The greatest movie ever made..!

That was an excellent one.

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

I love Sam Shepard's writing no matter what the topic. He is one of the finest writers in American History, because he was so brutally honest with his depictions of real people. Sometimes, writers will avoid the hardest part of the story to tell, so they rewrite facts that soften the emotional blow to their own psycne's. Not Sam Shepard, Sam changed the reality of story telling with his 'Life-To-Page,' inflections that make most people cringe with digust. But, we've discovered as an audience, that the truth always rises to the top. Sam has just fastened the pace of revealing the truth without having to investigate the story. You were and are still the greatest ins[piration to us in the industry, Sam! Thank you for your brutal haunting honesty, with your expose styled writing.P.S. LOVED all the supporting characters as well. They were real people as well, that Sam kept stowed deep in his memory.

You can't improve on the casting of the leads here, nor the dialogue. So earthy, and James Woods in the field during the thunder is incredible. Cinematography holds your admiration and attention. Can't beat Sam Shepherd in the first place; Beresford's name is familiar to me.... True as I read in another viewer's observation that it was slow, but when your focus is the craft, slow is a luxury. Beautifully understated complexities that hit home with few words. I did turn away during the graphic violence; I see men outnumber women in the enjoyment of this movie, and that's likely why. The role of the daughter was the only lackluster performance. For lovers of craft, I'd recommend this movie highly.

The Curse of the Starving Class is one of the most important things in my life. It was the play that made me want to be a playwright. It was play that made me fall in love with theatre for something more than just something to do to pass my time in high school. I encourage everyone of you to go out and read it, along with all other Sam Shepard plays you can get your hands on.Since I learned a movie version was made of it a long time ago, I had been looking for it all over the place, and tonight I was lucky enough to catch it from the very beginning on IFC. I must say, I loved this movie. They changed some things, omitted some (which made me a little angry) but over all, it was excellent. It was exactly how it should be, in all of it's ass dragging glory.Let's get out my complaints first. Don't worry, I'm not going to go on a rant about how the play is far superior to the movie. This wasn't the play, it's the movie. It was different. It's hard to keep that in mind, but you have to while watching it.(*SPOILERS*. Skip the next two paragraphs if you do not wish to know key events and the ending.)The first thing I have to complain about is they told you about Weston's bad purchase of land far too early in the movie. It was something that was more effective learning about later. The second is the total omission of the eagle and cat story. This was the most beautiful moment in the play, if not one of the most beautiful moments in theatre. But, since this was a movie, I understand the need to leave out things that aren't really important to the plot so that it moves nicely (Though that almost defeats the purpose of Sam Shepard.). The third is that they explained the significance of Wesley wearing his father's clothes way too much. I felt that it was more effective for the audience to infer what it meant, rather than them to come out and say it. The fourth, and last problem, was the end. They totally changed the ending. In the movie, Emerson and Slater didn't come back for their money in the end, and Ella didn't blow up in the car, she just rode away on her horse. The way they ended the movie is far different from the play, but like I said, they are different, so you have to keep that in mind. It was effective, how they ended it. Emerson and Slater letting it go, and Ella not dying. Not as good, but still effective.Now for the things that I absolutely loved about the movie. THE P***ING! I loved this moment in the play, and they kept it in the movie. Wesley p***es all over his sister's school project. This was a beautiful moment that meant a lot. The scene when Des comes into the house and turns the lightbulb in the kitchen on. That was a wonderful choice. I guess you would have to have read the play a few times, and seen the movie to understand what this meant. The whole thing centered around how they were starving and there was no food in the house. When Des screwed the lightbulb in, this (to me) symbolized that now they could afford food. How you ask? Well, where is food, and light in the same place? The fridge. Now that they have money to buy food, they now have a reason to open the fridge. I loved this. When Wesley strips down, he runs through the field naked. This left me thinking (I dunno why) that this was almost necessary to the film. There were a lot more moments that I loved, but I really can't put my finger on them right now. I'm going to have to watch it a few more times.The whole film was great. I loved it. All of you should watch it. As Weston explained in the movie, everyone needs a good hard table to sleep on once in a while to remind you where you've come from. This movie was my hard table to sleep on. It brought me back to years ago when I decided to devote my life to attempting to write something that even resembled art.Some people hated it because it supposedly drug on and on. I'm going to have to agree, but that is how it was meant. If you do not have the patience to view this fine piece of cinema. You will thoroughly enjoy it. Oh, and consider yourself hereby warned about James Woods' full frontal nudity shot if you are easily offended.

This would've been a *great* silent film. The acting really is good, at least in a Look Ma, I'm Doing Really Big Acting! sort of way.Everything is HUGE. Every line is PROFOUND! Every scene is SHATTERED BY HUMAN TRAGEDY!Mostly, I felt like gagging. Yet, like any train wreck, I couldn't tear my eyes away. This dialogue might've worked on the stage, although I doubt it. On the screen, it was cluttered, haphazard, hackneyed and pretty much every other stereotypical negative adjective you can come up with to describe a really bad dramatic work.If you enjoy your melodrama in huge, heaping doses, you *might* enjoy the movie. Be prepared to wait, however. For all that melodrama, this thing sure plods along at its own pace.This script must've sounded a lot different when the actors involved were reading it to themselves. It simply doesn't work once they get around to delivering it in front of the camera.IMDB does us a great disservice, at times, when it uses its goofy computer-controlled "weighted score". Curse of the Starving Class deserves less than a 1.Character-driven fiction is great, but when you develop your characters by simply pushing them through hoops with no plausible explanation for their maturation or evolution, it isn't character development! Your characters must have a motivation. Being drunk for a while and waking up in a field is *not* character development. That's a plot contrivance.Stay away from this movie. Or at the very least, watch it muted. Perhaps you'll get some amusement from all the arm-waving the characters do.Oh, and word to the wise -- to prove that this is truly an artsy film, you see James Woods in all his dangly male "look-at-me, I'm-the-figurative-and-literal-representation-of-the-naked-vulnerability-of- man" glory.Don't say you weren't warned.