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Hemingway's Garden of Eden

Play trailer Poster for Hemingway's Garden of Eden R 2010 1h 51m Drama Romance Play Trailer Watchlist
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4% Tomatometer 24 Reviews 21% Popcornmeter 500+ Ratings
During an extended honeymoon in Europe, a restless wife (Mena Suvari) tests her husband's (Jack Huston) devotion by inviting a sultry Italian woman into their inner circle.
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Hemingway's Garden of Eden

Hemingway's Garden of Eden

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Critics Consensus

Garden of Eden dramatizes Ernest Hemingway's clipped storytelling without carrying over the intelligence that undergirded the author's writing, yielding a thin drama full of artifice and no feeling.

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Critics Reviews

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Keith Uhlich Time Out 05/19/2023
2/5
An overly bookish dissection of romance, gender and obsession. Go to Full Review
Jesse Cataldo Slant Magazine 12/18/2010
1.5/4
In this Riviera vacation atmosphere, all sun, sand, and skin, the dialectic of opposites the film attempts to enforce instead melts down to little more than kinky foreplay. Go to Full Review
Cary Darling Dallas Morning News 12/10/2010
2/5
It just seems like a bunch of actors playing dress-up. Go to Full Review
Brian Orndorf BrianOrndorf.com 03/14/2011
D-
Sex has never felt more repellent after watching Eden, a clumsy effort of eroticism and psychological gamesmanship that's utterly devoid of structure and feeling. It's an awful picture. Go to Full Review
Kimberly Gadette Indie Movies Online 01/07/2011
1/10
The question that occurs is not whether director Irvin hates actors but rather, how much. We can imagine him shouting to the cast: 'Once more, with less feeling. Get shallow! Can't you do worse than that?' Go to Full Review
Robert Levin Critic's Notebook 12/14/2010
1.5/4
A soft-core, Jazz Age skin flick masquerading as high art. Go to Full Review
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Audience Reviews

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Sep 19 The worst movie ever.. is this a film school project.??..I made myself watch the entire movie.. The Andy Warhol cartoonish platinum wigs … ??? Actors from a high school play ??? The Wardrobe was a feeling of Americans imitating French people in “it’s a small world” ride at Disney Land ..…a total embarrassment. I had to turn away at all of the sex scenes.. Lol See more Al S Jul 1 I thought the film was lovely to watch and that it reminded me of Hemingway's style in how the personal conflicts developed among its characters. The three main character's attractiveness is reason alone to watch this film. See more 01/10/2021 Solid cast and good directing. A fair take on the Hemingway novel, but the characters and their motivations seemed thin. See more 09/12/2015 hmmm another lost review-don't know why I bother See more 02/24/2013 An intriguing Hemingway adaption. See more 10/02/2012 A writer and his wife take up with an Italian woman, and the three form an odd love triangle filled with lust and temptation. Garden of Eden confuses me. I haven't read the novel, but after the film, I want to. From what I can tell from the film, it seems like a first draft -- ideas that Papa plays with but hasn't developed into real characters yet. As Catherine transforms herself and her husband into carbon copies and as Catherine expresses her sexual obsession with Marita, it seems like Hemingway is exploring the slippery nature of sexuality -- how one can experiment with one's sexual identity. But what Hemingway specifically says about this concept remains unclear. It's doubtless that the story David writes -- told in flashbacks starring Matthew Modine -- is a mess. It's Hemingway's fantasies about manhood expressed through hunting and domination over nature. But this story has little to do with the frame story and doesn't give us any significant insight into David's character. Overall, I wonder if the novel is this incomplete because although the film has the beginnings of some interesting additions to Hem's oeuvre, it ultimately doesn't amount to much. See more Read all reviews
Hemingway's Garden of Eden

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Movie Info

Synopsis During an extended honeymoon in Europe, a restless wife (Mena Suvari) tests her husband's (Jack Huston) devotion by inviting a sultry Italian woman into their inner circle.
Director
John Irvin
Producer
Lorne Thyssen, Tim Lewiston, Bob Mahoney
Screenwriter
James Scott Linville
Distributor
Roadside Attractions
Production Co
Devonshire Productions, Freeform Spain, Berwick Street Productions
Rating
R (Nudity|Strong Sexual Content|Some Language)
Genre
Drama, Romance
Original Language
English
Release Date (Theaters)
Dec 10, 2010, Limited
Release Date (Streaming)
Mar 15, 2011
Box Office (Gross USA)
$22.1K
Runtime
1h 51m
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