Waste of time

Very best movie i ever watch

How wonderful it is to see this fine actress carry a film and carry it so beautifully.

For having a relatively low budget, the film's style and overall art direction are immensely impressive.

a game. more than a play. a film about small essential parts of life. its sin - ambition to say everything. the virtue, the real virtue - the cast. and sure, the script who becomes, after a precise panther, in first part, a huge elephant in the second. result - a good film for a lot of questions to yourself. but, in same time, an imprecise project. the acting is really great and the idea is not bad but my impression is to watch a boat facing strong currents.sure, it is interesting but in the last part almost confuse. the characters becomes silhouettes and a significant piece from its good basis is compromised. desire to born powerful emotions is a kind of obsession. so, the virtue remains the cast. that is all.

The Dying Gaul is the bizarro-world tale of three slightly demented characters: Jeff (Campbell Scott) and Elaine (Patricia Clarkson), a Hollywood "power couple," and Robert (Peter Sarsgaard), a gay screenwriter whose script, titled "The Dying Gaul," Jeff purchases. Through their twisted sexual, emotional, and professional involvements, the three develop pathological intentions towards each other.From the start we see very quirky behaviors and affects in each character, and plot-wise the film grows ever-increasingly implausible as it progresses. Granted, there are gripping moments and situations, but in my view the movie fails to deliver enough substantial resolution or meaning, Lynchian or not, to justify all of its implausibilities.Moreover, the characters spout meaningless aphorisms and pseudo-profundities seemingly designed for the audience to puzzle over afterwards, but no matter how much one pores over the details of the movie, it seems to end up with no more depth or inner meaning than a kaleidoscope, and one full of plot holes at that.The movie relies heavily on the internet chatroom as a plot device. I have a feeling writer-director Craig Lucas's original stage play went over much better back in 1998, when AOL chatrooms, especially gay chatrooms, were new, fresh, and all the rage. A dozen years later, some gay chatrooms are still around and still used for hook-ups, but they aren't the heady new thing that they were back then. Add to this the incongruous plot device of a potentially poisonous plant, and the fact that the DVD has a second, alternate ending in addition to the already ambiguous original ending, and all these factors contribute to the film's being a near-miss.Acting-wise, Peter Sarsgaard is phenomenal, Patricia Clarkson is very strong, and Campbell Scott is slightly uneven and perhaps miscast. In the end, the star of the movie for me is a beautiful infinity pool overlooking the lovely Malibu canyon and the Pacific ocean. With a movie this involved, one should be left with more, but there seems to be nothing behind the surface intricacies of this uneven psycho-thriller.I think the film's worst problem is that it ironically does exactly what it blames Jeff, the Hollywood producer, for doing: It takes a plot (not unlike Robert's original screenplay) which is pro-gay and AIDS-relevant, and turns it on its head in order to make it non-gay or anti-gay for the purposes of box office numbers. The film makes Robert, the gay character, an eventual villain, and that destroys the central metaphor of the plot: empathy, which the famous ancient Roman statue of the Dying Gaul is supposed to evoke. In the end, when the Hollywood producer experiences his own grievous loss (not unlike Robert's and his original screenplay protagonist's losing a lover to AIDS), we the audience are not able to translate this into a mirror-image exercise in empathy and a gaining of empathy for the gay community and for AIDS victims and their loved ones. The fact that the film makes Robert a villain equal to the other two characters precludes this. And therein, in my opinion, lies the central flaw of what could in my mind have been an excellent film. (I have to at least try to give the film the benefit of the doubt though and say that maybe this bizarre doubly cruel irony is a meta-message, but if so I think it's far too abstruse for audiences to grasp.) In any case, some people may enjoy this film, if "Lynch lite" is their style, and if plausibility or coherence is not that important to them. Beyond that, in my opinion it's a mixed bag of somewhat questionable appeal.

Until it jumps the tracks near the end, THE DYING GAUL is an interesting and literate film about relationships and suffering. But when it goes to the bad it does so in a big way.Robert is a screenwriter who has written a script called THE DYING GAUL which derives from his own experiences. It's about a gay couple who sees the sculpture The Dying Gaul and how the pain of loss translates across the centuries. Robert has lost his life partner and is still suffering the loss.Jeffrey and Elaine are a very successful couple. He's a Hollywood producer and they live in a mansion which in and of itself makes the film impressive. Jeffery likes Robert's screenplay and offers him a million dollars for it, but with one catch. The film would be big budget and high profile, and to justify that the couple needs to be a man and a woman.To complicate matters, Jeffrey comes on to Robert. Big time.The material at any point could have veered into farce. Instead, writer/director Craig Lucas tries and- for a long time succeeds- in trying to plumb the depth of the characters' souls.Elaine begins to communicate with Robert through an online chat room. She pretends to be a man and, later, a man that Robert has known in the past. And this is where the story starts to unravel.Elaine begins to assume the personality of Robert's late lover and soon convinces him that he's communicating with a ghost, veering awkwardly close to making the story an updated BLYTHE SPIRIT.Eventually Jeffrey casually mentions to Robert how in Woody Allen's CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS a major character seeks to shed himself of an unwanted wife by homicidal means, and soon the project is off the tracks.And in the final scene Lucas has a major character do something so out of character, so irrational, so atypical.... How bad a miscalculation is this plot twist? So bad that Lucas can't bring himself to stage it. Instead, it takes place offstage and is revealed in a phone conversation.Flaws and all, this is still a mature and well thought out film. It's masterfully visualized and is a great vehicle for three talented performers. I'm convinced that fifty years from now film historians will be looking back and wondering why Campbell Scott wasn't a megastar from his first role on. As always his performance is rock solid.It's good to see a well produced film that's made for grownups and isn't a special effects nightmare. Check out THE DYING GAUL.

Vaguely at the center of THE DYING GAUL is a screenplay for a potential movie. The plot of the would-be movie, also called "The Dying Gaul," concerns a gay couple and what happens when one of them is faced with AIDS. It would make a perfect movie, so says the studio exec who wants to buy it and film it, except that the couple really doesn't have to be gay. And it doesn't really have to be called "The Dying Gaul." And I guess it doesn't really have to be about AIDS. And, when you get right down to it, the plot of this film itself doesn't really have to be about Hollywood, screen writing, homosexuality, AIDS, infidelity or betrayal. But it has to be about something for it to be worth our time. And it isn't.Strip away the pretentiousness of the supposed noble symbolism of "the Dying Gaul," brush aside the trendiness of it being set in Hollywood, and forget the faux importance of it exploiting AIDS; and THE DYING GAUL is nothing but a gimmicky soap opera with a contrived and not-particularly-honest twist. It's a love triangle wherein the anonymity of an internet chat room not only becomes a vehicle for deceit but the basis for a seemingly supernatural scam. Lovers and/or rivals building a wicked web of lies out of disguises is as old as drama, be the pretense coming in the form of masked balls, con games, mistaken identities, innocent pen pal letters or CB radios. Playing such duplicity for laughs, this sort of romantic misdirection can work nicely, but THE DYING GAUL has less in common with YOU'VE GOT MAIL than with the gloomy, pseudo-realism of overwrought junk like CLOSER.The neophyte screenwriter is Robert (Peter Sarsgaard), who wrote the script to honor his deceased partner, Malcolm. Jeffrey (Campbell Scott) is the producer who wants to make the movie, but insists that the sexuality of the protagonists is irrelevant; straight or gay, it is all the same, pain and loss is universal -- but straight pain and loss is more commercial. He should know, Jeff is bisexual and seems more interested in Robert's sword than his pen. But Jeff loves his wife, Elaine (Patricia Clarkson), who becomes fast friends with Robert, until she figures out that the two guys are collaborating in more ways than one. So far, so good. Then writer/director Craig Lucas derails his entire project by letting his entire film become hijacked by a lame and contrived gimmick. Elaine, using a fake identity, begins exchanging messages with Robert via the internet and convinces the already disturbed writer that he is actually communicating with the spirit of his dead lover. Apparently DSL reaches as far as Heaven's gate.Even as the film prattles on about mythic themes and makes references to famed art and literature, yet sells out to a lame technological gimmick, it still has potential. Elaine suddenly has the power to control Robert and, indirectly, her husband. But Elaine doesn't know what to do with her newfound power, and unfortunately neither does Lucas. The confused story takes a dark turn and it is obviously headed for tragedy, but Lucas balks at making the film either an outright thriller or even a psychologically twisted comedy. He has a cast of morally bankrupt characters (well acted by excellent actors), but he seems unwilling to let any of them be the villain. Each are painted as being capable of killing, but when death finally takes a role in the story it is left frustrating unclear whether a murder was even committed. The ambiguity is meant to be clever or disturbing or shocking, but it is really just a sign of incredibly bad writing.The film certainly doesn't play to our expectations. Lucas is an acclaimed gay playwright and is probably best known for his script for LONGTIME COMPANION, a landmark in gay cinema. So when the film at first appears to be about the integrity of gay fiction -- compromising orientation and honesty to pander to a straight public -- there is a promise of THE DYING GAUL being a story of substance. But that quickly evaporates when the ineffectual Robert far too easily sells out his values -- literary and sexual -- to the charming and pragmatic bisexual Jeffrey. Then there is the hope that the film will be about redemption, about Robert regaining his self-respect and ethics -- but that never materializes and if anything the characters grow increasingly amoral -- and increasingly less interesting.Ultimately, the story seems intent on proving Jeffrey right, that the sexuality of the protagonists is irrelevant; straight or gay, it is all the same, good and evil are hardly relevant. And, I suppose, there is some minor victory to be had by Lucas showing no need to be politically correct by making Robert neither a role model nor a tragic hero -- but just another unredeemable human wretch. But the victory is very small and no more meaningful or gratifying than Robert's ultimate reward.And for what is worth, Jeffrey is right; THE DYING GAUL is a lousy title.