Punch-Drunk Love

delly

Having recently availed of a bargain range of play.com DVDs, I picked one of the few serious Adam Sandler movies. I vaguely remember seeing part of it somewhere sometime but never really paid attention to it, I have however heard good things from critics.

At this point I can only admit to watching the first half during my lunch break, and will finish it off tomorrow, but already i'm blown away. Sandler does a great performance of playing such a disturbed character and in combination with the score seems ready to go off on one at any stage. As a whole the soundtrack keeps the tension going for long periods of time whereby even after several minutes of mundane happenings, your tense just waiting for some big occurrence. I can see where the second half will be heading, and look forward to finishing it off tomorrow.

Having checked it out, I have a few other titles of Paul Thomas Anderson's work, but will be sure get the rest to make sure i'm not missing out on anything special.

dr.bollocko

It gets my two thumbs up. I can see why a load of people hated it, but for me it is an excellent little movie.

kraggy

If you haven't seen Magnolia, make sure you watch it.

As close to perfection in film making that you will ever see.

TheIrishGrover

kraggy wrote: »

If you haven't seen Magnolia, make sure you watch it.

As close to perfection in film making that you will ever see.

What a load of badly acted, boring,confu......... oh, I can't keep it up. magnolia's f*cking amazing. One of my all time favourites: Respect the c*ck. Tame the c*nt. Check out the documentary. Almost as good as the film itself.

jackdaw

Yep .. Punch Drunk Love was a great film ...

Magnolia was v good too...

vincenzo1975

sandler was great in both Punch drunk love and Spanglish. i think he did a great job also for Reign Over Me, but because Mike binder directed it, the punch was really taken out of in in place of oddball mements and inappropriate comedy lines.

I think sandler, like Bill murray and yes, steve martin, can be really good when moving into the serious stuff.

magnolia is great by the way....'I used to be smart, now im just stupid'!!!

dr.bollocko

I didnt get Spanglish at all. Didnt laugh once or feel any connection to the movie. I like Sandler for what he is, but respected PDL for taking a step out of the norm.

Naos

Interesting, I watched half of this film but never got around to viewing the rest of it.

Am a fan of Sandler, but I remember I wasn't crazy about this. However, I'll give it another look shortly.

He is very good in Reign on Me, glad he got the chance.

gman2k

This film won best director prize at Cannes - deservedly!

I saw this movie in the cinema, not knowing what it was going to be like or about, and I was completely blown away by it - definitely one of the movies of the decade.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0272338/

delly

Just finished watching the second half now, and man it was fupping excellent. Again, the soundtrack really adds to the film in building scenes of tension.

There are times when you really want Sandler to be a better or more normal person, but then the realisation of knowing that his love interest actually finds this quirkiness as part of the attraction so its ok. The last scene had me waiting anxiously to see how it went, but I won't ruin it for anybody else who may be interested.

I would definitely put this in my top 10, but can likewise see how many people wouldn't be interested in it as its not your typical flick, in a similar way that There Will Be Blood didn't follow conventional lines. I've also just ordered Magnolia for €7 delivered, so I have that to look forward too.

kraggy

delly wrote: »

Just finished watching the second half now, and man it was fupping excellent. Again, the soundtrack really adds to the film in building scenes of tension.

There are times when you really want Sandler to be a better or more normal person, but then the realisation of knowing that his love interest actually finds this quirkiness as part of the attraction so its ok. The last scene had me waiting anxiously to see how it went, but I won't ruin it for anybody else who may be interested.

I would definitely put this in my top 10, but can likewise see how many people wouldn't be interested in it as its not your typical flick, in a similar way that There Will Be Blood didn't follow conventional lines. I've also just ordered Magnolia for €7 delivered, so I have that to look forward too.

Usually don't like to build things up for people but I'm glad you haven't seen Magnolia. You're in for one hell of an experience.

Just make sure you set aside proper, quiet time to yourself to watch it. It's 3 hours long and deserves proper attention. A lot going on though not in the "miss one thing and the story is ruined" kind of way.

I never tire of watching it.

Running Bing

PT Anderson is an absolute genius.

Closest thing this generation has to an Orson Welles imo.

bnt

Are TV schedulers reading this forum? Punch-Drunk Love is on TV3 tonight, 23:40, so I have a chance to see what everyone's on about. I've also heard Kermode (the BBC critic) praising it, and wondering why Sandler doesn't make more films like it.

homerun_homer

This is a great film. As someone who isn't into Adam Sandler movies I definitely agree, he should do more work like this. His performance contains some of his usual hallmarks - quiet guy who errupts and shouts a lot but he does it differently somehow, PT Anderson's script and direction I guess.
Philip Seymour Hoffman has to get his mention of course, I love his character in the film.

calahans

Saw this when it came out. Emily Watson is a great actress. I enjoyed it but didnt think it was great.


6/10

bnt

Well, I saw it, and while I appreciated the acting and direction, I was left wondering "why was this movie made?" I was reminded of Breaking The Waves, and not just because Emily Watson is in both films.

I mean... without giving away any spoilers, it seems to me that everything that happened to Sandler's character was down to his natural stupidity. The trouble was all avoidable, and not necessary for the film to end the way it did.

Sandler gets the girl (Watson) at the end... but they met at the very start of the film, and could have started a relationship straight away, had he not been as thick as a brick!