Prozac Nation (2001)

Trite garbage

In the real world of art Elizabeth Wurtzel is the sexy drama queen every guy wants to do, but no guy wants to wake up next to. Her on-screen portrayer, Christina Ricci, is the ugly artsy wannabe girl that desperately wants every and any guy, but no guy will touch her. That's why, in Prozac Nation, the unreleased 2001 film of Wurtzel's 1990s bestseller book of the same name, there are immediate problems. Ok, the problems start before the miscast of Ricci, who has the emotional range of a thimble- is it any wonder that, by far, her finest acting was in the two Addams Family films? First off, she is bizarre looking- with big eyes and a bulging forehead, making her look like the fetal Starchild from 2001: A Space Odyssey. Secondly, she always plays whiney brats. But, thirdly, is the way films try to make it appear any guy would be attracted to her. In one scene in the film her pal Ruby (Michelle Williams) and Liz walk through Harvard, and all the guys' tongues are wagging at Ricci, not the super-cute and sexy Williams. Hello....Reality check time.... This material begged for the Andy Warhol treatment. Here is his version of the film. A five minute shot of a hypodermic needle. A five minute shot of Wurtzel's hairy pudenda. A five minute shot of her sleeping naked and stoned on the bed. She rises, gives the middle finger to the audience. Cue credits. See, less than twenty minutes to distill Wurtzel's whole life. And, oh yeah, Warhol's film would not have cast Ricci. Even Michelle Williams would have been better, and after seeing Ricci's pallid bosom, I'd take anything Williams or any other babe had to offer me cinematically. Ricci is almost the kiss of death for a film, and how she stays working is a mystery. Think of her performances in mediocre to bad films like Monster, Sleepy Hollow, and Woody Allen's Anything Else- also co-starring Jason Biggs, and now picture another actress in her role, and immediately the films could seem better, if not great. She is the female counterpart to banal, wooden, milquetoast actors like Tom Cruise and Leonardo Dicaprio. September 15, 2008

Picked up from the Discount bin

I picked up this movie from a discount bin because it had a picture of Christina Richie on it. She has always intrigued me. I was stunned to find a movie of substance and deep emotional material.

Late the other night, I was tired, but not enough to sleep, so I popped Prozac Nation into my DVD player and watched. I wondered, why didn't I know more about this movie which had such talented actors in it? As the movie progressed I was amazed at the quality in acting, the beautiful cinematography, the flowing direction which neither tried to placate me or reduce the story to idiocy such that I could get it on the first try.

Prozac Nation is exactly the kind of movie I want. It has depth and truth and tells it like it is. It wasn't until near the end that I even realized that this was a movie about depression. When it was over I was transfixed, eager to know more about the writer, pleased that Ms Richie took on such a complicated and misunderstood subject, amazed at the astounding performance of Jessica Lange.

That night I couldn't sleep. My mind was racing analyzing what I had just experienced. I wanted to know more only to find mixed review. Rotten Tomatoes gave it the worst movie of 2005. The lack of interest in the movie sadden me, I needed to know more. Finally after more searching I discovered this site with people who found this movie as amazing as I did. I was not alone in my admiration of a story so well told.

I have such disdain for movies these days, so little substance and nothing of real value. It is rare that a movie can affect me as Prozac Nation did. If you are interested in a movie which does not lower itself to the typical lethargic audience of today and want to provoke your thoughts and emotions then I recommend you see this movie.
April 28, 2008

Unfortunately, as usual, try reading the book

A decent film about a young woman's battle with Mental illness. I would guess though that the book was better. The ending of this seemed rushed. Unfortunatley, the movies seemed choppy, melodramatic, and just kinda blah. Worth watching, kinda interesting for a person that works in the field. April 14, 2008

Always look for the "Root of the Family Problems."

I would recommend this movie to all families experiencing "problems." The beautiful Christina Ricci portrays Elizabeth Wurtzel life. This is based on Wurtzel's own memoir on addiction. In this movie Lizzie's parents are totally disconnected. With each disconnection, it reinforces Lizzie's need to self medicate with alcohol and other drugs. She is medicating emotional pains that will not go away. Of course the pains won't go away, since her parents screwed up her life.

In true life, Ms. Ricci's parents also divorced and she went through a period of "self injury and issues with self esteem." Ms. Wurtzel is currently studying to be a lawyer. This field has a high rate of depression, burn out, and can be emotionally taxing. Good luck to her.

Parents are usually in another world when they began to divide their child emotionally. They are too caught up in their heated arguments, hatred, tempers, back and forth blaming that they forget how the child is suffering from all the chaos. I hold parents completely responsible for child-related family issues. It will take many more years to finally come to grips with why our youth are so troubled. All ways look to the root of the family problems. March 9, 2008

None of the Virtures of the Book

I really liked the book version of Prozac Nation. It is a hard read in places, parts of it seem like the author wrote them on speed, the protagonist is also the antagonist, it drags a bit in places... but it perfectly captures the zietgiest, it is so baldly, terribly honest that it makes you flinch, and by the end, after you have been through ten years of depression, therapy, and bad behavior with Lizzie, you are just relieved that the Prozac worked. That is a huge element that I think most people take away from the book, that while Prozac or SSRIs in general can be a godsend for some people, they have become almost absurdly overprescribed, and not after a decade of treatment, but a 15 minute medical consultation.

The movie leaves all this behind. Yes, Lizzie is hard to watch, but there is no further, deeper explaination. And the writers of the screenplay tried to condense ten years into one, and the story arc really suffers for that. There is no plot-- and while you could make the argument that the book was plotless, the movie version becomes ultraplotless. Rather than the meandering of the book, the movie is oddly stagnant. The worst thing I can say about this movie is that it completely misses the point of the book- the misgivings the author has about psychiatry, even though it has helped her; the misgivings she has about a physically healthy person taking drugs after drugs, even though she needs them to function; the malaise of an entire nation of people (NOT just the author) that seems to have become a sign of the times. In the end, all the awareness of the author's world has been stripped away by the filmmakers, and left an already selfish and self-destructive characterization into an even more self absorbed character. The movie version of Lizzie is almost nothing at all.

On the plus side of this movie, the acting is strong. Way too strong for such a pitiful script, and the actors seem to know it. Jessica Lange, in particular, acts like she's in a different movie altogether. Only Christina Ricci seems to really inhabit this movie, and she is compelling, the only unequivocally good thing about this film.

This movie got shelved for years because it isn't very good, and moreover, it isn't at all true to a book that was, in it's way, quite groundbreaking. It's just too bad. March 7, 2008

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