Rating: 
Summary: A bitter-sweet gem!
Review: My husband and I -- both 50+ years old -- absolutely adored this movie. We laughed and cried and laughed again. I am on Amazon at this moment to buy a copy or two: one to keep, and one to give to a lucky person.
Rating: 
Summary: A very worthwhile film
Review: I saw this movie because I rented it from the movie store and I really enjoyed it. I'ved showed it to two of my friends so far, and they both loved it. I think its something that every teenage girl ought to see, if only for some of the great comedy. There's a whole scene Where Sobieski is in a mall and she feels so uncomfortable and she makes it so true to life, the claustrophobia and frustration is so true to life it makes me itch.
Rating:
Summary: A Jem! Albert Brooks' Absolute Best Performance to Date.
Review: I never heard of this movie until I saw it at the video store. I almost didn't rent it. That would have been a terrible mistake on my part. This movie is fantastic! It is warm, touching, sad, and at the same time funny. Carol Kane is a hoot. Albert Brooks & Lee Lee give the perfomances of their careers (in my opinion). Please, do yourself a favor and rent it. You (like me) will be buying it for your collection soon afterwards.
Rating:
Summary: Connections that Last Forever
Review: "J" and "R" are two very different people. "R" is in his 40s and runs an upscale clothing store. He's a conservative, very particular creature of habit, and he has a secret that keeps him separate from the rest of the world, stopping him from making friends. "J" is a 17 year old goth teen poet who hates her family, talks to her dead grandmother, hangs out in graveyards, self mutilates, and makes paper airplanes out of her own suicide notes. She was just fired from her job for farting, of all things, and decides she'd like to sell clothing in "R's" store. What "R" and "J" do have in common is a need for change, and together, they'll get it. This isn't really a feel good movie. There's a lot of sadness and futility here. However, it is also an ultimately positive movie about family, friends, fate, forgiveness, and connections that last forever, even beyond death.
Rating: 
Summary: Unimaginative
Review: I sat through this movie hoping it would get better. Unfortunately it got worse and the ending is classic Hollywood confectionary. Brooks is good as usual but Sobieski is completely miscast and is too pretty to really pull off the alienated teen she is supposed to portray. I would recommend seeing Ghost World which deals with exactly the same subject matter and is much more touching and realistic.
Rating:
Summary: Decent movie - funny and sad at the same time
Review: I originally saw this movie with a packed audience and everyone was blown away. Upon a second viewing at home, I changed my rating from a 5 to a 4. The ending just doesn't rate a 5-star review. Other than that, the following comments, which I made after the first showing, all still stand. LeeLee Sobieski is wonderful as the 17-year old misfit who has no friends, hates her family, hates life and spends most of her time writing her own eulogies. She manages to convince Albert Brooks, a mens clothing store manager, to hire her as a stock girl and it changes both their lives. Some of the lines in this movie are laugh out loud funny and while the ending is a bit simplistic, my friends and I enjoyed what we call a "3-hankie" moment. Albert Brooks is believable as the 49 year old loner who spends his free time reading magazines. The two main characters are made for each other and their dysfunctional lives are changed for the better for their having met.
Rating:
Summary: My "most favorite movie" for this year
Review: The title made me think it was a much different movie. This is a GREAT movie that has substance to it. It's on the same line as "As Good As It Gets" (another most favorite of mine). When the cost of the movie goes down to a reasonable price I will buy it so I can watch it over and over again.
Rating: 
Summary: You'll like it if you like movies about relationships
Review: ...a film about a young Goth girl who develops a relationship with a set-in-his-ways, some might say nerdy, middle-age man who manages a store selling too-conservative men's clothing. I rented this as I am intrigued by Goth and why? How many 47 year-old men know about Goth or are attracted by or curious about Goth? What does this say about me? I'm at the age where my peers have daughters that have went through that stuff! ...as for me, I'm ready to run off to Transylvania with the first Goth girl that will have me! We'll figure out why when we get there. Funny, but seriously, I identified with both the girl's inner emotional dynamics, state in life and desire to grow as well as the man's state and condition. When you meet the girls parent's you know why she's [messed] up. ...a surprisingly human movie...
Rating:
Summary: Welcome Home, Christine Lahti
Review: Christine Lahti hits her directorial stride with My First Mister, the story of goth chick J's precarious friendship with her wry middle-aged retail boss Randall. Proving the old adage that cliches are cliches because they're true, Lahti guides Leelee Sobieski (think Drew Barrymore's geeky math team friend in Never Been Kissed) and Albert Brooks (Taxi Driver, Defending Your Life) through Jill Franklyn's warm comedy that misses sappiness through its edginess and wit. "I like chocolate. It's dark and warm, like I imagine a hug would be" is just one of the lines written by Franklyn, who has contributed several scripts to the Seinfeld show. J's perspective, like that of Winona Ryder's Roxy in the '80's movie Welcome Home Roxy Carmicheal, is dark and miserably self-centered but enormously entertaining. Her chemistry with Randall requires no suspension of disbelief--Brooks and Sobieski have just made my list of Top Ten Most Watchable Onscreen Couples. The movie's set up is absorbing, and the somewhat formulaic rise of action doesn't deter from its entertainment value as the last third of the movie veers from the predictable and into the deeply satisfying. Cameos by Mary Kay Place, Micheal McKean, Carol Kane and John Goodman add color to the screen as well. In short, an excellent movie and well worth your time.
Rating:
Summary: Bathos supreme
Review: With superior performances by Leelee Sobieski and Albert Brooks as the two leads, this should have been a much better film than it is. Carol Kane as well turns in a terrific performance as an overly middle class-ified Mom--bourgeois to the max--and John Goodman, in a smallish role, is very funny as a way overgrown hippie. The first half of this film is absolutely perfect. The comedy is witty, sharp, and simultaneously touching. As "J" (for Jennifer), Sobieski really shines; she's a Goth-obsessed teen who, true to the Goth spirit, writes eulogies and haunts graveyards. One might think this sounds much too trite, but the dialogue (and J's monologues) are very smart and lift this portrayal far above the cliched. When J meets Randall (Brooks)--her polar opposite--the inspired mix of antagonism and curiosity is brilliantly done. He becomes her ultra conservative boss in an equally conservative clothing store where she's the backroom clerk responsible for keeping stuff in order. Told never to venture out onto the floor, she does so anyway and typically scares away the customers with her purple-dyed hair and single nose ring (this, after shedding the other four or five facial piercings at Brooks' prompting). So far, so good (in fact, really good). Then the entire course of the film changes with the revelation of Brooks' true condition and we are faced with yet another Hollywood film meant to teach us the value of life and the true nature of us all and the importance of humanity and there's a lesson to be learned here for everyone, fellow earthlings. Of course there is. With such great characters, as revealed by the first half of the film, why not expand upon that foundation and go for the gusto? Move the characters into situations that sharpen their differences more and bring them together based on those differences. By introducing an enormous element of bathos, the momentum of the first half is shattered, to be replaced by an extremely forced convergence of souls rather than a natural one that could easily have been developed, given the intelligence shown earlier in the film. The three stars are for the excellent performances and the great first half of the film.
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