Déjame vivir

First of all, those guys out there who see the posters and advertising and assume this is some sappy chick flick, you couldn't be more wrong. What it is, is an extraordinarily moving piece of work. It's the kind of film that hits you right in the pit of your stomach. Personally, my mind has a tendancy to wander during movies, but with this one, I was glued to it right from the first frame to the last. It's been awhile since I found myself so touched by a movie.. and it reminds me of why I love movies in the first place. The performances here are top notch. Alison Lohman (Astrid), I never even heard of her before going to see this... but she tackles this difficult role like she has the experience of an award-winning veteran. I'm not even sure most of the big names could pull off this role like she did. Michelle Pfeiffer (Ingrid), who I was never a big fan of, is also excellent...she has a character who's so beautiful, yet so repulsive at the same time. The mother/daughter relationship her character has with Alison's is probably the most unconventional i've seen in a film, and that's what makes it so compelling. Renee Zellweger, as Clare, also gives her best performance here. Her relationship with Astrid is a beautiful but ultimately a tragedy one, mainly due to Clare's infatuation with her cheating husband Mark (Noah Wyle), but I won't give it away of course! ;)

All I really have to say is, if you want to see a movie with strong performances throughout and an excellent story that will leave you fully satisified (and personally touched) when you leave the theatre, this one's for you. I highly reccomend it to everyone! One last thing I should say though... quite often when a movie comes out that's based on a book, the cliche seems to be for people to say "it wont be/wasnt as good as the book". Now, I never read the book to this movie... but the way I look at it, people need to judge the movie for the movie... not the book. If the directors were to follow the book word for word and detail for detail, we'd be left with a movie that would probably take days to watch. The advantage of a book is that you can have a complete knowledge of what the characters are feeling inside their head, which of course you can't always get in a movie unless they make it obvious or tell you how they're feeling truly. The advantage of a movie is that it brings it all to life... and let's you witness it for what it'd be like if you lived out the story. After all, if you were witnessing these actions in real life, you wouldn't have a book to help you understand what thoughts caused them. So, to all the people who go hating a movie before they even see it, just because it's based on a book... keep in mind that the book and movie are essentially two different things and that both have their advantages. I've honestly never seen a based-on-the-book movie where people were completely satisified with how it was translated to film. You can like both the book and movie separately, you know! :)

My rating: 10 out of 10... HIGHLY RECCOMENDED!!!

I have just one word: Wow.

I saw this movie not expecting much and was completely blown away. The story and especially the acting was incredible! INCREDIBLE. I am now and forever will be a devoted Alison Lohman fan. I've never seen anyone take a character and make it more real than she did with Astrid. She made me cry more than once. It is amazing to watch it all the way through and then start it over again just to reaffirm the amazing transformation the character goes through from beginning to end. She not only looks different but her mannerisms are also so innocent and naive in the beginning. It's unbelievable. I have to say I am completely angry that her acting was not mentioned in any awards, nominations, or anything by Hollywood.

All the acting was incredible. Robin Penn, Renee' Zellwegger, Michelle Pfieffer; all did outstanding! I've never hated Michelle Pfieffer before but she did an incredible job being someone you could truly be disgusted with. Also loved the job...and sorry to do this but the guy who was in Almost Famous...have no idea what his name is...did. The love story between Astrid and him is very sweet.

As I said before I was very blown away by this movie. I would recommend it to anyone and everyone and hope it gets more popular as time goes on.

White Oleander was a great book, but there are a few nagging omissions in the movie. For some reason, Michelle Pfeiffer is an artist and not a poet in the movie (was the focus group confused?) Noah Wyle's character's name changed from Ron to Mark for some unknown reason.

More importantly, so much was left out of the movie. Before Alison Lohman's character goes to Claire's place (Zellwegger's), she endures lots more than what the movie shows. There is zero mention of the Van Nuys house with the racist foster mom, the black woman next door, the next place which was the Argentinian woman who had a padlock on the fridge etc.. In the book, Claire's place was like an oasis of peace and tranquility, and love. This did not come through the way it should have. Claire was just a short episode in the movie too, which was wrong.

On the plus side the acting was great, Pfeiffer; beautiful but with that dagger glare; Wright Penn as the white trash hypocrite; Renee as the insecure actress and Alison Lohman as a girl going through foster homes and living in her own prison. Good enough movie if you haven't read the book, but a letdown for me.

"White Oleander," adapted from Janet Fitch's best-selling novel, is hard and edgy about the bond between single mother and daughter, letting us see the reality of a strong artistic mother (Michelle Pfeiffer) tyrannizing her gifted daughter (Alison Lohman). After murdering her lover, mom goes to prison and daughter goes on an odyssey of self discovery in foster families, reminiscent of Burt Lancaster's episodic journey in John Cheever's `The Swimmer.'

In the first home, Robin Wright Penn's fundamental Christian presides over a frenetic household but reveals the sweet chaos of people who really love each other. In the next home, vulnerable actress, foster mom Renee Zellweger brings intimate caring to Lohman at an emotional price. Russian rag picker Svetlana Efremova brings hard-nosed business into Lohman's sights to complete an education of survival. Lohman finds loving understanding with Patrick Fugit, another artist in her life, but one without an agenda.

It's been a while since I've seen as good a job at depicting the effects of a strong but flawed mother on her strong but impressionable daughter. `Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood' tried with Ellen Burstyn as mother and Sandra Bullock as daughter, but the film failed to engage beyond a few shouts and eccentric southerners. `Oleander' has a brilliant artist manipulator teaching her daughter to be independent, even cold, to survive, yet the daughter has a need to be loved that draws her to older men, Christianity, and rebellion. Her psychic search for her absent father serves only to exacerbate the matter.

Pfeiffer does her best work here-- beautiful even in prison, she plays an ugly soul capable of the worst emotional tyranny over her sensitive, intelligent daughter, played with heart-breaking insight by Lohman. I was pleased with Kirsten Dunst last year in "crazy/beautiful." Just substitute Alison Lohman this year.

The white oleander looks beautiful but its poison kills. Social service agencies take children from their abusive parents but place them in homes and institutions where violence reigns. Ingrid Magnussen (Michelle Pfeiffer) puts her daughter, Astrid (Alison Lohman), in the center of her artwork but pushes her to the perimeter of her reality. Life is a contradiction in which nothing is purely good or purely evil.

White Oleander is a story about life's contradictions and the complexities of control, power, loneliness, betrayal, loyalty, and love. Janet Fitch won rave reviews in 2000 for this novel; screenwriter Mary Agnes Donoghue did not match Fitch's brilliance, but turned a weighty narrative-both in terms of content and size-into an admirable film blueprint.

Director Peter Kosminsky and accomplished actresses Pfeiffer, Robin Wright Penn, Renée Zellweger, and newcomer Lohman used this blueprint to create a gripping film that both readers and nonreaders of the original text will appreciate.

Pfeiffer is as cool and controlling as she is stunning even in prison garb, and her mastery of personality subtleties deserves acclaim. Audiences will hate the character because she is too smart, too manipulative, and too real.

And anticipate an Oscar-worthy breakthrough performance from Lohman. She shines in her portrayal of a daughter who worships her mother until she realizes the superficial nature of her beauty and the cruelty of her heart. Ingrid Magnussen is not as perfect as she thinks, and her love is as poisonous as the white oleander.

Stereotypes cheapen some of the film's richness and choices made to avoid an `R' rating sap some of its strength, but overall the film is as compelling as its sad and truthful characters.