L'hôtel New Hampshire

Slowly I realize what Homer Simpson meant when he said: "I wanna be John Irving!" No, seriously, that was just supposed to be a joke. The ONLY movie I know "The Hotel New Hampshire" can be compared to is "The World According to Garp" - as this one based on a novel by John Irving.

Sometimes this movie makes you think that it's a mediocre and senseless one. That it's gross and abnormal. But that is John Irving! Like in "Garp", sex plays a central role in "New Hampshire" - and it's turned upside down. In "Garp", Glenn Close *raped* a dying man. In this movie, Jodie Foster is raped, she and her brother (Rob Lowe) want to make love and know that they will eventually - and they tell each other. They also tell each other everything about their sexual relationships, they talk about whom they fancy and how they should make love with them. Sex is always present in the development of the characters, but at another level as normally, i.e. as the most normal thing of the world, basically.

The main reason why that strange movie works is that the characters are very interesting. They are grotesque, alright, but something makes them real. The point is, that the characters in this movie are allowed to dream and even to be really mad. However, there are frontiers to their freedom, it's just not the same frontiers as we know. They make the frontiers themselves. Their frontiers allow the siblings to make love - on ONE single looong afternoon. And that scene is not as disturbing as it is kind of beautiful and touching, because THESE characters CAN do this! It's the *radicals* in Vienna who bring us back to the real world - still in a grotesque way. Well, and there are sooo many important characters in this movie - that makes it!

The actors are fabulous. Jodie Foster can never be bad, Rob Lowe is believeable and Amanda Plummer is as good as always. A real stand-out is young Jennie Dundas. About twelve or how old she was then, she looks so adult in terms. She does not have to hide opposite stars of Jodie Foster's kind here, she is really great. What she does is make a quite unreal character come to life - quietly but impressive and likeable. Well, it's no normal movie and there should not be many more of its kind. But, though confusing and gross, there are so many things that you must see. The characters, the actors, the freedom to be mad. Almost as good as "Garp"; there may be worse movies that I rated 8 out of 10.

Well, no that is probably hyperbole. I thought this movie was disjointed and difficult to grasp. Whereas Garp was a strange movie, indeed, it at least managed to capture some essence of flow. Hotel New Hampshire was choppy and more like a series of stories than one whole story. The elements that dragged the pieces together, like the Dog Who Would Not Go Away, etc, gave a comical lift to the otherwise tragic and painful story.

On an off note, the ratings for this movie listed its R rating as being caused by Language, Violence, and Nudity. It neglected to mention the rape. For those who have no desire to witness something on those lines, here's your warning should you have not read the book.

I am a big movie fan and I'm certainly not one to ever tell anyone what to watch and to not try to enjoy a movie each his own we all have our own tastes and opinions but I have to say for a film with so much talent involved I hated this film in fact it probably ranks as one of the worse if not the worse film I ve ever seen!!!In fact just like another reviewer wrote I specifically decided to review this film because of how terrible it was and bad taste this film left in my mouth, but again this is just my opinion watch it and make up your own mind This whole film though I realize it was trying to be quirky didn't make any sense at all.

This offbeat and quirky comedy is a bit too pretentious to work. It's an interesting cast, and most try but none of the characters are likable. They are too dysfunctional and bizarre and director Tony Richardson never develops them past the superficial characters they are. It goes on way too long for a film of this type. It's very disjointed and never appeals to the viewer like it should. And even though the humor is dry, I was rarely amused. Richardson's quest to be avant-garde and original misfires and we are left with a cold film with no substance. Rob Lowe is in over his head, Jodie Foster is quite good though, and Paul McCrane and Wilford Brimley do well. The rest of the cast is unremarkable.

This is a perfect example of why good, literary novels shouldn't be made into films. I read this book (along with his other best-sellers "World According to Garp" and "Cider House Rules") back in the 80's when they were published, and I thought they were great, serious works of fiction full of colorful, off-the wall characters fleshed out in engaging prose. Unfortunately, all of this is lost in this film adaptation.

I don't know who Tony Richardson is, and if he directed any other movies, but if they are as poorly-lit, badly-recorded, ineptly edited, and haphazardly narrated as this one is, I'll pass.

Although the movie sticks pretty closely to the original, it just doesn't work on the screen. The first third of the book, dealing with the first Hotel New Hampshire, is truncated into a five minute, voiced-over series of vignettes under the opening credits. This is all of the movie you need to see, because the director uses his entire bag of tricks here.

We seem to enter in the middle of a story, one everyone (except you) seems to already be familiar with. Random characters and situations are thrown at you, with no apparent continuity, sense, or narrative flow. When the story gets dark or uncomfortable, the director resorts to cheap gimmicks like fast-action photography. It may have been funny when the Keystone Kops did it, but it is most definitely UNfunny here.

Wallace Shawn, sporting a bad wig, motorcycle jacket and towing a performing bear, shows up and just as suddenly, disappears. (We do encounter him later in the film, but now he's bald and blind, and although he's back in his native Vienna, his German accent seems to come and go mysteriously. It's also 10 or 15 years later, apparently but somehow he's the only one who is any older.) Rob Lowe looks pretty and vapid. Jodie Foster looks sexy, talks dirty, and acts tough. Beau Bridges just looks befuddled most of the time. And the actress (whoever she is ) who plays the mother has such a tiny part that she barely registers.

Incest, rape, murder, accidental death, suicide, radical German nihilists with bombs, pornography, and a lesbian in a bear suit are all in this movie, and it's all BORING.

All I can recommend is that you read the book. Everything that is confusing, depressing, and just plain weird in this movie makes great, if quirky, sense in the book.