Rating: 
Summary: Peter Sellers at his best!
Review: Of all the Peter Sellers' movies I have seen, this is my favorite. I loved it from beginning to end. The scene with Shirley MacLaine was one of the funniest I have ever seen . . . also one of the saddest (if you're serious enough to take it that way!). He was truly a genius and he played this role like no other, which was great acting on his part. That, combined with a great cast and script, makes this a five-star movie. It has enough memorable scenes and laughs to convert even people who don't normally like Peter Sellers' movies. Go for it, you'll love it.
Rating:
Summary: Being There
Review: This has to be one of the most entertaining Peter Sellers movies I have ever seen. At first, I was reluctant to see this movie since I am not a Shirley MacLaine fan, but at the urging of a friend I borrowed her copy and watched this movie and I'm glad I did. Soon thereafter, I just had to go out and buy myself a copy. I highly recommend to all.
Rating:
Summary: Peter Seller's Parting Shot At Greatness Fulfilled
Review: I recently read a review by a young movie critic who had the honesty to admit being baffled by the final scene in Peter Seller's celebrated last movie, "Being There". In this scene Sellers' character Chauncy Gardener strays away from the funeral party to walk in the woods of the estate he may inherit based on the wishes of his dying benefactor's and the prurient interest the benefactor's new widow has in Chauncy. He blithely strolls across the surface of a pond like a squire surveying his acreage, stopping to stab his umbrella into the depths. We're astonished, of course, when his 'brolly' disappears up to its handle. This, of course, implies Chauncy is walking on water. Is this intended as a biblical reference? I think not. More likely, it's the director's way of visually depicting the same surreal theme he has been developing throughout the movie: All things are possible to one whose own perceptions and understanding is so retarded and child-like as to believe in both everything and nothing at once. The viewer understands from the movie Chauncy is no one spectacular, a bit retarded intellectually, totally naive, without any formidable experience or understanding in the outside world. It is precisely this lack of merit, his obtuseness, which makes him the perfect foil for everyone he comes into contact with. The others lay their own biased perceptions, understandings, and imaginings onto him, so he is seen as being everything they superficially suppose him to be based on his outward appearance; his suit, his visage, and his mannerisms. He who they see as everything is in actuality nothing. Nothing but the perfect fool. He succeeds not because of his native ability, but because he has none. He rises to prominence because our culture has become so artificial, so intellectually bankrupt, and so superficial that all anyone around him relates to is his image, his superficial appearance, his innocent charm and lack of self-consciousness. He's a chameleon, the "tabula rasa" they then write the script for. To the dying billionaire industrialist, he's a caring friend, to his wife an erotic tease, to the President, a witty raconteur. When the other characters in the movie overlay their own human foibles and shortcomings into the equation of interacting with him, superimposing their own corrupted values and ideas onto Chauncy's blithe but transparently idiotic behavior, his nonsensical utterances become transformed into clever witticisms, witty, thoughtful and politically adept observations. He is "everyman" precisely because he is no one. When people no longer ground their perceptions, actions or behaviors on reliable, objective and well-educated abilities to decipher and determine the truth, when they abandon the laws of gravity and chance, they enter into a cultural purgatory bounded chiefly by their own ignorance. They travel at their own peril through a strange and quite unpredictable world filled with artifice and illusion. Such a description also fits the way the world is depicted in the stylized fantasies and superficial plot lines of many mainstream movies, videos and TV. Unfortunately, the consequence of a steady diet of such palpable nonsense is nothing to laugh about. The use of such superficial and stylized models as guidelines for operating in the real world is becoming much more common. Indeed, we're living in a culture virtually transfixed by simple surface impressions of what things appear to be rather than with what they actually are. Like Chauncy, we walk blithely on the surface of our world, never bothering to look at the dangers in the depths below. Unlike our fearless celluloid hero, though, we cannot necessarily evade the dangers of an incredibly complex and increasingly disintegrating contemporary society by merely ignoring them. At the surface all shades of subtlety are muted and lost; the rich panoply of shades, colors and hues characteristic of a complex world are stylized into simple pastel monochromes, representing a gauze-filtered replica of a world that's unclear, indistinct, and out of focus. This loss of clarity about the nature of the world and its basic reality leads inevitably to dangerous over-simplifications of complicated realities. We would do well to remember that ours is a complex, multilayered world; forgetting this fact is a well-documented recipe for social, economic, and political disaster. As George Santayana warned us long ago, "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it". We must remember that sometimes things are profoundly different from the way they appear, that appearances may often deceive and mislead even the best trained and the most sophisticated eye. We must recognize these negative social forces for what they really are; arbitrary, indifferent, irrational, and profoundly anti-human. Mistaking them for anything less (or more) could be a truly fatal mistake. Perhaps Sellers was trying to tell us something......
Rating:
Summary: A Sellers Masterpiece
Review: "Being There" (1979) remains one of the all-time great films, with a brilliant performance by Peter Sellers that should have won an Academy Award. Director Hal Ashby has done justice to Jerzy Kosinski's perceptive satire on the media age, dominated by Sellers' unique portrayal of the simple-minded gardener Chance. The film's political humor has grown in relevance as we watch the ludicrous farce of Campaign 2000. Shirley MacLaine and Melvyn Douglas lend excellent support to Sellers' finest screen role. In retrospect, the derivative "Forrest Gump" is a pale imitation of this timeless classic.
Rating:
Summary: Being There
Review: This is widely (and for me,personally) thought to be his best work...turns out he wanted to do this to show his other side. This is where I learned that illiterate doesn't mean dumb. Enough said...although it's worth the price of admission to see Shirley Maclaine in the throws of an orgasm as Sellers watches.....TV.
Rating:
Summary: "It certainly is a white man's world"
Review: This movie hits you on many levels. From the "Basketball Jones" video to the Vanderbilt mansion, you have to appreciate the ironies of life. You can picture the White House trying to find out who this guy is, although made in the era of Nixon, you can see George Stephanopoulous doing the same vetting. Except for the bedroom scene, "I like to watch", this movie was perfect. And because of that scene I would not recommend this movie for small children.
Rating:
Summary: The bodisattva of a little gardener
Review: When I bought my elderly parents their 1st VCR, BEING THERE was already in the deck when I hooked it up for them. FORREST GUMP(the movie only)hints at the essence of Chance the gardener when Gump is running, & doesn't know why everybody's following him. Graham Chapman's Brian Cohn in LIFE OF BRIAN doesn't know why and doesn't want any followers. Chance is the true idiot savant who doesn't know or care that people are hanging on his every word. Both movie and film are gentle, peaceful looks at modern society, the media, and the messianic fixations therein. This was Melvyn Douglas' last film, and Peter Sellers' last but one, and is also the first film I can remember that finishes with outtakes, as Sellers busts up trying to get out a line. BEING THERE is a wonderful film with a wonderful cast, and it is as deep as you want it to be. Take it at face value as the story of a man who is misunderstood by everyone, and just enjoy it. After Jerzy Kosinski's tortured youth, that he could come up with this amazes me. By the way, if you've seen this, if you see Raphael...
Rating:
Summary: This guy was luckier than Forrest Gump
Review: This is the finest acting performance by the late Peter Sellers. This movie's plot has many similarities to the plot of "Forrest Gump", but was made many years before "Forrest Gump" was ever written. Sellers plays a mentally-challenged gardener whose only knowledge of the world comes from viewing television. When he gets out into the streets of Washington, D.C., he is mistaken for a very intelligent and affluent gentleman by the VIP's of government. Stick around to see the out-takes presented with the end credits; you'll see how many times some scenes had to be shot over and over because Sellers couldn't help laughing at his own material.
Rating:
Summary: Best endings ever?
Review: I read through every review and I cant believe that nobody really mentions the ending. It has to be one of the best, most unexpected and yet most satisfying ever committed to film. Just when you think that you understand the point of the movie and what his character is about - BOOM along comes that ending. Yes the movie starts off a little slow, and yes some of the humour is a little dated, but stick with it. The movie has a message and if dont get it, your probably not meant to. Peter Sellars was a genius.
Rating:
Summary: Deeper than you realize
Review: I think most everyone has missed the point of this fabulous movie. Certainly the gardener is not a mental giant, but neither is he simply a parrot of TV aphorisms. The simpleton is very much a spiritual genius because he sees life in the most fundamental way - something we all crave and somehow identify with. Come on - open your hearts and see this gentle genius for who he REALLY is! ...and, it's a damn funny movie!
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