IMDb-BEWERTUNG
6,8/10
2970
IHRE BEWERTUNG
Füge eine Handlung in deiner Sprache hinzuAn exuberant, sharply satirical comedy about two parentally neglected teenagers who find the courage to believe in themselvesAn exuberant, sharply satirical comedy about two parentally neglected teenagers who find the courage to believe in themselvesAn exuberant, sharply satirical comedy about two parentally neglected teenagers who find the courage to believe in themselves
- Auszeichnungen
- 4 Gewinne & 12 Nominierungen insgesamt
Yesse Spence
- Jenny
- (as Jesse Spence)
Empfohlene Bewertungen
7kcdl
I really enjoyed this movie. I won't lie to you though it isn't uber-brilliant, deep or ultra-funny. It is the sort movie you watch late at night when your expectations are low. If you're looking for a movie that doesn't make you think too much this is it.
That being said I did find it funny, if somewhat puerile at times. I could relate to the main protagonist. The story moved along at a good pace and didn't get bogged down. I really wanted to see how it would end up.
I like that it didn't suffer from the usually Australian movie problem of "lets show you how uniquely Australian we can make this film" it just let itself be. It showed a side of Australia that wasn't purely rural or suburban.
Also Rose Byrne is absolutely gorgeous. I think I want to marry her!
That being said I did find it funny, if somewhat puerile at times. I could relate to the main protagonist. The story moved along at a good pace and didn't get bogged down. I really wanted to see how it would end up.
I like that it didn't suffer from the usually Australian movie problem of "lets show you how uniquely Australian we can make this film" it just let itself be. It showed a side of Australia that wasn't purely rural or suburban.
Also Rose Byrne is absolutely gorgeous. I think I want to marry her!
When Placid Lake was a little boy, his mother sent him to school wearing a dress, just so he could experience sexuality from a different point of view. As a result, he had the snot punched out of him and for years is constantly the victim of bullies, though he found a soul-mate in the nerdy/studious Gemma. Gemma loses her mother at 8 and her father, not quite sure how to deal with children, wants her to be a scientist. Years pass - Placid still lives with his Mum and Dad, ageing hippies with an eccentric outlook on the world and is about to finish school. Placid's idea of rebellion is to make a prize winning video of school life which will net him $10,000 and help him achieve his dream of fishing in Montana. At the official screening which turns out to be a little disasterous he falls from the school roof and undergoes a life change. This is a quirky "coming of age" flick - with a relatively unknown cast (to those outside Australia). Ben Lee in the title role is well cast as the slightly nerdy but intelligent Placid, Rose Byrne's Gemma is terrific and Garry McDonald and Miranda Richardson as Placid's hippy parents are brilliant. Take the time to see this film - it's worth it!
i have been in love with Australian cinema for years. it all started with "The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert" & "Muriel's Wedding". it then continued with films like "Love & Other Catastrophes", "Hotel De Love", "Cosi" & "Garage Days". (not sure if those were the Australian titles for all of these films or not.) the problem is that America doesn't get a lot of Australian films to choose from. even American made independent films have a hard time making it to theatres. the overload of bad Hollywood films makes it hard for anything to make it to the screen. we have to either rent them on DVD or watch them on channels like IFC or Sundance, and now we have Logo. i know Ben Lee is a household name in Australia, but in America he is still relatively unknown. (which is just unfortunate for America.) i recently saw him in concert opening for Aimee Mann. he blew me away. once i got home i checked out his website and that's when i learned about "The Rage in Placid Lake". i rented it thinking that he would have just enough charisma as an actor to make it entertaining. instead he blew me away again. i was also pleased to see Miranda Richardson in this also. she is such an incredible actress. i would love to find out about more great Australian films that i should see. so if anyone out there can recommend some, please do. and as far as recommendations go, it said somewhere on here if you liked "The Rage In Placid Lake" that you should see "Kindergarten Cop". wow, i am not sure how that conclusion was made. if you did see this and liked it, check out some of the titles i mentioned above instead. some similarly themed American films you might check out are "The United States of Leland", "Garden State", "The Battle of Shaker Heights" and yes even "Napoleon Dynamite". and if you like good music check out Ben Lee in concert (i get to see him again soon, with Ben Folds & Rufus Wainwright) or get his CD "Awake is the New Sleep".
Characters are believable, yet stretched to be perfectly bizarre. I saw the film at an Indie Film Fest at a college where my mum works and the whole room just kept laughing. I thought my sides were going to burst!
This is definitely on my list of favorites now.... I just want to give it a hug.
Oh... you have to see the movie. You just have to. You will be laughing so hard throughout you won't be able to hear half of the lines and you will have to see the whole thing over again. I think i might re-watch it tonight and then have a bunch of people over to watch it again.
This is definitely on my list of favorites now.... I just want to give it a hug.
Oh... you have to see the movie. You just have to. You will be laughing so hard throughout you won't be able to hear half of the lines and you will have to see the whole thing over again. I think i might re-watch it tonight and then have a bunch of people over to watch it again.
Aha! After last week's debacle with American Wake, I was starting to worry that the Reel 13 Indies were going to be a series of below average films that didn't receive more significant distribution for a reason (i.e. they stunk). But HERE - here they have found a diamond in the rough that long lost indie gem that slipped through the cracks and failed to reach a wider audience. This, of course, leads me to two questions: 1) Who at Fox Searchlight or Focus Features went to somebody's bar mitzvah instead of a screening of this film allowing Film Movement to pick it up? and 2) Why in the hell didn't Reel 13 debut with this film instead of American Wake? (Sidenote: Another option would have been to air it on 2/2/08 when Reel 13 is showing Rebel Without a Cause this would have been a PERFECT companion piece for that why aren't they looking at content when pairing these films???) The first thing you need to know about The Rage in Placid Lake is that it's an Australian film. The second thing you need to know is that it stars that country's quirky rock/folk icon, Ben Lee (you may have noticed that I recently added one of his songs to the MySpace page it's pretty good
). The film starts out with a five year-old Placid Lake being sent to school in a dress by his granola, new wave bisexual mother (Miranda Richardson) to challenge the other students' preconceived notions of sexuality or something like that. It's a very clever idea and very efficient with a few simple images, it establishes Placid, his family and the series of problems he is likely to have when he grows up into Ben Lee.
The film is full of moments like this visual, clever ideas that optimize screen time to push the story forward (There is a great dream scene in which Placid plays his own therapist and they discuss his life predicament and action steps to resolve it more films need to be creative like this when it comes to exposition). There are not many belly laughs, per se, but the film is consistently amusing, often inspired and always irreverent. The script is really strong structured without feeling manipulative and resisting the urge for sitcom-type "set-'em-up, slam it home" humor. There are a few minor contrivances (Placid's corporate job interview is a bit too easy) and there is a heavy reliance on voice-over, especially in the beginning (I am particularly biased against the over usage of VO that and dissolves but I won't get into that here. We could be here all day ), but on the whole, the film works on many levels.
Ben Lee is amiable and pleasant as the titular character. He has the charm, if not the chops. If you're looking for chops, look no further than Miranda Richardson as Sylvia Lake, reminding us why she was the Brit femme du jour of the early 90's when she received two Oscar nominations in a three year period (for Damage and Tom and Viv) before she faded into occasional obscure roles on BBC TV movies. Hopefully that won't be the same fate for Rose Byrne, who has the unique distinction of being the best thing in two very bad movies (Troy and Wicker Park). Byrne gives her best performance to date as Placid's genius best friend, Gemma. Byrne can't hide her sexiness (she was innocuously sexy as both a spunky slave girl and a psychotic stalker in the previously mentioned films), but she can (and does) layer it with intelligence, wit, (appropriate) pathos, and an emotional confusion that, to some degree, stems from her inability to reconcile her smarts with her sexuality.
The most memorable part of the film for me, though, involves the performance of Christopher Stollery as Joel, Placid's supervisor at his corporate insurance job. This has as much to do with Stollery's impeccable delivery and timing as it does the very concept behind the role itself. Joel becomes an unwitting, somewhat accidental surrogate father/big-brother to Placid - almost like a corporate soothsayer, whose advice is generally as much a surprise to the giver as it is to the recipient. This is a great, original narrative device invented by writer/director Tony McNamara who uses it consistently and effectively to steer the story in one direction or another.
As excited as I am that Reel 13 discovered and aired this film, I am somewhat appalled that it didn't receive domestic theatrical distribution. This isn't just a good little indie film this is a good film in general and had it been released in 2003, it would have stood a good chance of making a few top ten lists that year, including my own. I understand that Ben Lee was less of a sell-able commodity at the time and that Australian films are not in high demand, but successes like My Big Fat Greek Wedding, Bend it Like Beckham and Napoleon Dynamite prove that there is a market for more varied entertainment. We can only hope that the next hidden gem like The Rage in Placid Lake gets the kind of attention it deserves.
The film is full of moments like this visual, clever ideas that optimize screen time to push the story forward (There is a great dream scene in which Placid plays his own therapist and they discuss his life predicament and action steps to resolve it more films need to be creative like this when it comes to exposition). There are not many belly laughs, per se, but the film is consistently amusing, often inspired and always irreverent. The script is really strong structured without feeling manipulative and resisting the urge for sitcom-type "set-'em-up, slam it home" humor. There are a few minor contrivances (Placid's corporate job interview is a bit too easy) and there is a heavy reliance on voice-over, especially in the beginning (I am particularly biased against the over usage of VO that and dissolves but I won't get into that here. We could be here all day ), but on the whole, the film works on many levels.
Ben Lee is amiable and pleasant as the titular character. He has the charm, if not the chops. If you're looking for chops, look no further than Miranda Richardson as Sylvia Lake, reminding us why she was the Brit femme du jour of the early 90's when she received two Oscar nominations in a three year period (for Damage and Tom and Viv) before she faded into occasional obscure roles on BBC TV movies. Hopefully that won't be the same fate for Rose Byrne, who has the unique distinction of being the best thing in two very bad movies (Troy and Wicker Park). Byrne gives her best performance to date as Placid's genius best friend, Gemma. Byrne can't hide her sexiness (she was innocuously sexy as both a spunky slave girl and a psychotic stalker in the previously mentioned films), but she can (and does) layer it with intelligence, wit, (appropriate) pathos, and an emotional confusion that, to some degree, stems from her inability to reconcile her smarts with her sexuality.
The most memorable part of the film for me, though, involves the performance of Christopher Stollery as Joel, Placid's supervisor at his corporate insurance job. This has as much to do with Stollery's impeccable delivery and timing as it does the very concept behind the role itself. Joel becomes an unwitting, somewhat accidental surrogate father/big-brother to Placid - almost like a corporate soothsayer, whose advice is generally as much a surprise to the giver as it is to the recipient. This is a great, original narrative device invented by writer/director Tony McNamara who uses it consistently and effectively to steer the story in one direction or another.
As excited as I am that Reel 13 discovered and aired this film, I am somewhat appalled that it didn't receive domestic theatrical distribution. This isn't just a good little indie film this is a good film in general and had it been released in 2003, it would have stood a good chance of making a few top ten lists that year, including my own. I understand that Ben Lee was less of a sell-able commodity at the time and that Australian films are not in high demand, but successes like My Big Fat Greek Wedding, Bend it Like Beckham and Napoleon Dynamite prove that there is a market for more varied entertainment. We can only hope that the next hidden gem like The Rage in Placid Lake gets the kind of attention it deserves.
Wusstest du schon
- Zitate
Sylvia Lake: He used to live between my legs! Live there!
- VerbindungenFeatured in Getaway: Getaway to the Music (2007)
Top-Auswahl
Melde dich zum Bewerten an und greife auf die Watchlist für personalisierte Empfehlungen zu.
- How long is The Rage in Placid Lake?Powered by Alexa
Details
- Erscheinungsdatum
- Herkunftsland
- Sprache
- Auch bekannt als
- Placid Lake
- Drehorte
- Produktionsfirmen
- Weitere beteiligte Unternehmen bei IMDbPro anzeigen
Box Office
- Weltweiter Bruttoertrag
- 284.808 $
- Laufzeit
- 1 Std. 29 Min.(89 min)
- Farbe
- Sound-Mix
- Seitenverhältnis
- 2.35 : 1
Zu dieser Seite beitragen
Bearbeitung vorschlagen oder fehlenden Inhalt hinzufügen