Rating: Summary: Lili Taylor rules Review: Before I saw this film, I never knew Lili could be so, loud. Normally, on shows and in other movies she's very soft spoken in most of the scenes. She portrays a Lesbian writer, Valerie Solanas, who is a man hater. She decides to write a manifesto, and create S.C.U.M., or society for cutting up men. She worked her way through collage by prostitution, and got a degree in psychology. Then she is often homeless, sleeping on ruffs, with her typewriter, and paper bag of things.
She even comes up with weird ways of earning money, ten cents any dirty word, six bucks for an hour worth of conversation, and even some chest stepping, odd but true. This is how she meets Maurice Gerodeious. He's major porn publisher who wants her to write him two novels. She declines at first but later goes to dinner, all dolled up, and signs the contract. Then the next day she read the whole contract and sees that she got screwed...(... a rate of six percent for the first 20,000 copies, a rate of six percent for the first 20,000 copies, he wants to own scum....).
So she tries to sell the manifesto, telling people it will change their life; she also charges 50 cents for girls, and 1.00 for men. Valerie has also written a play called up your a** about some experiences she has had with the "male species". Andy wont produce it, and it gets tossed out, but she specifically told them that she only had one other copy, that she needed that one back. she spends the remainder of the movie trying to get the script back, and develops the obsession. She now believes that Andy and the publisher are trying to steal scum and own it, alone.
In order to do what ever she really wants to do, she gets dolled up, again, and goes to the new factory. Here she shoots Warhol and his assistant before running out of bullets, then she tries to shoot the other assistant so she pulls the trigger anyway, only to make noise that it makes, and she goes out the elevator. Valerie walks down the street and sees a police officer, she goes up and tells him the police are looking for her and gives him the gun. "I shot Andy Warhol, yeah, I had to he had too much control over my life.", as she hands over her gun, out of the paper bag. See a couple of days ago she got the bag and putts all her belongings in it. "See I've been carrying all my belonging in the bag for a few days now, including the ice pick, which I'd forgotten." is what she says when she is asked why she needs the ice pick.
Lili masters this role, as usual, and SHOULD have walked away with that Oscar, she deserved it. Do you know how hard it is to believe you self in to a role the way she does? She has that unknown quality, the thing Judy Garland had, that magic, that nobody can copy. Not in a thousand years. Great movie, you should see it, but its not the greatest for children, they refer to a lot of sexual references, and intercourse.
Rating: Summary: A brilliant and overlooked film! Review: "I Shot Andy Warhol" is an interesting look at the life of the disturbed feminist Valerie Solanas. Its a brilliant film that takes you into a world that is often ugly yet impossible to turn away from. The first time I watched it, I felt a little uncomfortable with some of the subject matter. I don't see this movie as making a judgment call on either side. It just tells the story of the deterioration of this woman and her growing hatred and obsession with Andy Warhol that led to the shooting. Valerie wrote this odd little play with a name I can't write here. She found her way to the Factory through Candy Darling, a drag queen brilliantly portrayed by Stephen Dorff. None of them were interested too much in the play and it got tossed out with the trash. After being duped by a shady publisher for her feminist manifesto, she became increasingly enraged and obsessed with Warhol who she believed was trying to steal her book. I have to admit that this would be a disturbing film for most people. Her ideas were very warped and skewed by a hatred and distrust of men. The ironic thing was that she probably could have been a good writer if her bitterness and insanity hadn't taken over. I think this shows what can happen to a person sexually abused as a child. Its a really depressing film that always makes me wince whenever I see it. However, its so powerful that I've watched it many times. I think Lily Taylor should have got an Oscar for this film. She put her heart and soul into this character. All in all, I wouldn't recommend it to everyone. Its definitely a film that offends a lot of people. I didn't see this film as glorifying this woman nor condemning her. It told the story the best that it could. Its definitely a film that will be remembered.
Rating: Summary: A brilliant and overlooked film! Review: "I Shot Andy Warhol" is an interesting look at the life of the disturbed feminist Valerie Solanas. Its a brilliant film that takes you into a world that is often ugly yet impossible to turn away from. The first time I watched it, I felt a little uncomfortable with some of the subject matter. I don't see this movie as making a judgment call on either side. It just tells the story of the deterioration of this woman and her growing hatred and obsession with Andy Warhol that led to the shooting. Valerie wrote this odd little play with a name I can't write here. She found her way to the Factory through Candy Darling, a drag queen brilliantly portrayed by Stephen Dorff. None of them were interested too much in the play and it got tossed out with the trash. After being duped by a shady publisher for her feminist manifesto, she became increasingly enraged and obsessed with Warhol who she believed was trying to steal her book. I have to admit that this would be a disturbing film for most people. Her ideas were very warped and skewed by a hatred and distrust of men. The ironic thing was that she probably could have been a good writer if her bitterness and insanity hadn't taken over. I think this shows what can happen to a person sexually abused as a child. Its a really depressing film that always makes me wince whenever I see it. However, its so powerful that I've watched it many times. I think Lily Taylor should have got an Oscar for this film. She put her heart and soul into this character. All in all, I wouldn't recommend it to everyone. Its definitely a film that offends a lot of people. I didn't see this film as glorifying this woman nor condemning her. It told the story the best that it could. Its definitely a film that will be remembered.
Rating: Summary: Revealing the S.C.U.M. manifesto Review: Excellent indy pic with outstanding performances especially by Dorf, Harris and Taylor, all excellent small-budget mainstays. I liked Harris' portrayal of Warhol, because he's usually represented by someone who just acts aloof and goofy, but here he actually works as a person. Stephen Dorf as Candy Darling and Lili Taylor as Valerie Solanas are entirely convincing. This movie started director Mary Harron's reputation for skillful storytelling, and it was later cemented by her work 'American Psycho.' I greatly anticipate her next film.
The Amazon critic here criticized Harron for not taking a stand on Solanos and the S.C.U.M. manifesto. Why? The movie's not about the manifesto, but Solanos' bizarre character and the story of how she shot Warhol. This is done to a T.
Great flick!
Rating: Summary: such extereme fascination!! Review: A politically radical, man hating lesbian shoots Andy Warhol (who remains one of the most visionary pop heroes of our time) and leaves him for dead. The events in this movie are part of our cultural history, and it lets you in on everyone's motivations (except Andy, who remained elusive to the end). Very 60's-very cool.
Rating: Summary: UNBELIEVABLE Review: A TERRIFIC movie, stylish and beautiful. Lili Taylor's tour de force! One of the great "New York movies," and MUST SEE for fans of the genre!
Rating: Summary: FINE OFF-BEAT DRAMA..... Review: Amazon.com's Tom Keogh's remarks aside, this is a fine chronicle of the events leading up to the shooting of Andy Warhol by deranged fringe-dweller Valarie Solanas. Having grown up in the Warhol era, I thought the film rather accurately captured the essence and feel of the Factory and Warhol's groupies. As to Solanas' psychological deterioration--who's the expert? Keogh? I don't think there's anyone who can explain in gratuitous detail what the woman was actually going through and why she shot Warhol. The film only gives an account of what could have happened based on the information available. And it did a great job. Casting was perfect--specifically Lili Taylor as Solanas and Stephen Dorff as Candy Darling. Jared Harris was OK as Warhol. But truthfully, I don't think anyone could actually play Warhol but Warhol. He was that unique. I recommend this film to anyone who remembers that era and anyone even interested in it. The film is fine and stands it's own ground exceedingly well. If anything, just see the film for the performances. You'll still learn something.
Rating: Summary: Totally degenerate, but very well done Review: Director Mary Harron invades the sixties tinfoil castle of Andy Warhol and spins a kind of art deco loser romance with the very talented Lili Taylor playing the very butch Valerie Solanas, who actually did shoot Andy Warhol. I have been driving myself crazy trying to recall who Taylor is taking off on, some little guy, ghetto denizen from a forgotten flick of my mind. If anybody recognizes the style, please let me know. Anyway, she manages to be surprisingly sympathetic as the authoress of the SCUM manifesto (that's "Society for the Cutting Up of Men") and a play entitled "Up Your ...," which I suppose is appropriate considering the decadence depicted. Taylor's Valerie Solanas is strangely winning as a victim of a desperate, mad integrity. (I suspect the real Valerie was anything but sympathetic.) She won't take a job but will beg, panhandle, turn tricks and steal. She's a true believer whose main tenet is that men are something akin to a disease. Because she is bright and witty and courageous she wins us over even though she hates us. We forgive her because we know she hurts a lot and can't help herself. (To which she would say, "...")
Harron decorates this sixties cum nineties version of New York chic/flophouse reality with the kind of degenerate personalities for which the Big Apple is justly famous. Jared Harris plays Andy Warhol brilliantly with something like a truer than true characterization, combining a sympathetic, eccentric and gentle exterior with an exploitive mercantile heart. One gets the sense that he had it coming. Stephen Dorff is Candy Darling, a transvestite so fetching that he makes a guy like me wish he had a sister. Lothaire Bluteau as Olympia Press publisher Maurice Girodias seems a little young, but otherwise fits the bill, and Martha Plimpton as Stevie does a nice job in a modest part. The sound track might catch your ear with Blue Cheer performing the Coasters' "Summertime Blues" and Bettie Serveert doing a fine interpretation of Dylan's "I'll Keep It with Mine." Jewel (yes, the very same) sings "Sunshine Superman," and completing the nineties accent on the sixties, REM does "Love Is All Around." Probably outright anachronistic is the use of an aluminum soda can to smoke grass. I don't think that came into practice until later when the skunkweed got so strong you could smoke it like hash. Some other sights: the Andy Warhol hanger-ons doing a faux sand-painting mandala with pills as they party, and then one of them rolling her naked torso into the pills so that they stick to her body. Or the guy coming out of--an encounter, we'll call it--with a jar of Vaseline in hand in time to greet some slumming French aristocratic ladies whose hands (one gloved) he kisses. In a bit of haute culture ridicule, another of the hangers-on asks poor Candy Darling, "We've been wondering, how often do you get your period?" To which s/he replies, "Every day. I'm all woman." If you're the kind of person who watches the Disney Channel, I would recommend you skip this. Otherwise you might want to check it out. I found it surprisingly smart and witty. The print is finely cut, the acting is superior, and there's an underlying sense of something close to the heroic in a clearly quixotic way.
Rating: Summary: PERFECT, PERFECT, PERFECT!!!!! Review: I can't believe that anyone could have given this film a bad review. Lily Taylor is so amazing that I just don't know how she accomplished this incredible, tour-de-force performance. The movie captures the collective memory of the sixties in New York perfectly, and the story is just riviting. I can't say enough for this wonderful movie, so I'll stop here. ...Oh, one more thing. Lily Taylor should have won the Oscar for Best Actress, no question.
Rating: Summary: The S.C.U.M. Manifesto Review: I cannot say in any other words how phenomenal Lili Taylor's performance was in this film. This flick was based on the true fact of Valerie Solanas who actually did shoot Warhol. After the shooting, Andy never quite recovered very well, and his health was fragile. As to Valerie, I must correct those that call her a feminist, because the true definition of a feminist is someone that believes in equality for both male and female. Valerie was a male basher, she hated men, and if she could of had it her way she would of (...) every man that crossed her way. Valerie was a delusional maniacal nut case with plenty of sex abuse issues and so on, however you end-up sympathizing for her in the film. Harris's role as Warhol along with Dorff's Candy Darling (who's very convincing as a drag queen) perfect the well put together film directed by Mary Harron. This film is decadent and brilliant, and you can watch it several times before you tire of it.
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