Plot so thin, it passes unnoticed.

everything you have heard about this movie is true.

Easily the biggest piece of Right wing non sense propaganda I ever saw.

Story: It's very simple but honestly that is fine.

I Melt With You is an easy film to dismiss as crass, unnecessary nihilism. It's easy to look at the four wealthy, healthy main characters and scoff at the idea that they are in any kind of turmoil or crisis, and patronize them for going to the staggering lengths of excess portrayed in this film. Take a second. Empathize. Everyone, rich or poor, healthy or terminal, is going through their own private hell in some way, shape or form. These four guys, meeting together for a week long getaway to gorgeous Big Sur, are manically stoked to be together and appear outwardly happy in their revelry. But as the days pass, we see this is just not the case. Thomas Jane plays the failed writer turned schoolteacher who is at the end of his rope. Jane displays here that he's got more going on than just the strong hero type, showing a sadsack depression and wicked energy in his scenes. Jeremy Piven brings his usual spitfire, hopped up parade of mannerisms, and they click wonderfully with the writing and direction as a hedge fund prize boy who has embezzled money and is on the guilt train straight to insanity. Rob Lowe surprised the crap out of me, as I was never a huge fan. But here he shows stinging vulnerability and an utter, soul sucking sadness as the pill popping MD who's in dire straights for peddling wares outside the boundaries of prescription, as well as living with a broken family and kids he can't see through no fault but his own. Christian McKay, who I've never heard of before this, just owns his role as the fourth, a sensitive, guilt ridden and deeply troubled man who was responsible for the death of his boyfriend many years ago, and is clearly not okay about it even years later. The four of them descend into a chaotic cacophony of extreme drug and alcohol abuse, everything from coke to downers, tranqs, and every other substance you can think of is consumed in this film. The scenes of excessive consumption are hard to watch, but also have a go for broke, kamikaze approach to them, set to one of the best soundtracks I've ever heard. Seriously, I could list the 100+ amazing songs that show up throughout, and I'd still be missing some. The film progresses to some really dark, unsettling places, involving a pact the four of them made 25 years before, and the ramifications of where their self disappointed lives have ended up. It's easy to watch this and hate it, to be bombarded with its sensory overload of various gimmicks, unconventional styles and brutal onslaught of despair and self loathing. It's much harder to try and put yourself in these guy's shoes and imagine what it might be like for them. Each one, personally as an individual, to truly not be right in your soul, and what that might look like bursting out into one's life. Kudos to Mark Pellington for undertaking such a brave, unique venture. Indeed in the last five years it's truly like no other film I've seen, with an energy and operatic stream of consciousness all its own. Oh and the cinematography. It's a breathtaking one to look at, some of the images like pure silver and gold distilled into cinema. Between the beaches, wide amber sunsets the same colour as the whiskey in their glasses, to the sand dunes that stretch into the beyond, endless and desolate like their collective psyches, it's a wicked looking movie. I'm almost reminded of Stephen King in a way, like if the kids from Stand By Me or Dreamcatcher grew up to be in some kind of nightmare sequel. There's great supporting work too, from porn star Sasha Grey as an enigmatic local prostitute, Carla Gugino as an inquisitive local cop, and the excellent Tom Bower as a heartbroken fishing vessel captain. This one isn't for everyone. But anyone open to pure excess, emotional destruction, beautiful scenery and the best soundtrack in a while needs to watch this.

"I Melt With You" is a play off the song of the same name by Modern English. But it's clearly a double entendre as the film is about to begin.IMWY is the story of four middle aged men, each with their own personal crises that they hide under the macho swagger and attempt at youthful bravado with drugs and alcohol. The four of these men are all college pals reuniting for a lost weekend of sorts, gathering together at a beach side house out in Big Sur, California. What starts off as a fun weekend of excess, slowly turns into a sinister exploration of what it means to regret the mistakes we make in life. Richard (Thomas Jane) is an English teacher with one published book to his credit, who is trying to reprise the free spirited, artsy bad boy he clearly was in college; Ron (Jeremy Piven) is a family man and stockbroker with the forces closing in on him, from a career that may not be as legitimate; Jonathan (Rob Lowe) is a divorced doctor pocketing cash on the side by making illegal sales of prescription drugs and a relationship with a young son that's clearly going south; and Tim (Christian McKay), a man who made one deeply fatal mistake in life that may have damaged him beyond curing. These four college pals reunite in what may not be for the best turn of events.Let me just say that "I Melt With You" is directed by Mark Pellington, a fairly underrated director who made the horror film "The Mothman Prophecies" and the domestic terrorism thriller "Arlington Road". Pellington may be onto something as a director, unable to unearth the sinister nature of what appears to be normal. "The Mothman Prophecies" was about an urban legend that people dismiss as myth while "Arlington Road" was about how a next door neighbor may not be as friendly as they appear. "I Melt With You" falls into similar territory: the idea of how a friendly reunion, has a more unspoken and deeply sinister nature to it, when the truth finally surfaces. While not going into great detail, the film takes a deeply dark turn midway through the film, that I didn't expect. This turn reminds me of a 1973 French film called "La Grande Bouffe" (The Big Feast) in which four middle aged men, all feeling that their successful lives have lead them to a hollow existence, decide to retreat to the countryside to eat themselves to death. Replace food with drugs and in a sense, you have "I Melt With You"."I Melt With You" focuses on the themes of middle aged regret, which seems to have become somewhat of a staple in American cinema with the likes of films like "Sideways". However, this film is much darker and it's quite brutal in nature. The idea of four men who are long past their prime and their youth, halfway between youth and death, end up going on an epic bender of sorts in order to numb the pain in their souls. I look at this film and I think of my friends, and I hope to God that we don't end up like the four main characters in this film. If anything, this film might be a painful reminder of what not to become. Between the constant drug taking and the boozing, it's an absolutely brutal experience to watch these guys, all with their own pains, slowly spiral into something worse. During a party sequence in the film, the four characters find themselves in deep conversations with peers half their age, and in a way, representations of what they were like at that age, before family, career and responsibilities got to them. It's not a comfortable thing to watch.The performances are all top notch and uneasy to watch at the same time. I think of Rob Lowe as happy-go-lucky Chris Traeger from "Parks & Recreation" and idealistic Sam Seaborn from "The West Wing". But he's the complete opposite of those characters. He's just a man, like the rest of the characters, slipping away on the fringes of life. Jeremy Piven has always crafted a career of playing the angry neurotic that he's performed well in films like "Very Bad Things" and "Entourage", and his character's descent into his own personal hell is something to watch. Christian McKay, perhaps the least well known of the cast, is effective as well: a sad man who may already be dead, except he may know it. Thomas Jane, whose career has not been as great as it was in the late 90's and early 2000's, is fantastic as well. We all know someone like Jane's character. Hell, I might be like him in some respects. But the four men take this film seriously as an actors piece, and they do it perfectly."I Melt With You" will slip into the abyss of the thousands of movies that get forgotten each decade. In a more ideal world, I'd like to think that it could be revisited as being a good film, under-appreciated in its time, like other films have often gotten that reception only later. This isn't a bad film by any means, but it's a brutal, nihilistic piece not for the faint of heart. I'd highly suggest for anyone who loves movies starring Marvel superheroes or Meg Ryan, to move on and find something that will be crowd pleasing. "I Melt With You" is like going to the dentist without getting the novocaine, and having to sit through the whole experience with that kind of pain, only in the mind.

This might be the worst movie I've ever seen. The only redeeming quality is the soundtrack, and maybe a few funny quotes. A bunch of selfish California Hollywood types who think their life is oh so bad whaaaaa. Yes, their lives are terrible but it's because they never got it. And this movie doesn't get it. Don't waste your time.The plot had a lot of potential. Disappointing to see several of my favorite actors partake. I've lost a lot of respect for them. This could have been a great movie but instead it is another example of the simple-mindedness coming out of Hollywood. Life is too short for you and all of us to get all caught up in this kind of crud.

I expected a lot from this movie given the cast but was sorely disappointed. The basic premise is so juvenile as to be unbelievable in 4 adult men, regardless of their problems. The suicides/deaths are so overwrought and seem to be staged to try and lure the viewer into some kind of sympathy with these guys. Didn't work for me at all. It's hard to care about these characters in any way. Perhaps if more attention had been paid to the back story, it would have made the seemingly stupid pact more believable. Unless it's supposed to be a metaphor. Which would make it even worse, if that's possible.A little subtlety might have gone a long way to helping but Thomas Jane shamelessly overacts through the entire movie and the others aren't much better in it. Don't waste your time with this one.