A movie with both strengths and weaknesses. The story has three salesmen -- or marketers as they like to call themselves -- holed up in a hotel room waiting and hoping for the Big Kahuna, the jackpot client, to show up at their party.
Among the strengths, the sterling cast -- Kevin Spacey as the wisecracking but perceptive pusher; Danny DeVito as the recently divorced, troubled friend; and Peter Facinelli as the morally pure Baptist acolyte. That's about the whole cast, and there's basically one setting -- that arid hotel room -- because this play hasn't really been opened up much.
The actors -- I don't know how to put this -- but they LOOK right for their parts. Kevin Spacey as they guy who debases most others, and Facinelli as the plain-faced innocent are especially good. Danny DeVito may be the weakest of the trio, if only because he never really LOOKS depressed. Can you imagine a suicidally melancholic Danny DeVito?
Another strength is in the lines written for Spacey's character. His dialog varies from resignation to something that turns logic into an Escher drawing or a Mobius strip, in which everything seems to lead back to where it began. Some are hilarious.
Alas, a play or movie has to be ABOUT something. The diverse salesmen as a way of exploring character is so old that it MUST be trustworthy, from the Maysles brothers' "Salesman", to "Tin Men" and "Glen Gary Glen Ross." Yet, we don't know what these guys are supposed to be selling, some kind of lubricant, but that's all.
And there's a religious element of the kind that's best left masked by events. Not only does Facinelli continually reveal his spiritual purity but Danny DeVito, unprovoked, spins a long and improbable story of a dream he had about rescuing God who was hiding in a closet after some calamity.
I said it was "improbable" only because my own dreams are entirely lacking in the kind of clarity, unity, and organization that DeVito's dream had. Also, while I'm at it, is it okay if I register a minor complaint to whoever is in charge of the lighting that I'm getting pretty fed up with the overuse of burnt orange? And they're too dark too. And can I please have more women and fewer ogres?
When the characters discuss God and religion and all that, it sounds like a couple of college sophomores earnestly schmoozing over some weed. It all seems like an attempt to elevate the story to a plane on which it simply doesn't belong.
The strengths outpace the weaknesses by a head.
Among the strengths, the sterling cast -- Kevin Spacey as the wisecracking but perceptive pusher; Danny DeVito as the recently divorced, troubled friend; and Peter Facinelli as the morally pure Baptist acolyte. That's about the whole cast, and there's basically one setting -- that arid hotel room -- because this play hasn't really been opened up much.
The actors -- I don't know how to put this -- but they LOOK right for their parts. Kevin Spacey as they guy who debases most others, and Facinelli as the plain-faced innocent are especially good. Danny DeVito may be the weakest of the trio, if only because he never really LOOKS depressed. Can you imagine a suicidally melancholic Danny DeVito?
Another strength is in the lines written for Spacey's character. His dialog varies from resignation to something that turns logic into an Escher drawing or a Mobius strip, in which everything seems to lead back to where it began. Some are hilarious.
Alas, a play or movie has to be ABOUT something. The diverse salesmen as a way of exploring character is so old that it MUST be trustworthy, from the Maysles brothers' "Salesman", to "Tin Men" and "Glen Gary Glen Ross." Yet, we don't know what these guys are supposed to be selling, some kind of lubricant, but that's all.
And there's a religious element of the kind that's best left masked by events. Not only does Facinelli continually reveal his spiritual purity but Danny DeVito, unprovoked, spins a long and improbable story of a dream he had about rescuing God who was hiding in a closet after some calamity.
I said it was "improbable" only because my own dreams are entirely lacking in the kind of clarity, unity, and organization that DeVito's dream had. Also, while I'm at it, is it okay if I register a minor complaint to whoever is in charge of the lighting that I'm getting pretty fed up with the overuse of burnt orange? And they're too dark too. And can I please have more women and fewer ogres?
When the characters discuss God and religion and all that, it sounds like a couple of college sophomores earnestly schmoozing over some weed. It all seems like an attempt to elevate the story to a plane on which it simply doesn't belong.
The strengths outpace the weaknesses by a head.