Matchstick Men

[cine]

I actually feel Matchstick Men is his best work. The runner up for me would be Blackhawk Down (that movie was just unjustifiably raped at the oscars), then Thelma and Louise, Someone to Watch Over Me, and then either 1492 or Blade Runner. I think that would be my own top 5.

[Alethia]

1492

I really HATED that movie.  I like most of his other shit though.  and i'd have to agree with whoever said it above me a few posts, I think Blade Runner is my fave.  blackhawk down i loved.  alien, well, just really cool.  matchstick men, i liked, but i already posted why i didnt love it.  hannibal was ok.  thelma and louise is really good, someone to watch over me was ok, gladiator i actually really liked (for certain reasons), and i also really like the duellists.

[abuck1220]

spoilers abound....

i also didn't particularly care for the wrapped up ending, but i felt as though the movie kind of sealed its own fate in a funny way. what i mean is this -- the "first" ending (cage realizing he's been duped totally -- no doctors, no shrink, no $, no daughter) is almost TOO harsh of an ending to pin on a guy the audience has come to know and love. i mean, that's just rough. so, unless they wanted the audience walking out of the theatre feeling really crumby they HAD to tack on the ending like they did. the super-rough quasi-ending written for cage's character kind of forced their hand in a way.

[edison]

Screw viewing, try owning.

well thats what i meant, i guess i should have written it that way. and besides, who wants to buy it now when somewhere down the line that special edition is sure to be released on dvd.

[Pas]

Great great movie ! Cage totally owned the role and I'm really starting to like this Sam Rockwell guy.

I felt it should hav ended with Cage screaming in front of her ex-wife's door though. That would have been awesome.

[Finn]

I agree that the last two minutes in the store was probably not appropriate. it was like they were trying to wrap everything in a nice feel-good bow.

[Vivian Darkbloom]

This movie is not the sixth sense !

I actually liked the movie a lot as I was seeing it and I likedit a lot better when the ending came (not the supermarket scene but the one in  the store). It had to end like this because the movie then becomes a metaphor of its therapy (remember Freud used to say the patient has to pay with cash for every session in order to feel the transfer... In a way, that's what Cage's character does.) And it's also more vastly a metaphor of human relathionships : in the end, even know they both know they're lyring to each other, they're still pretending because it's easier, it's more relieving...
If the movie actually ended with Cage screaming, it would have ruined everything.

[Jeremy Blackman]

Then, the revealing ending. it was cheap and destructable, but not what announced a bad ending. That came when the situation amounted to the girl killing the guy in the final confrotation. That was cheap thriller ending in every sense. The revelation itself was predictable. Any fan of Mamet saw that coming a mile away. Mamet was more for the con and clever in his movies so you felt less robbed by the gimmickery of a "turn the table" kind of ending. And of course, general rule in my opinion when a movie rests on a "surprise" ending, it usually suggests a shit film.

I agree. The end was terrible. And it doesn't even make sense. Mamet would cry at the mess the movie makes of its manipulative minutia. There's far too much to explain. There are just too many steps in the process. Event one leads to event two, which, through a minefield of innumerable, small, uncontrollable events, leads to event three, which perfectly sets up the twist ending. Unless they left a scene of divine intervention out of the final cut, I don't buy it.

[MacGuffin]

I was really enjoying this movie. It had a nice relationship going between Cage and Lohman; along the lines of "Paper Moon"... But then the ending came.


*SPOILERS*



It really raped that relationship. It was a joy to see the two of them learning from each other. The final con went against the rest of the movie. It seemed too much of a leap to explain it as, "Roy, you always said to go for it when you see it." Roy says, he'll 'take' anybody (fat, lonely, etc.) But this became more personal (using Roy's ex-wife, his ticks, his long lost daughther) than a con.

[abbey road]

i really hated it, i think nick cage (who i nrmally love) was going to far to the point of overacting/self-parody, the stor was way to confused upon weather it was a con film or a film with a point to it, the end, especially the con, wa horrible, i felt abused watching how the movie ended- i could have been waaaay better- but the cinematography was great, and ridley scott, even in bad descions, does a good directing job.

[Gold Trumpet]

A lot of this movie was organic in that it rested on characters and such. So much trickery for trickery's sake as if the characters weren't interesting enough to leave alone (Actually, I tend to agree with this though the solution falls flat also). In all that is bad with the ending, I will agree with Vivian Darkbloom's analysis on the final scene. It's a nice little touch. An ending of Cage just losing it all would have been further into genre cliche and out of the body (as all the trickery as well) of the film when focused on characters. A movie with better development and story would have made this final scene even better.

~rougerum

[©brad]

spoilers abound.

I was really enjoying this movie. It had a nice relationship going between Cage and Lohman; along the lines of "Paper Moon"... But then the ending came.


*SPOILERS*



It really raped that relationship. It was a joy to see the two of them learning from each other. The final con went against the rest of the movie. It seemed too much of a leap to explain it as, "Roy, you always said to go for it when you see it." Roy says, he'll 'take' anybody (fat, lonely, etc.) But this became more personal (using Roy's ex-wife, his ticks, his long lost daughther) than a con.

well let me get the good stuff out of the way; performances across the board were terrific, as was the cinematography. im amazed at scott's ability to make any shot, be it in a ford, an ugly doctor's office, in parking lots- all beautiful ones! and hans zimmer's score, well, i think the source music kinda drowned out the score itself, but nevertheless, it works.

i have mixed feelings on the ending. i didn't know what to think of it at first when we were driving home. one things for sure- it was certainly one of scott's more manipulative movies, if not the most. essentially what the movie is telling us is that everyone's a suspect and to believe in human decency is pointless cuz u can't trust anyone. this makes me question the final shot w/ the cashier- after going through the anal raping he did, would he fall so easily for this chick? what if it was yet another con? how could u trust anyone after that?

i tell u what would have been a better ending- angela has a change of heart as a result of her time spent w/ cage, and when she is suppose to do her part in the end, she ends up fucking roy and the other dude, leaving them high and dry. she comes back to cage's place to find him sitting in his living room, cleaning his carpet, chainsmoking, depressed, only to give him back his money. then they take off for hawaii.

see, that would've been better.

actually im not sure that would work either. u see, its doing my head in cuz there r times when i think the ending really does work.  

anyhow, the movie is defintely one to see. sum funny stuff in it too.

[MacGuffin]

*SPOILERS*

Just thought of something. Correct me if I'm wrong, but at the beginning, Roy knocks over his bottle of pills and needs to find his shrink to get more, right? How would Rockwell's character have known this was going to happen? The whole con depended on Cage going to this new shrink recommended by Rockwell since it played into the whole finding the daughter, etc. And while I could believe Roy would have fallen for the rest, it seems like a big gaping plot hole that the pill spill could have been calculated into the con.

[Jeremy Blackman]

SPOILERS

Just thought of something. Correct me if I'm wrong, but at the beginning, Roy knocks over his bottle of pills and needs to find his shrink to get more, right? How would Rockwell's character have known this was going to happen? The whole con depended on Cage going to this new shrink recommended by Rockwell since it played into the whole finding the daughter, etc. And while I could believe Roy would have fallen for the rest, it seems like a big gaping plot hole that the pill spill could have been calculated into the con.

That's what I was thinking. Like I said, there are too many steps in the process. I guess Rockwell's character could have waited for his supply to run out and rigged the doctor being out of town thing. But still, they would have had to know A LOT about Roy, and mostly things that Roy doesn't even know, to predict that he would respond to the psychiatrist every time in every way he did... i.e. not really needing medication, having guilt about his previous marriage, having a secret urge for a paternal relationship, NEVER contacting his ex-wife (even about the custody thing), NEVER dropping off or picking up his daughter at her house or trying to call her or contact her at her house. It goes on. Besides, Mamet has taught us that there are much easier cons.

[godardian]

I was really surprised by how little I disliked this. It was mostly the cutesy, "comic" stuff and Nic Cage hamming... the Ridley Scott Stuff was more or less vintage, though.