I wanted to but couldn't!

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

This is a gorgeous movie made by a gorgeous spirit.

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

Some guy loses his girlfriend, his job and now drinks all day in a boring bar. He then inherits an ice cream van from his deceased uncle and drives around the streets half-bored selling sweets.This is a perfect example that illustrates good actors don't necessarily make good films! The characters are weak, the story told a thousand times before and the complete luck of active plot makes the film suitable only for TV on a Sunday afternoon. Buscemi fails to push the actors to their limits resulting in a 'soap opera' style performance which is well below the average. Most of the scenes were pointless and contributed nothing to the film.Trees Lounge could have started straight after Tommy inherited the Van (thirty minutes before the end) and still wouldn't make any difference! If you do end up watching the film just imagine how the film would be like if Tarantino directed it.Better watch TV commercials :(

"Trees Lounge" sympathetically intersects a portrait of close-knit family and friends with that of a spiraling down, lonely loser in their midst.With an exceptionally effective ensemble, including notable cameos, writer/director/star Steve Buscemi in his debut feature film is particularly good at establishing the sense of a local bar where everyone not only knows your name but knows your relatives and where you and they live. In the movies, we usually see this kind of ethnic gathering, here Italian-Americans in the part of Long Island that's just over the border from New York City, at a funeral or wedding, rather than in the every day life of the casual, lazy days of summer when the neighborhood ice cream truck coming down the street is an event.What distinguishes this movie from so many others about losers is that each one here has a moment of recognition about what they're doing, and gets to see themselves as others see them. For a slight story, we do wait in suspense if Buscemi's "Tommy" in particular will have enough of an epiphany to turn himself around.While the alcoholics among them seem perhaps too comfortably tolerated, our attention is also kept by similar curiosity if their enablers will stop protecting them as they keep sliding backwards. But what happens to both sides in the struggle is handled in an unusual way. Rather than feeling like a tragedy, the sliding and prevaricating is done with love and humor. Even the other bar fly, Mike Boone Junior's "Mike", while played for some broad laughs, including his screechy but understandably fed up wife, also has pathos for our sympathy.Uniquely compared to so many other debut films that rely on some semi-autobiographical bases, none of the characters are frustrated artists seeking or getting a big break in Manhattan or out of the neighborhood relationship as a deus ex machine solution. Even the "city girl" rejecting these suburbs turns out to be from the outer boroughs that are not that different.Very unusual for a film set in this environment, it is very sensitive to the women, who are not stereotypes even though their options aren't much above the wife or the girlfriend or staying with a cousin in the city. They mostly are the ones who have backbone, particularly as they wisely see what is needed to protect themselves and especially their children. There is a lovely scene when "Tommy"s very pregnant ex-girlfriend, by whom she's not really saying, is viewing old home videos of happier times when they were all friends and younger. She's not the only one in tears.Also very refreshing is for a film to recognize that messing about with a pretty 17 year old is not a plus, but a sign that a lonely older guy is avoiding age appropriate women who have given up on him. Chloe Sevigny portrays less a jail-bait temptress handing out sweets than an envious, imitative "little sister" from a pop song.Mimi Rogers, usually so frostily WASPy, surprisingly does a Long Island accent well enough to believably be the wife of a one-note Daniel Baldwin. Also against type, Carol Kane is not a kook. Debi Mazar has a small but memorable role.Samuel Jackson is in the film for a minute a two, along with Larry Galliard, Jr, pre-"The Wire", but well helps to establish a different side of a character who surprisingly turns out not just to be an amusing barfly, but rather a serious alcoholic who has more at stake. Anthony LaPaglia was a lot thinner ten years ago, but is charismatic here and not just the mechanic as lovable lug.The soundtrack selections are a nice blend of bar band classic rock and older tunes.Live Entertainment's 1996 VHS tape seemed to be in blurry EP mode for a 96 minute long film.

I've been a fan of the diverse and clearly talented actor Steve Buscemi for quite a while, ever since I first saw Con Air back in '99. Naturally, when I heard he'd directed and written a movie by himself, starring him, I wanted to see it. I found this to be more of a drama than a comedy, but it didn't really bother me. It didn't have much of a plot, but that didn't bother me either. The film is about Tommy(Buscemi) who's an alcoholic. He just lost his job, and his boss took over his pregnant girlfriend. So, what should he do? Going to the local bar is probably low on the list of good ideas, but that's what he does. The plot is almost non-existent... then again, there's plenty of back-story to make up for it, and the movie has a pretty good pace, even though it moves kind of slow. The movie is primarily a study of the environment of alcoholics, and as such, it's great. Just great. There's tons of little details, thrown in here and there that don't really add to the plot, but rather to said study. The acting is mostly great. Buscemi is great, as always, and some of the supporting actors are equally good; Baldwin and Sevigny, in particular. The characters are well-written and credible. The humor is a rarity in the film, but it is mainly a drama. Also, what little there is, is great. The environment presented is entirely realistic and accurate. There isn't really anything about it that seemed to just be put in there, everything is perfectly believable. The dialog is well-written. There wasn't a lot I didn't like about this film, apart from the few tell-tale signs of Buscemi's inexperience in the director chair(long takes for no apparent reason, one or two acting performances that are either under- or overdoing it, the occasional odd camera angle), but I can see why many probably won't like it. It's not a fast film, it's not that fun, and the ending doesn't really resolve anything. Everyone is still caught in their respective situations, none of which are satisfactory. No major revelation is made by the end of the film. In the end, Buscemi just makes his point... that the life of an alcoholic is an empty one. Nothing else. Don't rent this to laugh or learn a useful lesson. Rent this to get insight into the day-to-day life of alcoholics and their environment. I recommend this to fans of Steve Buscemi and people who enjoy films that just indulge in study of a certain group of people. Not for those with low attention spans. 8/10

TREES LOUNGE is a film about Tommy Basilio , an unemployed mechanic who spend most of his time drinking in a bar or snorting drugs . " What`s so compelling about this movie ? " you ask , well I think you`ve hit the nail on the head with that question because there`s nothing really compelling about TREES LOUNGE . It`s a really low concept ( ie character based story ) movie where not much happens . Written , directed and starring Steve Buscemi it feels like one of those indie projects actors come up with now and again to increase their cred with major Hollywood studios and I`m guessing Buscemi ploughed much of his own money into the project so maybe I shouldn`t be too critical !!!! MILD SPOILERS !!!!I should perhaps also give some praise to Buscemi for writing a screenplay with an obvious subtext of never getting what you want : Tommy want`s to snort yet more drugs but someone comes into the bathroom , Tommy wants to take a woman he`s picked up in a bar but she falls asleep while he`s in the bathroom , a young kid wants to buy an ice cream but the ice cream man suddenly has a heart attack , so the theme to this movie is very clear . Such a pity realism takes precedence over an exciting plot