Highball

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Dennui S @dennui Oct 1 Worth watching if you like Noah Baumbach films. Not his best but or most polished, but it's interesting to see the precursor to his classic mumblecores. See more 09/12/2011 Good choice to take your name off this one, Baumbach. Great cast ruined by a horrible script and some of the worst cinematography I've ever seen. If you have a low budget and only 6 days to shoot, shoot natural light. It was so harsh that it hurt to watch. The characters all have the Baumbach trait to them. It's a good concept to have the film contain 3 parties, and each party we see these "friends" change. Why do they keep coming together? They don't seem to like each other very much. Peter Bogdanovich's character seems to be there just because Baumbach wanted Bogdanovich in the film. Something was really lacking though. The dialogue was off, so were the performances, so was the cinematography. Highball tries to be witty but fails, which is insane for Baumbach. He does it so well with Mr. Jealousy and Kicking and Screaming. Not really worth watching, even for the biggest Baumbach fans. See more 08/31/2011 Best cast ever for a low budget, relatively terrible movie See more 05/15/2010 Link to my blog! http://www.cinemaenthusiast.com/highball-1997/ See more 12/29/2009 Just a mere 5 years before Noah Baumbach released the amazing, touching, funny Squid and the Whale (2005), he wrote and directed a comedy of manners called Highball. The next words on this page will discuss this particular film, though some words may appear that talk about other subjects. You are advised not to trust those particular words. For reasons I don't understand, Baumbach directed Highball under the name Ernie Fusco, and credited the script to Jesse Carter. In fact, the only credit he took in the production was for a birthday song that appears at various points in the film, including the credits, with the amazingly creative lyrics, "Everybody Felix/It's Felix's Birthday!". The movie is split into three parts, each being a different dinner party. Most of the characters appear in all three parties, separated over a few month period. There really is very little to say about the plot, it's delightfully absent for the first part. For example, Felix, probably the funniest character in the film, is inexplicably comatose in the final party, and the characters only hint at his condition. For some reason, this makes the entire scene that much more amusing. This movie simply has one of the funnier scripts I've ever seen. By eschewing any basic elements of plot and story, the film instead focuses on the characters' interactions with each other, which always end in laughs. Highly recommended for someone in need of a good, silly comedy. See more Read all reviews

Highball

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