Schlachthof 5

This is a workmanlike job of filmmaking. Many of the incidents and characters of the Kurt Vonnegut novel are in the film, but the filmmakers have not come up with a way of duplicating the novel's darkly comic tone, and the climactic firebombing of Dresden, the book's reason for being, is curiously unimpressive in the film. Michael Sacks is suitably sweet and blank as Billy Pilgrim and Ron Liebman gives frightening life to the maniacal Paul Lazzaro. Not showing us the Trafalmadorians, who abduct Billy and put him on display on their planet, seems a cheat.

There is a definite 70s feel to this production of a book that does an amazing job of spanning the most fascinating period of American history -- 1945-1970. I first saw this film in 1986 as a late teen at the height of Regan America, the cold war, nuclear detente. Billy Pilgram was the beginning of that world that I was just starting to pay attention to. The movie had a really profound effect on me at the time. Reading the book afterwards and getting into his other books, didn't detract at all from my assessment of the movie adaptation. Even seeing it now many years later doesn't detract from an amazingly solid film. The transitions as Billy gets unstuck in time are some of my favorite movie images. Also beautiful is the music which totally turned me on to Glenn Gould.

The realization of this glimpse into the mind's eye of a man unstuck in time is brilliant to behold. Yes, the book is a brilliant work in its own right, and open to interpretation, as a truly complex work must be. The movie is not the book. It is Hill's interpretation of the book, and a brilliant and viable one it is.

Hill won the best Director Oscar the next year with "The Sting". He later filmed the similarly unfilmable "World According To Garp" and also did a brilliant job with it, partially by letting go of John Irving's more depressing side. Other notable credits include Butch Cassidy... and The Great Waldo Pepper.

Michael Sacks, in his first movie, and only starring role at the tender age of 24, is completely convincing and natural. He is equally effective, compelling, and believable at the six distinct stages of Pilgrim's life memorialized herein. If he weren't up to the six-in-one role, the film wouldn't work, but he is, and it does. (I wonder why he has no other major credits, and ceased acting altogether in 1984. If anyone knows, please e-mail me.)

Valerie Perrine is fine as Montana Wildhack. The other characters are all played for maximum irony and effect, and the cast delivers beautifully, without exception. Eugene Roche is the epitome of kindness as Edgar Derby, the yin, to Ron Liebman's yang, a twisted ball of anger named Paul Lazaro. John Dehner is brilliant as a war-hawk professor upset at the Vietnam protesters. His character would be as appropriate amidst today's global conflagration as it was in 1966. Lucille Benson, Kevin Conway, Sorrell Booke, Holly Near, Richard Schaal, and Perry King are the more familiar names in a uniformly excellent cast, including the German actors.

The musical score is also perfect, both in tone and substance. Vonnegut is a master of superimposing satire over irony over futility. The movie does a marvelous job of blending these contrasts and making its audience feel enriched. The music underscores all of these contrasts. The cinematography also is magnificent.

Searching desperately for something to say to show that the movie cannot be 100% perfect, the only thing I can come up with is that the pacing of the movie drags slightly when the soldiers leave the first camp for Dresdner until their new Kommandant gives his "welcoming" speech. It might have played better with about three minutes cut from that sequence. So what?

I recently saw Slaughterhouse Five for the fifth time in 27 years since I originally saw it at my college campus -- this time on DVD. I never fail to catch something new, and I never fail to enjoy it all the more.

Given how many 70's movies have failed miserably to withstand the test of time, Slaughterhouse Five is a true treat to be savored.

This is a very clever, thoughtful, well made movie. It succeeded in doing what I thought was nearly impossible, i.e. to put this amazing book on film. There are one or two small points that keep me from giving this picture anything higher than a 7, the main one being Ron Liebman playing the Paul Lazzaro role - highly irritating. Other than that, a brave and imaginative, clever, witty film that I would heartily recommend to anyone.

Like most of those who have posted before me, I am an avid Vonnegut fan and went into this movie with a guarded optimism that it would just be decent.

But George Roy Hill did an excellent job conveying the overall feel of the book -- the time jumping was flawless and I didn't find it hard to follow at all. The actor who played Billy Pilgrim captured Billy's passive, calm and vaguely anti-social demeanor. Lazarro, Montana and Billy's wife are also well played.

George Roy Hill had a knack for directing movies made from great books -- e.g., "The World According to Garp" -- and in the end, I was pleasantly surprised how well this movie turned out.

As far as the Vonnegut adaptations go (I know of four -- this one, "Mother Night," "Breakfast of Champions" and the god-awful "Slapstick") this one is the best of the bunch.

I've always wanted to see a movie version of "Sirens of Titan," but it'll probably never happen -- so "Slaughterhouse Five" is my only chance to "see" Trafalmadore.

Recommended to any true Vonnegut fans. Other people probably won't appreciate it.