Igby

This film doesn't make us feel for any of its characters, but it's so full of memorable vignettes, it's hard to forget about this. It's dark and depressing but at the same time consistent in tone and so full of wonderful performances it just sticks in your memory.

Igby's life consists of one disappointment after another. We soon meet his ruinantly self-absorbed mother (Susan Sarandon), who treats her boys like full-grown adults. 'I call her Mimi because 'Heinous One' would be a bit cumbersome,' Igby remarks. And there's his schizophrenic dad (Bill Pullman) who has long since been confined to a 'home for the befuddled'. Igby's and his preppy brother Oliver (Ryan Phillippe) have nothing but contempt for their mother. When Igby has just been kicked out - again - of his latest prep school, he is sent to a military academy by his mother, but he swipes her credit card and absconds to an airport hotel in the Midwest. Soon he is dishonorably discharged and sucks his way in by his mother's new wealthy friend D. H. Baines, wonderfully played by Jeff Goldblum, who almost seems to play himself.

Two women play a crucial role in his life, both of them he meets at a cocktail party at "D.H."'s lavish Hamptons home. There's Rachel, a memorable role by Amanda Peet, truly astonishing. I knew her face, but I cannot recall other roles of her. And there is Sookie Sapperstein (Claire Danes), a waitress at the party and couple of years older college student, with whom Igby falls in love. But his brother is becoming a romantic rival or Sookie and when Igby crashes in D.H's fancy Manhattan apartment, in which Rachel is taking residence, he becomes entangled in an ever more downward spiral.

First-time director Burr Steers, who also scripted, filled this one with some very smart, observative and acidic dialog, and Kiera Culkin shows he can carry a film with a very good performance. And where has he been the last four years? Since this one he hasn't appeared in any other films. On the IMDb message boards there are some hilarious speculations about how he is supposedly "on weed". I don't know about that. He's probably going through some rough times, but I hope he'll be back soon. It would be a shame to lose an actor like him.

Camera Obscura --- 8/10

There's no question aspects of this are quite brutal. But the theme of the story dictates they would be so.

Igby Goes Down is about a kid in nowhere's land. He doesn't know where he's going in life and responds to this by being a rebel in everything. Add to this his parental instability with a schizophrenic father and a tyrannical mother and you can understand why he'd be a little mixed up.

In many ways it is a coming of age story, but in others it is too dark to be that. Indeed there is an ambivalence of themes with hope and despair featured in equal measure.

As Igby, Kieran Culkin excels. He's outstanding, the best thing in the movie - which given the quality of his peers, such as a sinister and agenda-ridden Jeff Goldblum, a monstrous and hierarchial Susan Sarandon, a confused and tortured Bill Pullman and a squeaky clean upstart in Ryan Phillippe, is no mean feat at all.

Performances are uniformly excellent, the story involving, and the themes well explored.

Well done all round.

I was very impressed by the movie and all the actors taking part in it. The story is very rich and allows the spectator to get emotionally involved in multiple ways. There is a good thing about a movie that finishes and leaves you with the feeling of wanting to know more about many of the characters in the movie. I particularly love all the unexpected moments, lines and situations in the movie without being exagerated or out of place. Excellent, for people who wants to see something different and still mainstream.

I had to drive to effin Antwerp, Belgium to see this movie, because it was taken out of Dutch cinemas after running just for one week. And that is something that I don't understand, or maybe I do, because this is not the typical Hollywood feel-good movie. The story could have been based on a early nineties novel by Jay McInerney or Bret Easton Ellis, but it is an original screenplay by writer and director Burr Steers. The mood is very dark, the acting is top shelf and the oneliners are sharp as razorblades. Kieran Culkin and Ryan Philippe are perfectly (type)casted and the choice of music is plain wonderful. The scene where Igby runs off through Central Park accompanied by Coldplay's Don't Panic is close to perfection. I enjoyed this movie very much and I think it paints a very accurate picture of the lives of spoiled, rich kids. Go see it!

Ten out of ten. One of the greats, with memorable characters you'll think about for days. This great film got caught in MGM/UA distribution purgatory. If it could have busted out of the indy circuit from day one and gotten into general release, it would have been favorably compared with "The Graduate" and Kieran Culkin's performance with Dustin Hoffman's debut performance in that Mike Nichol's classic. MGM/UA blew it.

Culkin is a great young player with a look and resources evoking both Hoffman and Robert Downey. He's naturalistic and great to watch. Smart, funny, urbane writing by first time director Steers is never "on the nose". Yet underneath the evasive, sarcastic stripped down dialogue he pulls hard hitting emotions from his ensemble. Not a false or wasted scene and more than a few really powerful ones. Every player is at the top of their game, from Kieran Culkin to Amanda Peet, Jeff Goldblum to Susan Sarandon, Bill Pullman to Claire Danes to Ryan Phillippe. They're obviously guided by a director who knows how to work with an ensemble to get an overall tone.

Igby is the anti Ferris Beuhler - a smart wanna be who's wise mouth and attitude usually piss off those around him - his mother, his brother, his godfather. Torn between those who don't get him and those who do (Peet, Danes), Igby paints all his relationships with the same sarcastic brush, his vulnerability only busting out when he's pushed to the limit. Culkin's perfomance is not to be missed. The key women, Sarandon, Peet and Danes all play fully formed characters. Goldblum is perfect for his role, his usual facile acting style well suited to the South Hampton prince he plays; his best turn in years.

Seers has style and flow, and his final cut is aided by the excellent music choices he and his music supervisor, Nick Harcourt arrived at. Cameron Crowe couldn't do better. The Igby soundtrack is tres alt moderne and every cut is great.

Warning: Actors are blocked (brilliantly) for wide screen format. So this film will suffer from TV / video screen ratios as the Graduate does. Either go see it in the theater NOW or wait for letterbox!