Less Than Zero

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mark g Visually hip, downright stunning cinematography, by far the strongest point of film. Moreover, the film does a great job of conveying the excess of the 1980s party lifestyle a common theme of the author. I am a big Brett Easton Ellis fan and had read the book. This movie is not even close to the darkness or storylines of the book. Downey and Spader carry their roles well. Where the film goes wrong is the casting of McCarthy and Gertz as Clay and Blair. Neither possessed the charisma or acting chops needed here. I also think many storylines of the book should have been included Rated 2/5 Stars •  Rated 2 out of 5 stars 07/15/24 Full Review Chris B I never thought I would say this, but read Roger Ebert's review of Less Than Zero. At a time when every critic in town was bashing that movie, he saw it in a context that would take many- including Brett Easton Ellis, years to come around to. Rated 5/5 Stars •  Rated 5 out of 5 stars 05/01/24 Full Review Jeffrey P With a soundtrack better than other 80's flicks, this was not as much 80's cringe and cheese as I was expecting. Decent film about addiction that isn't candy coated, has some hard hitting messages despite feeling rushed at times. Rated 3/5 Stars •  Rated 3 out of 5 stars 03/24/24 Full Review Daniel J One of the bests performances of Robert, Completely destructive if you associate the life of the character with the life of the actor at the time, great to know that he managed to recover from all addiction and today is about to win an Oscar for his work in Oppenheimer Rated 5/5 Stars •  Rated 5 out of 5 stars 02/06/24 Full Review Charyl R Great soundtrack, excellent cast and a decent story. Rated 4/5 Stars •  Rated 4 out of 5 stars 09/16/23 Full Review Brandi W I was 14 when this movie came out. I probably watched it and didn't get it. So I watched it again last night. McCarthy's performance is borderline mentally absent. I didn't realize how much he struggles with playing anything other than a rich love interest with almost no personality. I get why they gave the characters slightly better character. Because in the book they're self entitled narcissistic turds. Spader is the only realistic character, and Downey Jr portrays addiction well enough, probably due to his own issues IRL. But McCarthy man. It must be hard to act with him. He has like 2 facial expressions: constipated and surprised he's constipated. Which pains me to say because I had such a crush on him. And the script is typical 80's: jumping headfirst into this fantastical scenario and filming their (I guess you could call them) reactions and behaviors that have no context to who they are, so it just all seems so... unrelatable, on any level. Less than 6 months and his two best friends sleep with each other and develop cocaine addiction... seriously? and he returns, like a robot, (true to the story's character I suppose- an unempathetic entitled rich kid) to have a lot of unnecessary sex scenes, exist in a periphery of fashion victims at excessive artsy fartsy parties and engage in conversations between 20-somethings that don't exist IRL... none of which further the story, (just how the 80's producers sold their YA movies to the wishful civilians) and feel so Hollywood, it's like Hollywood believes their own fantasy. A writer didn't write this script. The addiction element is the only validation this movie offers, which is to be expected in the Nancy Reagan era. A tiny fleck of homophobia is a notable twist - as well as a weird almost menage á trois feeling only a male script writer would enjoy 🙄. The "sensuality" was forced and didn't belong. This movie is good for one thing: nostalgia. And Spader. He always delivers. Rated 0.5/5 Stars •  Rated 0.5 out of 5 stars 08/14/23 Full Review Read all reviews

Less Than Zero

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