When Will I Be Loved

This movie got a lot of undeserved juice from Roger Ebert's four-star review, and it's just awful. I've liked some of Toback's other work, particularly "Fingers", but this thing feels like a really boring home movie on autopilot. It's purportedly about the non-adventures of this bratty little rich girl (Neve Campbell) and her no-account boyfriend (Fred Weller) and, ultimately, their scheme to seduce a rich Italian count (Dominic Chianese) out of some major money. But it takes some time to get to this plot point, and up till then, the movie just meanders in a cinema-verite sort of way that makes it seem like Toback can use it as an excuse for the picture being a dud. It's like he's saying, "Well, whatever we shot, we shot. I can't be held responsible for the randomness of events."

The movie goes from Neve Campbell meeting one person on the street to another in what I'm sure Toback would insist was "character development", but it's done in such a way that it all rings false. It's scripted without being scripted. In another words, it's contrived. When Neve's college professor (played by Toback) explains what he thinks is going on with Neve and her head games, you can almost hear the gears locking in the background. It might be the most mechanical ad-libbed sequence in history.

Toback's use of celebrity here is also peculiar. The Mike Tyson cameo is pretty funny; he actually gives the movie a momentary spark. But when Toback has Neve recognizing a bit actress like Lori Singer on the street like she's Jane Fonda, I wonder what world he's living in. This whole "expository" part feels like padding, like Toback didn't have enough legit material to go around. Then, when the action shifts to the "scheme" in the final twenty minutes, it's good - it's the best part of the film. But the effect is a little jarring. Toback goes from a lazy, dawdling atmosphere to a sequence that's scripted tighter than Abbott & Costello's Who's on First, and it just doesn't work. The two forms don't really mesh, and you get the feeling Toback only had twenty good minutes in him to begin with - the rest is like a warm-up, like running in place to get the circulation going. And I hate to sound like an old prude (which I'm far from being), but the nude shower scene is an absolute cheap shot; Neve Campbell is just being exploited here. It has nothing to do with her character or anything else; it's completely gratuitous. But I guess anything goes when you have no material. Minus credits, this thing is barely over an hour and fifteen minutes. It hardly seems worth being made.

What a real bummer. I have to lay most of the rap on Mr. Toback. First, inserting himself into an already short movie (that must run 81 minutes with opening AND closing credits) appeared both self-aggrandizing, unnecessary, and a near complete digression (as was the lengthy cameo by former boxing great Mike Tyson). I would elaborate but I don't want to ruin some questions that might arise should you be paying attention (Picture Michael Moore on the Atkins diet, wearing a dashiki).

Neve Campbell is thoroughly charming and totally wasted as the lost, passionate rich girl. Bottom line, is that there will be thousands make off of her nudity in this flick. The nudity only consists of a shower scene. The sex scenes are little more than bumping and grinding and contrived, and I can only wonder if the talent were as uncomforable making those scenes as I was watching them.

But back to the erstwhile Mr. Toback, if you listen carefully to his voice early on, then you'll likely hear it in the other characters as well. His New York chatterbox cadence becomes tiresome.

I had hoped for better. Ms. Campbell is a major talent is one or two films away from breaking out super huge. Mr. Toback is also talented though this certainly isn't the work to pin his fame on. I wish them well in their future endeavors, and mourn for the eighty-one minutes I can never get back.

Why the film was even made is the first and lesser of the two puzzles I came away with. The second was that the Chicago Sun Times and Roger Ebert went totally overboard in praising it. I can imagine that some misguided individuals in Hollywood thought the film would "work" or at least make a profit, but how some big-time media people be so taken with so awkward an effort really surprises me. I noticed that many professional reviewers rated the film well below 50/100 but the few comments by ordinary viewers were even more telling in terms of negative reaction. This film seems to me a perfect example of how too many of the media pros quite often give far more praise to a film than do ordinary viewers. I always read all the professional reviews and find them cleverly written and well worth the reading, but I very often turn to the comments from the crowd to bring me down to earth.

When Will I Be Loved is a story about Vera (Neve Campbell), who seems to be struggling with who she is and what she wants out of life. She has a scheming boyfriend named Ford (Fred Weller) whose character is directly lifted from Phone Booth's Stu Shepard, played by Colin Farrell. The two characters are nearly identical, only Ford is not as likable. Other than this, there is no real storyline going on until, after what seems like an eternity, the last 15-20 minutes. It becomes a cross between Indecent Proposal and Wild Things.

Truthfully, this movie bored me until the 3rd act. There is one main reason most men wanted to see this film, and most of you know what it is. Neve Campbell is featured in her first nude scene. While I am certainly all for her doing this, I believe it was done because her career had become a little stagnant. She has not really done anything to note since Scream. I think she had the right idea to get some attention back on herself, she just picked the wrong movie to do it with. There was not even any real reason to have the nudity. It did nothing for the plot, which was nearly non-existent. It was simply thrown in at the beginning and the end. Again, I'm thankful, but I feel it could have been put to better use in a better film with better meaning. It is the only reason I'm giving this movie 5 of 10 stars.

I watched this movie to look at Neve Campbell.....possibly the reason the movie makers made it. She is beautiful and a fine actress. A lot of the dialog was interesting,seemed to be a lot of ad libbing. What the heck was Lori Singer doing in the movie? Neve's character meets her in the park and says "Hi Lori" and they talk a few minutes about movies. Mike Tyson also makes an appearance as himself and seems to have some acting talent. The film starts and ends with Neve Campbell in a shower. The rest is a waste of eyes and ears. I usually agree with Roger Ebert,but he was one of the very few critics that liked the film. He gave it a top rating. Maybe he loves Neve more than me.