It’s sentimental, ridiculously long and only occasionally funny

Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

Mostly, the movie is committed to the value of a good time.

A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

Sometimes you just have to sit back and enjoy something for the incredible richness of it's characters the story and the backdrop! NYC circa 1982. That fact in itself added to Al Pacino, Dyan Cannon and a sweet funny script make it pretty cool. This movie is hard for me to watch because I am from NYC and was a teen at the time of the release of this movie and it brings back so many awesome memories it's kind of hard to handle. Anyway I love you guys, pardon my sugary delivery but I'm in a weird mood. Watch this movie, just saw it in HD for the very first time. Ps, Al Pacino is simply the best actor of our time, no matter what the role!

this Al Pacino vehicle didn't do much for me.Pacino plays a playwright struggling with writing his latest play,while dealing with all kinds of personal issues.i found it boring,boring,and more boring.i just didn't see the point of it all.to say it's moves at a sedate pace is an understatement.it hardly moves at all.Pacino is good,but i felt his character is underwritten.the kids are cute,but not enough to carry the movie.in short,i couldn't wait for this thing to end.i really wanted to turn it off several times,but i stuck it through to the bitter end.it wasn't worth it.but that's just my opinion,maybe i'm wrong.for me,Author! Author rates a 4/10

I thought the movie was great. I think Al Pacino showed most of his humanly emotions in this movie. He played the part very well!! Dyan Cannon, and Alan King also played good roles. Tuesday Weld did not have enough of a role in the movie as Gloria. She did well in her part, but I wish they would have added more of her character in the story. It would have been nice if her and Alice had gotten into a little spat. That would have spiced up the movie a bit!!! :) The children in the movie played good roles too. But I did not agree with the foul language that the kids used. I know if those were Al's real children, he would not allow them to talk to him that way!!! LOL It was more of an adult movie, than for children, because of the language, and the little scene, with Al and Dyan in bed. Even though it wasn't gross (the bed scene), it was what she had on in bed, and Al sleeping in the raw. LOL I loved the movie, and I think it is good adult entertainment. Not a violent movie, just light-hearted comedy.

Even "Cruising" suited you better than this, and I naively thought that was you hitting rock-bottom. I suppose had I glanced at the respective CV's of both the writer and director before viewing, that should have been enough to give me a slight clue (Pacino teams with writer of "See no Evil, Hear no Evil"- Yeah, I can see why that somehow won't be on any re-release posters!); but nothing could have reasonably prepared me for the mind-numbing awfulness that is this film.The synopsis I read promised something of a 'comedic' turn from the esteemed leading man; Sure, if 'comedic turn' is a handy insider euphemism for 'rancid heap of vomit-inducing mush'... ... It's criminal to see such a talented performer marooned in a vehicle so abject as this; a picture that even an individual noted for their generosity in spirit would shrink away from and crawl fearfully back to watching 'sitcom-lite'. It's so bland that this colourlessness becomes an insulting element in itself. What meagre humour there is is so desperate to generate any kind of reaction that it resorts to mining attempted chuckles from child-abuse, of all topics. Not just edging toward, but apparently happily camped in 'distasteful' territory, I'm sure most of you will agree... This kind of trash deserves the misfortune of a Z-grade celeb saddled with 'headlining' it - not the finest actor of his generation. If you've ever had a burning, deeply shameful and dirty desire to see Al Pacino in a "Home Alone" flick; don dark glasses to rent this, watch it ONCE only and then commit yourself to good deeds for the rest of your natural days. Or failing that, just 'commit' yourself! Dreck like this is mercifully likely the closest our society will come to the realisation of such a hideous nightmare; until Satan decides to sublet Hell as a skating rink, that is!I'm convinced this title is a hidden subliminal insert from a worried distributor, drawn from the wailing of a traumatised audience member dragged raving from a test-screening. His mostly incoherent babble was meant as the beginning of a tirade against the scripter for being so callously inhumane as to subject him to this utter pap.I refuse to believe that "Revolution"; the film that kept Al Pacino away from our cinema screens for four years (85-89), can possibly be any worse than this; but shudderingly I think that I might once have possessed the brashness to say the same about "Cruising" when THAT review was in genesis, too... Imagine waking in the morning to the horrified surprise of finding a neighbour had laid a bowel movement on your doorstep. Maybe this will help you to partially assimilate my reaction as I sat and watched "Author! Author!" unfold before my disbelieving and silently weeping eyes. Thus I know not to so casually prejudge "Revolution" before I see; because until this morning I thought I'd see nothing more heinous from Pacino than "Cruising"... It was a brighter world at that time, untainted by such pure evil in celluloid form - but alas, now my relative innocence has been snatched away from me, and I have experienced the toxicity of some things that writers and directors are capable of dredging up from the fetid cesspools that must surely constitute their minds...Run now, while you can. Save yourselves from such a pile of insipid garbage. A klaxon-call if ever there was one, and you can quote me on it, if you wish...1/10.