Who payed the critics

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

Amazing worth wacthing. So good. Biased but well made with many good points.

This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.

I love films like this. Limited, resourceful, and yet makes mountains out of molehills. I also love David Mamet and I could listen to his expert dialouge for hours on end. So how could I not love this film? Sure if you dissect it, it has some issues, but I can't help but love everything it does. The movie only has three characters. Dustin Hoffman is Teach, a bitter and cynical man whose friend is Don, played by Dennis Franz. Don owns a junk shop and also looks out for Bob, a street kid with a lot of issues. When Teach and Don learn that they might have been jipped out of some very valuable coins they decide they're going to go steal the coins back. The plan reveals the dark inner turmoil the three characters feel and it is ultimately their quest to find meaning and purpose in a world that has hung them out to dry. It's a story of futile human desperation delivered through snappy and quick witted dialouge that I found fascinating.It's imperative to mention that this film is only dialouge. There is no action, no special effects, and not even a change in scenery. I might be crazy for saying this, but I loved it. It was an extremely interesting watch to see what could be accomplished on an existential level with so little tangible material. The film was originally a stage play written by David Mamet that he adapted into a screenplay with little to no changes in his near perfect dialouge. Because of the little change in location and the unusually small cast of three I get the feeling the film works better as a stage play, but having never seen the stage version, the movie was a great watch unto itself. Everything is kept very simple and all of the focus was on the actors and the dialouge they delivered making the movie very unconventional, so much to the point where it doesn't really feel like a movie. But this uniqueness is what I enjoyed so much about the film, just out of personal love for the strange and different.Now I will admit that if the film had not had good actors to back up Mamet's sharp edged dialouge, American Buffalo would have been an awful, dreary, and pathetically boring film. But the three main, and only, actors in the film keep it lively and interesting from start to finish. Hoffman and Franz work together as a perfect duo and their contrast in characteristic give the film a lot of its deep perplexity on the human condition. Nelson isn't in the movie as much as Hoffman and Franz, but when he is present he does a great job, and his character is very important to the progression of the story. The actors do a lot of justice to the ingenious dialouge of this film.There isn't much more to say about American Buffalo. There isn't a whole lot to the film, but what elements it does possess are fantastic. The dialouge and acting is brilliant, and there isn't much more to the movie. I honestly loved how different of a movie experience this was, and can give the movie nothing but props for making me think and delivering to me such a unique experience.

Chock Full o' remarkably well acted, meat and potatoes' dialog,American Buffalo renders shades of , "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest," in a satirical Forum. As the two main characters are masterfully fleshed out by Franz and Hoffman. This dialog is so tight that I manage to arm My own verbal arsenal with, what I deem as, "Social Pet Phrase Ammunition", in a single viewing! To draw on a few key points, has me doubled over with side-splitting laughter! Please pardon my allusion, yet you must see it - To relate. Further more you can set your Wrist Watch to the remarkable timing, captured on screen, of this Rare Duo's, seemingly natural, performance. Don't get me wrong, in terms of there being an absence of opposing thematic content towards plot. The acting definitely saves the movie. Although, it's probably not for your average movie goer. It's become one of my top 20 "Dialog driven" classical winners!This is a fine example of, "You don't need a billion-dollar budget to make a quality Motion Picture".

American Buffalo is an example of David Mamet's ear for dialogue and his way with the gritty underbelly of society. Perhaps no other movie has so deftly demonstrated Mamet's unique sense of rhythm in spoken language. The movie is engrossing and entertaining, all the while using only one location and three characters. Dustin Hoffman is revoltingly slimy as Teach, and Dennis Franz perfects the conflicted role of Don that he originated on stage many years ago. A must see for any fan of Mamet or student of the human condition.

Watching this film on screen and on stage (I imagine) wouldn't be a hell of a lot different. It's still a 3-character film that revolves around the same setting--most of the time. But when you see great acting like this, how can you complain?? Dustin Hoffman is great at whatever he does, and he's perfectly believable as the foul-mouthed Teach. He has some of the greatest lines. My favorite is "Guys like that, I'd like to f**k their wives." He is rude and obnoxious with barely a sympathetic quality, but he's the guy you love to hate. I just recently started watching "NYPD Blue" and just from watching a few episodes, I can say that Dennis Franz is one of the best actors I've ever seen. He deserves to be on the big screen a lot more, because he has abilities as an actor that only few TV actors also possess. He delivers every line and every emotion with such power that your eyes are wide open with amazement every minute he's on screen. Even young actor (I assume he's now in his late teens) Sean Nelson is perfectly cast, blowing me away with a performance I'm sure very few young actors can pull off just as effectively. He only has about 20 or 30 minutes of screen time, yet he's the character you most feel sorry for at times, despite the fact that he lives an unclean life, dealing with thugs and earning his money via dishonest methods. You can just sense that he didn't have any parental leadership, and he wasn't sure what path in life to take, so he took the most easy one--and also the most dangerous one. In a way, the two guys are like his surrogate parents. I've never seen the play, but when I see the name "David Mamet" under the writing credits, I immediately know that I'm gonna hear some priceless dialogue. I don't know how he does it, but he just has a relentlessly quick wit when it comes to creating dialogue. Like a play, this movie is composed of 80 % dialogue, but the dialogue is so great that I don't really care if there's no exciting visuals. And last but no least, I loved the opening and closing theme song. It just has that grungy quality that perfectly fits the tone of "American Buffalo." If you're a fan of superb acting, this will be a real treat! A real treat! My score: 8 (out of 10)