpectedtwists throughout, and grows surprisingly dark and captivating. Eachcharacter is very well designed, but you have to take intoconsideration the fact that we only see a small part of eachcharacter's potential. Like I said before, there is zero characterinteraction in this film unless you count the things said directly toour invisible narrator. It is difficult to fully judge a character'sdepth when you never see him or her interact with the other charactersof the film. But for what we are given by these characters, it is allvery interesting. Each character has their own philosophy and outlookon life and the fashion industry, and these personal values each one ofthem expresses drives the story home. A lot could have been done withwhat was laid out across the screen, but the over experimentalnarrative style held it back significantly.And to add insult to injury, the characters were played by excellentactors who I would have loved to see go further with their roles if thenarrative had allowed for it. There are some very big names in thisfilm and a variety of A-list faces. There is everyone from SteveBuscemi as the disgruntled photographer, to the kind old Dianne Wiestwho wants her perfume company to succeed, but also wants to keepeveryone happy. Jude Law goes the extra mile for this film and playsthe transsexual runway model Minx. It is one of the most enticing yetdisturbing roles in the whole film, and Law does a great job. JudiDench plays a painfully honest fashion critic, who delivers one of thelast and most enthralling speeches of the film. She ends the film on aparticularly dark, yet fascinating note and her performance is greatfor what she has to work with.I see this film getting torn up by critics and audience members alike,but I feel it deserves much more credit than it has received. Obviouslyit is very flawed, but it is not an outright horrible movie. Thenarrative style simply doesn't work and it definitely holds the filmback a lot, but apart from that the film delivers a lot of good things.The story, while not perfect, is undeniably interesting, and so are thecharacters. The actors do a great job in their limiting roles and theonly complaint I can make about them is that I just wanted more.Overall, Rage is a failure in minimalist filmmaking. The film makesnumerous references to Andy Warhol, but I'm sure Warhol would have beendisgusted by this film, as its style almost ended up being a mockery ofhis own, unintentionally of course. With a lot of tweaking andrevising, though, Rage could be a great film or even stage play thatwould most definitely be worth watching.

benjiworkshard 2012-05-03 06:55:12

I liked it.

I greatly enjoyed this film and have no idea why all of the IMDbreviewers seemed so bitterly scorned by this production. I found somuch of this movie to be funny, sad, or at least entertaining. Ithought the writing felt honest and sharp, and i found the acting to besuperb, because IT FELT LIKE I WAS WATCHING REAL HUMAN BEINGS. Everyoneelse who commented seemed to have a problem with the performances but ithought they felt authentic. I think we could probably all agree thatsome people working in the fashion industry might on occasion behave ina way that is a little over dramatic. So when the characters in thisfilm are portrayed behaving in an overly dramatic way, as many of themare, it makes complete sense to me. I thought this was a really unique(I'm saying this because I haven't seen any other movie shot with onlyactors sitting infront of blue screens) way to tell a story and I wasreally glad I picked it up. A fellow reviewer complained that Rage wasplot-less, but it felt as ambiguous as something a teenager might puttogether but still had cohesive elements strong enough to leave you, orat least me, with a sense of what transpired off camera, which Ibelieve was the aim of the director. I mean, so it is rather beyond thescope of possibility that some teenage black kid got to interview allof these people, repeatedly, and did so while they were not trying tobe interviewed. But I think the statement that, "Rage shows how uglyand downright wrong it is to allow the production, fiancé anddistribution of 'anything goes' cinema," is a horrible and selfindulgent criticism of a artistic work you didn't like. There are a lotof things down right wrong in this world; creative expression typicallyisn't one of them. And also that isn't how you spell finance.

2012-05-02 11:22:18

Dull and purposeless - that is what art is about

This movie is definitely different; unconventional would be a good way to put it. A different genre definitely. But think of the analog of looking at paintings. Modern art. The product can be so much more on an emotional and/or aesthetic level than the sum of its parts. This film is such.I watched this at home and enjoyed it in the comfort of my own family room. I did not have to trek to the theater and invest an whole evening and expect the usual action, drama, stimulation, you name in what we usually get in our conventional American movies.

2012-05-01 09:35:37

utter horse manure

Don't be misled by the good reviews that seem to outnumber the bad ones here. The bad ones are genuine. This film is utterly worthless. If you are a particular fan of one of the stars, and you feel compelled to watch every film they have ever made, then I suppose you will have to sit through the whole thing -- otherwise run for the hills. I didn't waste a whole 98 minutes of my life, as one of the reviewers here did, but I wasted 30, then I had to turn it off. Luckily it was just a netflix movie -- I can only imagine having to sit through this at the full cinema price, or having purchased it on DVD for $25. The reviewer that said that people were leaving the cinema in droves is accurate. Don't waste your money. I would have given this 0 stars, if I could have. This is now my worst movie in recent memory (though it does have a good cast whose talents were wasted in this turkey), now supplanting The Happening, another one that you don't want to see.

chris-3415 2012-05-01 03:29:44

cinematic negative space

in classical Chinese painting, what gets left out of the composition isof crucial importance. potter's "rage" omits quite a few of thecompositional elements we take for granted as essential in moderncinema - a bold move in a world dominated by Hollywood tropes and CGI."rage" isn't what i'd call an experimental film, it's a film producedwith an acute awareness of cinema as a super-saturated medium, in whichthe audience already knows all there is to be known. there are no newstories to be told; no killings which haven't been shown, no motivationwhich remains unexplored, no new formulas. but this literate,knowledgeable and sophisticated modern audience produces a space whichcan be activated by leaving things out, rather than putting things in.potter knows that all she needs to do is map out a bare structure, withsumptuous color and first rate actors, and all the rest of the work canbe played out of the expectations we all bring to bear on the cinemaexperience. "rage" is a who-done-it, with andy warhol's "screen test"film series operating in the background, dressed with a kind ofglossy-magazine-photoshopped look in which everyone's irises are asuspiciously similar sci-fi hue, and with a nice little twist in theend which implicates us, the passive viewers. i thought one of the mostsurprising things about the movie was the palpable "rage" expressed inother reviews on this site. we react like addicts when the sugar-candyexperience of having everything laid out for our adrenal stimulation iswithheld. this isn't a movie about the fashion industry, its about themodern obsession with surface, with effects, and its background themeis intensely political. it's characters are ciphers for the mainplayers in the infotainment infiltrated everyday world, thebusinessmen, the celebrities, the wannabes, the innocents, the jadedold-hands, the haves and the have-nots. for those who were disappointedby this work, who weren't fascinated by watching, up close, greatactors working, i sincerely hope michael bay's next SFX blockbustaisn't too far away. . .

2012-04-29 22:33:22

Rage

It is an interesting movie.There are a diversity of complex characters that are impressive.The movie forces the viewer to imagine what is going on, as the audience only hears what is going on.My favorite characters were Minx(played by Jude Law),Lettuce Leaf(played by Lily Cole),Mona Carvell(played by Judi Dench),and Anita de Los Angeles(played bt Adriana Barraza).This movie is not for everyone obviously.It is basically the characters talking about their world.The background is simply a colored wall.It is easy to see how many would grow tired with the simple setting.But if you are a fan of films with in depth conversations,this movie is for you.

JCaseyChapman 2012-04-29 02:57:22

I found this brilliant

RAGE is certainly not a movie for everyone. I could see how it wouldmake some people very angry, and I am sure many people walked out ofthis. However, being an actor myself, watching these performances intheir most intimate and raw presentation was nothing short ofbrilliant. Sure, there are a few flaws, but the truth behind the filmis good acting can and SHOULD stand alone. All you really need is agreat actor, and a camera pointed at them. It's a series of monologuesgiven by some of the best actors out there. The performances that stoodout to me most were: Judi Dench of course, John Lequizamo (who givesperhaps his best performance here), Bob Balaban (who is both hilariousand heartbreaking), Dianne Weist (who can do no wrong), Riz Ahmed (whoI didn't know before this and hope to see again), and finally the bestof all Adriana Barraza! You should rent/buy this movie just for hermonologue about desiring to be invisible. Its a strange little film.But also a brilliant one.

2012-04-25 05:34:03

Voice of an Artist

I see all of Sally Potter's films. She is always different, new, and interesting. I saw her latest, RAGE, at The Box, in SOHO. I had read online of this provocative movie with a wonderful cast set in the world of fashion; about its unique mobile premiere. I was puzzled; how could a movie be shown on the tiny screen of a cell phone? And then I saw it. Now I want to have it on my cell phone. Imagine, Judy Dench talking to you on your own cell, like your friend, who trusts you enough to tell you the truth, that fashion has become an obsession akin to porn. And Steve Buscemi, Lily Cole, Bob Balaban, Patrick Adams, John Leguizamo, Dianne Wiest, Jude Law, all of them would became your personal friends and enemies. They speak to you directly. They were speaking directly to me on the big screen, each image so crisp, so intense; each face so close, you can see every tiny movement of a muscle. So much drama without outside action. There are no sets here; you don't need them at all. The face is the set. And the costume. The faces are everything here, a landscape depicting all kind of battles. RAGE tells the story of a crisis at a New York fashion house through a series of interviews, shot on his cell phone camera by a young boy named Michelangelo. The interviews are taken over the seven days in which a runway accident becomes a murder investigation. It's a funny, sad, bitter, tragic collection of monologues, spoken directly to the camera. Each shot is a close-up of a character against different color backgrounds. Every actor performs alone. They are so close that it is impossible for them to hide anything from you; just as you can't hide anything from yourself.After watching RAGE on the big screen and online, I ordered it on DVD. I want to have it; I want to be able to see those faces close and hear the voice of an Artist who never takes a conventional road, Sally Porter.

2012-04-24 17:58:10

Terrible

This review is from: Rage (DVD) Just a bunch of big name actors sitting in front of the camera talking to it with different colored backgrounds. Very boring, thinking of reselling it.