Did you people see the same film I saw?

Admirable film.

It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

This is a dark and sometimes deeply uncomfortable drama

I don't see the problem with this, it has everything a movie should need to be a hit.I mean, Al Pacino is in it. Sure you feel sort of robbed if you sit through a Pacino movie and he hasn't screamed and yelled by the end of it. Something about snakes on a...wait, that's Sam Jackson, but it was an easy mistake, we go to see their films for largely the same reason.But even if he didn't scream and yell and threaten to take a flame-thrower to this place...it's still Al Pacino, so you have to see it. He DID give us the hands-down best documentary on Shakespeare ever made.And it had Winona Ryder in it, and she's not only a great actress but, if you are my age, you had a crush on her growing up.Jay Mohr, the man who was in EVERY 90s movie ever made.So the movie is worth seeing for the cast, there is talent there.But wait there is more, Andrew Niccol wrote it...you know Gattaca, The Terminal, Lord of War, The Truman Show...the dude has a seriously sharp pen and S1m0ne is no exception.The script is tight, it went places, it had points and plot lines seldom made in this era of plot less pointless popcorn munching entertainment.Not only that, but the directing was solid too.It should have been a force to be reckoned with in the box office...and yet no one has seen it.Check it out, it's a good film and one that is going to be rediscovered and praised, in the future, when critics and audiences learn how to think again.Once society starts using that lump that's three-feet above their...well, if it came out in the 70s, the 80s, the 90s, you's have heard about it and seen it on EW's Movies to See Before you Die list.Unfortunately for everyone involved, it came out at the birth of the re-make era where originality is shunned.

I had heard a little about this film, possibly that it was a box office flop or just not very popular, I was interested to see if that was the case, from Andrew Niccol (writer of The Truman Show and The Terminal, director of Gattaca). Basically Viktor Taransky (Al Pacino) is the film producer who has recently started work on his new big film he wants to be a success, but his project is in danger when the big star Nicola Anders (Winona Ryder) drops out. Just when Taransky thinks he can't continue the film he meets Hank Aleno (Elias Koteas), not long before he dies, and he inherits a new computer program from him that enables him to create a new way to finish the film. This program allows him to create a completely realistic digitally constructed actress, the program is called "Simulation One", so he simply deletes the letters to create "Simone" (Rachel Roberts). The film is completed, and the co-stars of the film accept that he has selected this new actress that they will not see in rehearsals or filming, and to his surprise they see the completion and lap it up. The finished film is released in cinemas, and synthetic Simone is the big talking point, becoming an overnight and worldwide sensation, and naturally Taransky gains his notoriety too. With the success gained from this digitally created woman, Tarasnky does everything he can to keep up the pretence that Simone is a real person, such as fake telephone calls, voice change chats with colleagues, prerecorded and digitalised interviews, magazine covers and much more. As well as creating more films starring Simone, he also wants her to break into other markets, including a sellout concert where she sings, and still no-one is aware that she is a fake computer creation. It is after Simone wins the Oscar in a tie, both being for her, and he forgot to have her mention his name, that Taransky knows that it is Simone everyone wants, not him. While his huge lie is going on there are some nosey people trying to get close to Simone, unsuccessfully, investigating places "she" has visited, and luckily they do not suspect anything about her not existing. Tarasnky desperately tries to convince Elaine Christian (Catherine Keener) of the truth, but naturally she does not believe him, so he takes drastic action and decides to "kill" Simone, erasing the memory from the computer and throwing all the technology into the ocean. After the big funeral for the non-existent actress, Taransky is arrested for her "murder", in which he again tries to convince them of the truth, but in the end "Simone" is alive, after the little girl recovered her, and she will go on to have a baby and run for office. Also starring Pruitt Taylor Vince as Max Sayer, Jay Mohr as Hal Sinclair, Jason Schwartzman as Milton, Stanley Anderson as Frank Brand, Evan Rachel Wood as Lainey Christian Taransky, Daniel Von Bargen as Chief Detective and Rebecca Romijn as Faith. Pacino gives a good performance as the producer doing everything possible to keep everyone believing his fake female on screen personality is real, the supporting cast, including of course Roberts, do their best as well. I think personally the critics overlooked this film, it is actually really clever, it is giving us an insight into how Hollywood can be fake, how CGI is becoming bigger and better as time goes by, and it is both amusing and fascinating to see how a huge lie can go a long way like this one, I can see the tiniest snags to agree with the rating, but it is a pretty enjoyable satirical comedy drama. Okay!

Though not repeatedly heard, writer/director Andrew Niccol is really talented in incorporating societal topics into his movies in shocking ways. Basically, his works worked because the concepts he played with are well implemented and fertilized by him.From Gattaca to Truman Show, to S1m0ne, sci-fi is not something only Lucas and Spierberg can handle, although these guys are always interested in telling you their visions for the future are not cheap. The concepts behind S1m0ne can be considered impossible to realize in the real world because anyone with any computer knowledge would know to digitally fabricate a role and incorporate her into the real production footages would take 100 computer engineers and days of work to render each frame...... And, in the movie Simone only needed Al Pacino's solo job to do the motion-detection, dubbing and everything, using one PC. Of course this is a joke, but again anyone paying too much attention to that missed the point of the movie, that medias produce idols, idols made money and made the line between reality and illusion blur. In this crazy logic yet again accepted by most of us in the public, we can't laugh all the comedic characters portrayed without looking at ourselves. And frankly speaking, Niccol always knew how to end a movie in a satisfying way. S1m0ne is not an exception, that just when everyone thought the story will go in the logically-favored direction, it turned to be better.You need a good director to master someone like Al Pacino, and that means certainly not averagely-good, but really good. Before S1m0ne, I always thought Pacino only fits either outrageous roles or traumatic roles or both. But S1m0ne proved he can also be as funny as Jim Carrie. Given all the chaotic and idiotic situations in the movie, Pacino pretty much held true to his outrageous and traumatic nature but pulled off one of the best roles in his career. Robert Deniro, Dustin Hoffman both had similar roles in a similar genre(Wag the Dog and What Just Happened) and none of their performances can match Pacino's. Besides, S1m0ne really made What Just Happened looked like amateurish work.Al last, as the movie's rating kept dropping for years, the ideas in it actually are approaching us. I am looking forward to director Niccol's next project. Keep it up Mr Niccol!

Al Pacino plays a movie director with integrity who gets kicked by a movie studio, inherits a hard drive (!) through which he creates "Simone", a virtual human being, and from there films. Things do get tricky as he has to do stuff to make people think the virtual reality really is real. I cannot even begin to properly allow you to read how much I hate this film; it's like taking Philosophy 101, reading Descartes saying "I think, therefore I am" and then formulating your own theories thinking you're God, unknowing to the fact that somebody already did this before you, and that the plot and story are so wafer-thin that you just want to kill someone. Not to mention there are logical holes as big as our galaxy in this piece of crap, I want to kill everybody included in this film, and the end was so bad I wanted to Patrick Bateman myself. So why do I give it 2/10? I'm sleep deprived today, and this is the type of film I usually see when I can't think. This film made me realise it was horrible and stupid, and I shouldn't be able to do that. F-ing trash piece of garbage ill. AAAYEIAYEIYYEIYI!