Sorry, Haters (2006)

The Dust Has Finally Settled...For Most Of Us.A story of anger revenge and retribution so timely it could be true. It begins when Ashade (Abdellatif Kechiche) a Muslim cab driver picks up Phoebe (Robin Wright Penn) a well-heeled professional woman. When Phoebe becomes interested in exonerating Ashade's imprisoned brother a series of events are set in motion resulting in the revelation of a devastating hidden truth.System Requirements:Running Time: 83 MinutesFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA Rating: NR UPC: 796019795111 Manufacturer No: 79511 Product Description

Sorry, indeed...

Inconsistant, but it does keep you riveted to your seat. Robin Wright Penn has her moments in this film, and those moments are pretty creepy. However, this film was entirely unfocused and awkward at times, and while it attempted to be unique and original, this subject matter has been explored before in other films...and with much better results, I might add. The ending is one BIG cliche. See only for Robin Wright Penn's performance. April 3, 2008

A Sorry Mess

Phoebe (Robin Wright Penn), a divorced and detached staffer for a New York based, MTV style music video network, longs for the mood and feeling of 9/11--most especially for the way her self-absorbed boss Phyllis (Sandra Oh) had relied on her for emotional support back then. Trouble begins when Syrian-born cabdriver Ashade (actor/director Abdellatif Kechiche) picks up Phoebe and he tells her about his family's problems. Phoebe starts deceiving Ashade, letting him think she can help get his innocent brother released from detention in Guantanamo. After Ashade realizes Phoebe's mental instability and consequently distances himself from her, Phoebe turns ugly and plots revenge upon the Middle Easterner, and his French-Canadian sister-in-law (Eloise Bouchez), who is illegally resident in this country, as well.

SORRY, HATERS actually could have been a good psychodrama if it wasn't such an arty and self-indulgent mess. Being shot within in little over two weeks with a DV recorder, it stylistically has the feel of an amateur film posted on YouTube. Robin Wright Penn seems very uncomfortable in her role, looking in several scenes as if she's saying "What am I doing here?" to herself. Kechiche's lines are simply incomprehensible, mumbling in broken English and yelling in Arabic (while subtitles are provided for the Arabic dialogue, I suggest you activate your close captioning for whenever this guy speaks). Moreover, Kechiche, a Tunisian, is seriously miscast; Syrians, like the Lebanese, have much Greek, Roman, and Armenian blood flowing through their veins, and are generally more fair-skinned than this actor (think of Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad). For some reason Americans--regardless of whichever end of the political spectrum they congregate--feel this need to stress the notion of color difference into our dealings with Muslims, despite those differences being slight and, for the most part, illusory.

What is most disturbing, however, is the attempt SORRY, HATERS makes to force upon sane and rational viewers its message that we Americans are really the nihilistic predators and terrorizers. As with many nowadays who are socially and politcally left-of-center, it wants for us to acknowledge our society's consumerist ambitions, in combination with increased emotional alienation and self-loathing, as something as hateful and destructive as any extreme Islamist ideology.

Speaking of self-loathing, this movie's writer and director, Jeff Stanzler, is overwhelmed by it. There is some major--albeit confused--contempt for the trendy and the 'progressive,' who, assumedly, inhabit Stanzler's personal and professional life. Naturally, a man as devout as Ashade (who keeps to his ablutions and prayers under even the most stressful situations) doesn't merely enter into some sort of relationship with a strange middle-aged American woman, he also handles dogs, allows alcohol in his home and, better yet, recognizes and supports his brother's kafir wife. Yes, of course, we do have the gratuitous scene of thuggish Homeland Security agents copping cheap feels (naturally) off of Ashade's homely sister-in-law after she passes out from interrogation. But it's those characters and types, otherwise often favorably portrayed in independent films such as this, which are the real targets of Stanzler's disdain: Phoebe's boss, Phyllis MacIntyre, the head of a major cable music channel, is married to a slight and diminutive house husband, complete with downy beard and a moptop of hair. Stanzler shows Phyllis to be mercenary and a narcissist, producing violent, expletive-ridden rap videos, but whose top rated program, "Sorry, Haters," a CRIBS-style reality show that glorifies the ghetto fabulous and all things crass and materialistic. Most poignant of all, however, is the type of woman that is Phoebe herself. While Phoebe is portrayed as a successful middle-aged professional, she is also emotionally stunted; a woman who compensates for her ex-husband having full custody of their daughter by doting over her little lapdog and yearning to recapture that moment when Phyllis (who Phoebe despises otherwise) was afraid that the terrorists were coming to get her next and looked to her for security and comfort. Such women once represented the feminist ideal, but Stanzler reduces them to parodies, making it seem as if they are symptomatic of the West's decadence and dysfunction that is polluting the rest of the world. He also seems to be saying that it is from women such as these that men such as Ashade or even the 9/11 hijackers must struggle against with their pious purity. Such sentiments are a disgrace and are as spit in the face of every New Yorker who suffered through that day, regardless of whatever their lifestyles or politics. Others may wonder what it would take to make a Jeff Stanzler understand the trauma and loss of that day. Unfortunately, the Jeff Stanzlers of this country do understand, and they just don't care.

Now about the little dog...Stanzler makes a really cheap shot at the very end with that little pooch. While it is quite unlikely, if I ever come across the man he's got a slap to the back of his head coming from me over the sick finale to this sorry mess of a movie, which stinks worse than a well used port-a-potty on a summer's hottest day.
October 27, 2007

Kelly Capwell, You ROCK

Haha, this is not a pleasant movie to sit through but it boggles my mind how the filmmaker captured a very important type of "New Yorker." I also once again am startled by Sandra Oh. I've seen her in that Chinese Canadian movie, Dancing at the Blue Iguana, Hard Candy and this movie and for some reason, I feel like Sandra Oh's gaze is reaching out of the tv screen and touching my face. She's scary smart and I feel her strength in a movie even when her role is not a large one.

I think Robin Wright is a really interesting actress and a really impressive physical presence. I think she's kind of sneaky in what she is doing but this is not a good movie to stare at her and ponder what the actor is doing to us because I feel that if I look too hard at what she is doing, I will be singed. October 19, 2007

Seth J. Frantzman Got It Right- Good Actors, Horrible Director

It's funny because this film does pull you in and intrigue you at first but it completely falls apart a little over halfway through. The 2 lead actors and the French sister-in-law are great. But even they can't save this mess from a director who obviously thinks that any stupid idea that he comes up with is flowing with artisitic brilliance. By the time the viewer is hit with his surprises toward the end, you just don't care that much because this film has already had more twists than a Chubby Checker concert and the characters are not that well developed. As someone who was at Ground Zero and traumatized by that experience I came away feeling cheated and offended by yet another retarded attempt to cash in on the tragedy. I thought this was going somewhere interesting when the female lead starts talking about her experience that day but unfortunately this ends up being as shameless and pointless as Nicolas Cage in World Trade Center. It's nothing more than a typical film school homework project minus the lesbians and black and white film. June 24, 2007

Rediculous cliche film

This film is so full of cliches and rediculous scenes that it makes one want to cry. The 'religious' Syrian Muslim man grabbing dogs and allowing alcohol in his house, his uncovered sister in law who looks and speaks french, the screaming white women who is really 'crazy' and allows herself to be molested and beaten and that takes part in self mutilation. This is just a rediculous film that in its weak attempts to 'explode prejudice' and 'deal with 9/11' fails miserably.

The director evidently felt that by making the film complicated and giving it 'twists and turns' and trying to be unpredictable that this would solve the problem of the characters, neither of which are realistic or honest. The only thing slightly honest is that the 'religious' Muslim wants to marry the western businesswoman and that she in turn is inticed by her own racist orientalism.

Seth J. Frantzman






May 20, 2007

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