Rating: 
Summary: Hauntingly Brilliant.
Review: I love this movie.I don't know why,but for some reason I just do.
Sofia Coppola made her acting debut in "The Godfather Pt.3" proving once and for all that just because you're the daughter of a famous director doesn't mean your talented as well.Who ever thought Sofia Coppola would win an Academy Award and actually be good at writing or directing.It sure wasn't me."The Virgin Sucides" title speaks for itself.It's hauntingly perfect in the writing,the musical score,and the acting fueled by Kirsten Dunst.
I haven't read the book and I realize people say this is a bad movie because of the fact it doesn't match to the book.But this a great film.But...enough of the blabber. The movie is about the
Lisbon girls:13 year old Cecelia, 14 year old Lux(Dunst), 15
year old Bonnie,16 year old Mary,and 17 year old Therese. All of these girls are beautiful and all the objects of the neoghborhood boys's fantasies.Their uptight parents (James Woods & Kathleen Turner) don't let the girls make friends,drive in cars,or date boys. But that all changes when the school pretty boy Trip Fontaine (Josh Hartnett) falls in love with the beautiful Lux and gets a couple friends to take all the girls to the dance. The film is so hauntingly perfect it is something that really makes you sit down and just think I guess.The theatrical trailer on the DVD is just as good as the film itself and Sofia Coppola really shows how talented she is.Kirsten Dunst gives her best performance yet.A- for the movie.Enjoy
Rating: 
Summary: What the Hell?
Review: I don't know what everyone else saw, but I was bored to tears. If I had the choice of watching this movie again or bashing my head in with a big blunt object, I would find the biggest rock I could, and smash away. I am just being honest when I say that this movie deserves zero stars because it's like watching paint dry. It's drawn out and painfully boring to no end, and I felt like scratching my eyes out completely.
Rating: 
Summary: Luscious but formless
Review: I had heard great things about this movie, so I decided to give it a try. Of course, anything so hyped and praised can't help but be somewhat disappointing, but the film itself is really not "all that." Though I'm happy Sofia Coppola has finally emerged from the cruel and unfair dissing she received for "Godfather III," I think that this film is extremely overpraised. Coppola shows a great deal of flair as a director (as well as that rarest of commodities: a unique voice), but not much substance. Also, though her choice of music is very shrewd overall, her overuse of the song "Playground Love" on the background quickly becomes very annoying.The closest that the movie has to a main character is Lux Lisbon. Lux is not the prettiest of the Lisbon sisters -- Mary, the second oldest, is -- but she's the only one with anything like a personality, plus she has an uncanny ability to seem both unguarded and opaque. (Perhaps it is significant that Lux is the only one of the girls with a non-traditional first name, but the film never says.) As such, she's the main object of desire for the teenage boys. She swings from playing the "loose girl" to the uptight snob to the hurt flower, and even if you don't particularly like her, you do feel for her when Trip Fontaine dumps her. The rest of the cast is quite good as well, especially James Woods as the bumbling but intermittently tender father (one scene has him absently stroking the hair of one of his daughters as he tries to persuade his wife to let the girls go to the prom) and Kathleen Turner as the extremely strict, clueless mother. When the narrator wonders aloud how Mr. and Mrs. Lisbon could've produced such beautiful creatures, the answer is fairly apparent: they inherited their good looks from their mother. Mrs. Lisbon may not have aged well, but she was very pretty in her youth. The film's lack of structure becomes frustrating, and I found myself getting more and more bored, wishing that the girls would hurry up and kill themselves so the movie could end. So overall, a good debut, and a feast for the eyes, but not solid enough to hold my interest.
Rating:
Summary: Beautiful images
Review: I love this film and I don't have a clear idea why.
It just the kind of film that keeps you thinking. Did it really happen like that or did the boys' imagination went too far? The images are haunting. The cinematography is simply beautiful, it was so beautiful its hard to explain. It reflects the girls beauty, I think. The acting is superb. Some may complain that it's too plain, but it's (the acting) just right. Cause the girls aren't real. They are a memory of an obsession. A very hard role handled superbly by Kirsten Dunst and the other actresses, whose roles were more like cameos, if you ask me. Katheleen Turner and James Wood do an extraordinary job with the parents. We don't know much about their characters, but they do. Turner makes everything Mrs.Lisbon does plausible, a very hard thing, if you ask me.
Great Directorial debut for Sophia Coppola. She creates the mood for this beautiful film. Without her, the film would've had been nothing...
And the score. It's just too great for words. It haunts you, keeps your eyes on the screen, makes you want to know more about these beautiful virgins.
BTW, I read someone was complaining about the title, saying that they aren't all virgens and that the ones that ARE virgins, their virginity plays no important part in the movie, well, I think the title isn't talkin about their virginity as in sex, but about their minds. Their minds are virgins to full maturity. Take Lux as an example, she wasn't a sexual virgin (or whatever you like to call it), but she was a mind virgin. She may've been sexually mature for sex (therefore, making her a none virgin) but she wasn't mentally mature to understand sex or love, making her a mind virgin. Or simply a virgin... so, are they all virgins in some ways or another? YES! Did they all commit suicide? YES! there you go! the title has been explained...
Oh! and feel free to contradict me or call me stupid cause I didn't get it or something...
Rating:
Summary: the bored audience suicides
Review: The Virgin Suicides was recommended to me by someone who by all means should be dead right now. I don't understand how all these arty film school rejects can praise this movie so much. The only arty thing this "film" achieves is an entire new level of monotony. Even the music is boring in this movie. You'd have to shoot me with elephant tranq to get me to watch it for a second time.
Rating:
Summary: Teen Dream
Review: One of the most intriguing and subtle teen movies of the last years, "The Virgin Suicides" is an interesting and promising debut from director Sofia Coppola. This is a well-crafted story about the coming of adulthood and the power of (lost) dreams, one that wisely covers key issues like the loss of innocence, love and freedom. The five Lisbon sisters truly carry an ethereal, dream-like mood, an element that Coppola manages to deliver throughout the entire movie, which is as beautiful as it is haunting. One can sense a gripping and enigmatic atmosphere here, that combined with the slow development of the plot creates an hypnotic and addictive cinematic experience with an unique feel.
The soundtrack, mostly by the french duo Air, also carries that strange yet captivating feel, offering the perfect musical combination to the unsettling images. We never really know why the sisters killed themselves, although some hints are given through the movie. They really didn`t seem to connect with their envoironment, partially because of their parents` attitude but also due to the adolescence period they had started to experience. They saw the world in a peculiar way, discovering mysteries and elements no one else noticed. The effects of isolation and lack of communication are well handled here, especially in one of the last scenes where the girls play music on the phone to their neighbours. This is indeed an excellent and very well-observed coming-of-age moment, a truly memmorable sequence. Although it carries some unengaging scenes and has characters that the viewer isn`t allowed to know or connect with, "The Virgin Suicides" is still a fine effort and a worthwile indie movie about troubled and confused teenagers. It`s also another sucessful film that dares to explore the "peaceful" and "calm" american suburbia where apparently there`s not much going on.
Recommended.
Rating:
Summary: An interesting debut.
Review: 3.5 stars. In this bizarre tale of Americana gone horribly wrong there are many subtly disturbing moments that linger long after the film has ended. This is the film debut of fledgling director Sofia Coppola and it is surprisingly mature considering this is her first attempt. There are some naive moments where she blatantly provokes an audience reaction, but I ended up feeling resentful instead of moved. However, there is a dreamy quality to the film akin to adolescent giddiness where at any moment the scene could be emotional or transcendent. When it was over I was mildly depressed due to the tragic ending but still fairly impressed with this atmospheric and ultimately interesting film.
Rating:
Summary: Hmm...
Review: As far as I can tell, this film was trying to explore a few different themes:
-the dream-like quality of memory
-the adolescent mindset, especially toward sex
-and innocence vs. over-protectiveness
In the first case, Coppolla does an excellent job with her lighting effects (hazy, washed-out scenery) and dialogue (understated and, often, unrealistic) of portraying memory. The film seems distant and surreal, just as, perhaps, are your own memories of adolescence.
In the second case, however, I think "The Virgin Suicides" drops the ball. We never really learn anything about any of the characters. For the girls, there is an excuse- this is the boys' memory. But what about the boys themselves? They aren't particularly developed as characters, which would be fine, if they were at least a little sympathetic. Actually, I found myself put off by their warped fascination with the Lisbon sisters. This was the kind of obsession they really needed to see a psychiatrist about (although perhaps I'm not the best judge, since I didn't find the Lisbons appealing, and I've never considered Kirsten Dunst to be particularly attractive).
I also felt the third theme was fairly weak. The parents were so over-the-top (especially the mother) that I couldn't sympathize with them at all, while the girls were such blank slates that I had nothing to try to sympathize with. When the first daughter killed herself, I couldn't figure it out. I wasn't even sure if Coppolla was trying to make some kind of black joke. After all, there was really no reason for it- it was just such an overreaction. Because I didn't know why she'd done it, and the evidence I had made it look like she was simply being petty, I actually didn't feel sorry for her at all.
Needless to say, I couldn't figure out a reason for any of the other girls to kill themselves either. I realize that this is the boys' memory, and they wouldn't have known the reasons, but I can't even imagine a (reasonable) possibility that could have driven them to suicide.
The performances of James Woods and Kathleen Turner as the parents are outstanding, but the rest seem fairly lackluster. Part of that is the material, but part is just a lack of talent and/or effort.
In sum, this would have made an excellent 10-minute short, but as a feature it loses its way. It is worth seeing, if only for Woods' and Turner's acting.
Rating:
Summary: The Road to Nowhere
Review: Think back through your lifetime, of all the books you've read, stories you've heard, and movies you've seen. Now out of the millions of these, how many of the proganists did you not like? A few, maybe. Now how many movies have you watched where you actually wanted the protaginsit to die. Very few, if even at all. Now how many where you sat through the whole movie just wishing and waiting they'd just hurry up and die already? How may where you wish you could just jump into the tv and kill the charactors. How about the actors, directors, and writers too for putting you through this mysery of wasting time, money, and precious brain cells? If you don't get my point, I reccomend you watch this movie. At least then you'll be either (a) abled to answer yes to every question or (b) know that you're too inane to know the difference between a movie and a hangman's noose, in which case you'd spend your time more wisely suffocating on the latter.
Rating: 
Summary: Papa, I think I want to direct, or something...
Review: The nearly unanymous critical praise for this film is another case of Emperor's New Clothes syndrome, not unlike the absurdly over-rated and unnecesary Adaptation, directed by Coppola's hubby. I haven't read the Eugenides book, but if the pretentious, cliched narration and overall pointlessness of this excersize are indicators, I'd probably hate it. Honestly, I fail to see the point of a movie about boys longing for girls in which we essentially learn nothing at all about the boys or the girls. I also find it strange that noone out there in critic-land seemed to note some glaring problems that absolutely mar the entire film-- chiefly, that we are shown scenes inside the Lisbon house which there is no way the boys would have been privy to. If we can see these sorts of things, doesn't that sort of ruin the whole "ethereal, mysterious" aura that was apparently the point of it all? I mean, if we can see inside their world, why can't we be shown anything meaningful about why they each committed suicide? Oh, wait-- I remember: because this is a poorly made (but beautifully $hot) picture... This seems to be another example of a movie that looks so good and has such cool music that it absolutely has to be good-- we wouldn't have it any other way. Kind of reminds me (for various reasons) of American Beauty, another one of the most over-rated movies of the past few years. I'm sorry, but if you actually think that this is a really awesome movie, you are an idiot, just like your president and most your countrymen.
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