Too much of everything

Expected more

Best movie ever!

Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

Lantana is a captivating Australian movie. The fact that it has nearly 17,000 IMDb votes, and over 200 user reviews is a testament to this fine movie directed by Ray Lawrence and written by Andrew Bovell.It's not an action movie, so if you're into fast and/or furious cars, Marvel superheroes, and so on, then please respectfully vacate your cinema seat, please. Just do so.The emotions that interweave in this high standard movie is incredible, and the subtlety draws you in. You can feel the tension as the scenes play out, and in a way you don't want the movie to end, so compelling it is. Lantana is a movie for the ages.

This is a brilliant piece of cinema, concerning marriage and mature relationships, as seen through the eyes of different people who are all connected through odd coincidences. The interplay between the characters and the different situations are fascinating.The acting across is terrific, especially Anthony LaPaglia as a cop with emotional issues, suffering from guilt after cheating on his wife. Certainly a very ambitious movie that is not afraid to get its hands dirty, but the way it analyzes different situations with such perception and tender care is impressive. It makes thoughts and emotional webs run wild in your head. I highly recommend it.

"Lantana" is an Australian drama from 2001 about four couples in the Sydney area (where the film was shot). There are some important peripheral characters as well. The husband of the main couple is a detective going through a mid-life crisis (Anthony LaPaglia). His wife (Kerry Armstrong) knows something's wrong and is getting counseling. The marriage of the counselor (Barbara Hershey) is also troubled due to the death of their young daughter a couple of years earlier. The woman the detective is having a fling with (Rachael Blake) thinks her neighbor (Vince Colosimo) may be involved in the counselor's mysterious disappearance. This is odd because the suspect's marriage is, ironically, the only solid relationship in the story. The counselor's husband is also a suspect (Geoffrey Rush) and has insightful things to share about marriage with the brooding detective.The reason the film's called "Lantana" is because lantana is a tangled shrub common in Australia, which represents the entanglements of the lives of the characters. It also symbolizes marriage since lantana has a sweet but bitter smell; it's beautiful with its flowers, but has "stings"; its branches weave together in a complicated way and in the story a woman is caught in the complexity of it."Lantana" is the antithesis of big, dumb, effects-laden "blockbusters," which -- oddly enough -- often become boring with their overload of "exciting" things going on. "Lantana" effectively shows that ordinary life is more interesting and compelling, if done right. Human nature is explored through a blend of passionate emotions, misconceptions, betrayals, anger, premature conclusions, vanity, duty, ethics, honesty, loyalty and repentance.Two of my all-time favorite dramas are "Grand Canyon" and "Snow Angels". I place "Lantana" in their company. That's how good it is.The film runs 121 minutes.GRADE: A

This is one of those rarities, a movie which walks the tightrope between being a perfect drama and an absorbing mystery and does it spectacularly well. The first hour is dedicated to establishing the various characters like the cop, his wife, the woman he is fooling around with, her estranged husband, the neighbors of the women etc. The interplay between the characters and the different situations are very fascinating. The second half is about the disappearance of one of the characters and how the others interact and react. The acting is brilliant with Anthony Lapaglia surprisingly getting a meatier role and performing much better than Geoffrey Rush. The screenplay is simply fantastic. It is a travesty that this was not nominated for any of the major awards. perhaps it being from Australia was a reason. This is a must watch movie for buffs who love their drama with a touch of intrigue. 4 out of 5. Very well made movie.