best movie i've ever seen.

Absolutely the worst movie.

If you like to be scared, if you like to laugh, and if you like to learn a thing or two at the movies, this absolutely cannot be missed.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

Private Parts (1997): Dir: Betty Thomas / Cast: Howard Stern, Robin Quivers, Mary McCormack, Paul Giamatti, Carol Alt: Intimate look at controversial radio personality Howard Stern and our commitment to listen. According to the film Stern wanted to be in radio since childhood inspiration of his father. It chronicles his childhood to college where he meets his wife, to small radio jobs. He is soon partnered with Robin Quivers and has bitter battles with station managers. Although it seems self gratifying the film is insightful despite Stern's questionable antics. The film takes its subject seriously as when he attempts to mend his marriage, and the miscarriage that led to unfavourable discussions on his show. Directed by Betty Thomas and easily one of the greatest achievements of her career. Stern is convincing in his self portrait blending reality and humour. Quivers plays herself in her loyalty with Stern as well as her struggle to maintain sane even at the cost of her job. Mary McCormack plays his supportive yet frustrated wife who would like to believe that her husband's on air rantings are just a joke. Paul Giamatti steal scenes as a station manager who falls victim to Stern's perseverance. Carol Alt makes a cameo as a woman reluctantly seated by Stern on a plane but eventually becomes won over. The film argues that there is an ordinary side to Stern that challenges viewers to look beyond the cover. Score: 9 / 10

As a long term listener of Howard Stern I was satisfied with the adaptation of the book to the big screen. Betty Thomas was smart enough to allow Howard be himself. It works because Stern is not really acting. Having heard the actual tapes of his father berating him as a kid, seeing Richard Portnow as Ben, was dead on accurate and funny as hell. The other highlight is Paul Giamatti as the program director called pig vomit, who is hired to control Stern's free wheeling and often vulgar on air persona. At one point the self proclaimed king of all media is subjected to a lecture on the proper way of announcing wnbc with a prolonged and exaggerated W "NNNNNNNBC;" it is exactly as it happened because I actually heard the broadcast and the constant battles between Howie and the management at the now defunct radio station. Previous to the WNBC job, we see the struggle from college radio to Briarcliff, NY to Hartford, Ct. to Detroit and the last stop before the Big Apple is Washington, D.C. It is a ride filled with odd ball characters, nude women and people behaving badly, all for the ratings, and it works due to Stern's ability to communicate at the level of a regular guy. The film is well made and should be entertaining even for non listeners.

When Betty Thomas's "Private Parts" came out, I had only loosely heard of Howard Stern, and usually in a negative context. But the movie really opened my eyes. It turns out that beyond his sometimes shocking radio content, it's all about free speech. Stern may pull some of the grossest stunts on air, but he's just showing what the First Amendment is all about. Like Lenny Bruce, George Carlin, Larry Flynt, John Waters, and the Farrelly Brothers, Stern always goes for the funniest shock value. And the movie does a great job showing that.And yes, it's true, I once got to know Aimee Luzier, who played Pig Vomit's wife. She was the assistant in a history/literature class that I took in high school.

I decided I needed to watch this film again, a while after the last viewing, after constantly hearing the praise of the film from the rather biased source of the Howard Stern show.The film was as I remembered it. Pretty standard entertainment, slightly raised for those who are followers of the show.I wonder how differently this story would be told if it weren't based on material written by Howard Stern himself. Possibly as a result of this, the entire film comes across as self-promoting propaganda for Stern, which, naturally, feels a little immodest and most probably embellished.However, what surprised me was that all the praise that Stern lathers on himself for his performance in this film is well deserved. Howard slips into actor mode with the greatest of ease. Within ten minutes he has conquered the hardest hurdle of his transition: people know him too well when he's NOT acting.Why I consider this such a feat is because the audience expects a rather inorganic performance from him (or at least I did), due to the ability to compare it to his true relaxed state, every day, for five hours.Stern must be commended for the believability and immersion his performance allows the audience to enjoy. Although, one may argue that to play oneself is not that difficult to capture.Paul Giamatti also gives a stellar performance, with his red-hot outbursts being particularly memorable. ("YOU ARE THE MOTHERFUCKING ANTI-Christ!") All in all, a fun film for Stern fans. Perhaps still enjoyable for those that aren't, perhaps not.