American Love

Knots is a clever portrayal of the modern day urban relationship and love triangle genre. It is both poignant and relevant and effectively portrays a range of viewpoint and emotion relating to how people interact with each other both in and out of relationships and how people come face-to-face with their own demons. Scott Cohen and Annabeth Gish give strong performances. John Stamos is brilliant with his character portrayal of a care free womanizer (I can hands down say this is his strongest work that I have seen to date) and the rest of the cast does an overall strong job of rounding out the movie. I thought the movie was well written and directed with a crisp, thorough understanding of mood, pacing and the genre as a whole. Greg Lombardo does a masterful job of allowing the characters to evolve in a way that feels very natural and then gets out of their way allowing them to follow their own path to meaning and discovery. Overall, I think this a meaningful comedy with a strong message that shouldn't be missed.

It all begins with a bored married couple moving to Manhattan, huge happy faces on every box.

In an incredibly funny film about relationships (Director Greg Lombardo describes it as a comedy about our search for connection and the romantic disasters we survive along the way), Scott Cohen finds out painfully that his marriage is in trouble, and things unravel and ravel and unravel again from there. I have a feeling that quite a few quotes will end up here after the film gets a general release.

Paulina Porizkova, as a vixen with an evil grin who seems to enter the fray from all sides, is the big surprise, as she creates a supporting role deserving of an Academy Award nomination.

Also great are John Stamos, Annabeth Gish, and Tara Reid. I want the DVD now! Edit: I've got it!

"Knots" a predictable sex comedy from director of no note, Greg Lombardo. It is short on both sex and comedy, but is almost worth watching because A) John Stamos is actually good in it. B) You get to see Ric Ocasek's hot, Czech wife naked and C) Tara Reid surprisingly doesn't suck in it. The down side? The sex is totally tame and it's really not very funny. The rest of the cast is serviceable. Scott Cohen (from The Gilmore Girls) and Annabeth Gish (from The West Wing) play are bored married couple and Paulina Porizkova plays a vixen that reaps hell into their lives for no good reason at all, but ultimately we don't really care about any of the characters as the screenplay limps to it's obvious, group hug conclusion. "For No Good Reason At All". That would have been a good tag line for "Knots". You have been warned.

This really took me by surprise. I was expecting fun, light fare, but ended up loving this film. Paulina Poriskouva puts in the best performance I've seen in a long time - sexy, funny, and well acted. Annabeth Gish is awesome, much like her short appearances on the West Wing. John Stamos is hilarious and much more interesting than the junk he did on full house. Tara Reid is cute and not her "bad publicity" persona.

Many films would hang themselves on the twist (which I'm not going to give away) of the film's premise, and kind of leave the movie to its own devices. The film really goes forward from the premise and develops each one of the characters completely.

Just awesome cast, very good writing, and extremely funny! Loved it.

Knots is a comedy in the same field as the movie, Closer. Not nearly as hardcore as Closer was, and due to the fact this was a comedy, it was much lighter. I can not figure out why the writers decided on the name 'Knots', but as near as I can guess, trying to keep up with the story is like trying to unravel a knot.

This is the story of 6 people. Dave (Scott Cohen) and Greta (Annabeth Gish) are a married couple who have just moved into a new home. Their marriage is lifeless and seems to be suffering. Cal (John Stamos) is a fashion photographer who thinks nothing of cheating on his girlfriend, Emily (Tara Reid). In fact, he thinks is makes his relationship stronger, because if he is with many different women and still comes back to Emily, it proves that she is the one for him. He reminds me of Stifler from the American Pie series. Jake (Michael Leydon Campbell) is a poor sap who has no luck with women. Usually, it is either Cal or someone else who gets further with his dates than Jake, himself.

Finally, we have Lily (Paulina Porizkova). She is the wild card and the instigator of most of the problems in the movie. She seems to take pleasure in Dave's pain and the fact that she is mostly the cause of it. She is a lawyer with no scruples or inhibitions. In Dave's own words "She's a sick, twisted woman".

Dave comes home early one day to find Greta in bed with Lily and this is where his life starts to come apart. Both Jake and Cal's lives become a mess as well, because of a domino effect of sorts stemming from Dave and Greta's problems. This is where the movie began to remind me of Closer. You are never quite sure who is going to end up with who at the end of the movie, although Knots was not as well thought out.

The acting is mediocre. No one really stood out as a great actor here. John Stamos was probably the most entertaining and charismatic. Paulina Porizkova has not aged well for a supermodel and is a shell of her old self (which is still much better than many other actresses). The only bad performance was by, as much as I hate to say it, Tara Reid. She did not show off her acting skills here, or maybe she did, but that would mean that she is not very skilled at all.

Not a bad movie. I can recommend if you want a lighter, funnier version of Closer (lighter but by no means for kids). It is not a great movie by any means, but you can find yourself watching much worse than this. 6.5/10