The Fan: Schatten des Ruhms

It seems people either love or hate this movie.

I think novels, movies, and art do not have to follow an "essay" format. There's no requirement that a hypothesis must be proffered and clearly and logically proved within the movie/book. The goal may be to make people think, to raise questions without giving easy answers, and to do so in a framework that incites both feeling and thought simultaneously.

Hrm, I don't think I'm writing this in a way that really gets my thoughts across, but there you have it.

I enjoyed the movie. It was thought provoking without being highbrow. There was no "moral story" laid out or beaten into you.

I'd recommend this movie for people who like mystery, thought, and don't necessarily require a definite answer/conclusion to enjoy a film. The acting was super, and the movie flowed well.

:) Alma

I saw I Love Your Work at the 2003 Toronto International Film Festival. The film has a great cast and each one does some solid acting. The plot follows an actor who slowly spirals into madness because he cannot deal with his celebrity status. Ribisi and Pontente are especially good as a Hollywood couple, but the film drags on a bit too long and we never get a good understanding of the main characters and the motivation behind their decisions. Judging by the the discussions I heard at the end of the film, I was not the only person who felt this way. Aside from the acting of the two main stars, I Love Your Work is not that noteworthy.

The story follows the deteriorating mental state of movie star Gray Evans (Giovanni Ribisi). He's married to a movie star (Potente) but he essentially married her because he saw her in a movie (a french new wave musical) and is tortured by the fact that she clearly can't live up to the perfections of that character. So he stalked his own wife. And Jason Lee is stalking him. Gray's paranoia increases to the point that he imagines everyone in the world staring, speaking, trying to touch him and in this distressed state he seeks refuge in, of all places, a video store.

Here he meets a young video store clerk and his girlfriend, John and Jane (Joshua Jackson and Marisa Coughlan). They represent to him an ideal, the life he once had before fame. Where love was real and a commitment meant something. What does he do with this new found inspiration? He stalks them of course, buying the apartment opposite them and monitoring their every move. In the process he infects their relationship with his misery, resulting in their own break up. Using a little more of his own psychotic logic, Gray jumps in to save the day, solving the problem by beating the crap out of Jackson. Thus freeing himself from his demons, Gray is then able to move on to a happier place, the great movie theater in the sky...

Goldberg may be accused of solipsism. This is a movie about an actor, directed by an actor. And why not, aren't you supposed to write what you know? The main character is utterly self indulgent, he has a potentially great life but seems to be caught up in his own 'poor me' world. Bummer, successful movie star, married to another movie star, just how bad can life get?! Buy then again, who were the Montagues and the Capulets other than wealthy, self indulgent individuals? The same character flaw applies here as in Romeo and Juliet. The central character is not a philanthropist, he thinks of no-one other than himself and for that he pays the ultimate price. That's what makes this movie a modern day tragedy, a cautionary tale.

Sure, it speaks to actors more strongly than anyone else but there's a message in it for everyone. The grass is always greener.

Richly textured and layered, the film shows many influences from David Lynch to David Fincher. Goldberg gets magnificent perfomances from an astonishing cast. Ribisi is dazzling in his misery, Jared Harris and Eric Siegel hilarious, and Marisa Coughlan puts up an incredibly mature performance in a role that she could have coasted through. The cinematography is excellent, giving the film a look way more impressive than the budget.

This is the kind of movie that if you get it and it touches you, you won't want to stop watching it.

I saw this movie at a screening during the South by Southwest Film Festival in Austin.

The editing was cutting-edge, the cast was full of great actors who played their parts expertly, there were some great lines, great cinematography, the sets and scenery were perfect, the cameos were good...but somehow, it still doesn't work. I don't know what happened or where it went wrong, but it will leave you questioning what you just saw and if you missed some critical part of the movie that would make it make sense. But you didn't. Towards the end, it just becomes too convoluted to work. And having had many discussions with other film-goers from the festival, I can tell you with certainty that I was not the only one who felt that way.

I wouldn't call "I Love Your Work" terrible, but I would agree that it doesn't really go anywhere. Portraying director Gray Evans (Giovanni Ribisi) descending into madness and desperation, I guess that the movie is supposed to be a look at the unpleasant situations inherent in the Hollywood lifestyle, but the whole thing is too confusing to logically make that point. Ribisi, plus Christina Ricci, Jason Lee, Franka Potente and Vince Vaughn (and even Elvis Costello as himself) do the best that they can, but there's not really enough to work with. For a better look at the vicissitudes of the celebrity life, check out Carl Reiner's "The Comic", starring Dick Van Dyke.