Rating: 
Summary: Take a Chance On This One! It's Amazing!
Review: This is simply one of the best, most-intelligent, love stories I've seen. Crudup and Connelly are amazing and amazingly beautiful. Connelly brings so much emotion to the movie - all but the teenage boys will be crying. This is a story about true love, the kind that changes you, the kind that becomes a part of you and exists even absent the other person. But it's also about how hard it is to love a person without wanting to change that person into something they're not. Also, what I really admire about this movie, is the obvious thought that went into the song selections. They fit seamlessly with the movie, providing an almost operatic emotional effect. The images and the music combine to produce some of those rare special moments a movie can bring. This movie delivers emotionally, intellectually, and visually. My one complaint with the DVD: the director's audio commentary. Usually, this is the best bonus of any DVD, but Keith Gordon doesn't add much. He just talks about what an inspiration his wife is, how amazing the actors are, and how he got cheated out of a screenwriting credit. So, that's a bit of a disappointment. But the deleted scenes are another story! They make the DVD all the more a Must Have. The scenes, some of them amazing (Ed Harris has a great one), really add to the story. BUY this DVD; you won't be disappointed!
Rating: 
Summary: Almost perfect tale of Love & Politics
Review: In only a few scenes with limited dialogue, this movie pulls you deeply into the emotional bond between the two main characters -- credit both the director as well as Cruddup and Connelly who have 100 times the chemistry of most movie couples. The most interesting part of the movie though is how it shows the relationship being tested via each of the character's calling in life -- political reform within the system versus a more radical spiritual/social activism. Finding a good love story with intelligence was a breath of fresh air. But this movie is far from perfect. My main complaint is the focus on Cruddup's mental instability during the 2nd half. I think the purpose of his feeling and seeing his dead former love is to have him question the compromises he begins to make as he enters politics, not question his sanity with over the top emotional outbursts. Still the film brought it all together at the end in what I found to an inspiring not depressing final awakening.
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Summary: Buy This Movie
Review: This is my all-time favorite movie. It is such a shame that it was not in the theatre for very long, because this movie is truly a masterpiece. The characters are developed SO well that you genuinely believe in their love, and the plot is completely enthralling. I highly recommend this video as a gift. I don't think there is anyone out there who wouldn't like it. (Maybe wait til the price goes down)
Rating:
Summary: If you liked "Armeggedon", please don't see this.
Review: Where do I begin? This is the most beautiful film I have seen in memory. I saw it once in the theatre in LA, and once as a rental, and as someone who has never bought a movie, this will be my first. Nevermind that Crudup may be the most subtle and underrated actor of at least this generation, that is just icing on this amazing picture. You will not once see him acting in this perfectly acted film. The story and it's sequence is so cleverly told, and if summer blockbusters are more your fare, then you're better off at the tracktor pull. If you are in love, this will make you pray with urgency that you have with your beloved what binds these two characters, and if you are not, their tenderness will help you to believe that there is hope out there for the rest of us.
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Summary: Best Film of the Year
Review: I am an avid movie-goer, and I am here to say that "Waking the Dead" was easily the best film this year. Billy Crudup as Fielding gives a beautifully honest portrayal, of a young politician trying to hold on to his beliefs and the beliefs of his deceased true love as he enters the "machine." The dialogue is pure literature, yet not beyond everyman. The cinematography is absolutely haunting. You must own this film. The DVD conatains 45 minutes of cut footage as well as a featurette. I have yet to watch the film with Keith Gordon's commentary. Warning: have kleenex or a dry sleeve available.
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Summary: THE WAY WE WERE
Review: Fortunately, once in a while, you still discover movies that can surprise you. I nearly missed director Keith Gordon's WAKING THE DEAD. But it was clearly my fault ; I had the bad idea to read two or three destructive reviews in american newspapers written by so-called professional critics and, therefore, I postponed an eventual screening for weeks. Mea culpa. Mea extrema culpa.So WAKING THE DEAD hurted the sensibility of the rare persons who saw it because they couldn't classify this movie in a special genre. The main critique read about WAKING THE DEAD was that, at the end of the movie, one doesn't know whether this love story has really happened or whether it has only been a dream of the guilty mind of Billy Crudup. Frankly, I don't care at all. WAKING THE DEAD is not a documentary, it's a movie about the power of love, a power which doesn't die with the death of one of the lovers. The rest is literature. The eerie and melancholic atmosphere of WAKING THE DEAD is delicately rendered by Keith Gordon, without artificial special effects, the director using masterfully the simple language of cinema like flashbacks and a smart editing to make us feel the intensity of this love story. By the way, Billy Crudup and Jennifer Connelly deserve our utmost admiration for their always accurate interpretation. Exceptional bonus features with 45 minutes of deleted scenes, a commentary and a featurette. Spanish and english subtitles. A DVD to buy. Now.
Rating:
Summary: transcending romantic love
Review: this movie deserves more play...powerful...can be seen as documenting the painful process of *transcending* personal/romantic love that all souls will have to go through before or after death...
Rating:
Summary: A classic tale in the Shakesprearion sense
Review: A very compelling movie about true love, sacrifice and our own abitions... and what happens when they seemingly collide. It's a story about two very different people, with two very different views of the world, superfically opposing views - and yet they are really very much the same. All told from the main character Fielding's point of view. It's a story told from the middle about Fielding and Sarah, and her tragic death. It brings you through Fielding's coming to terms with her life, and his. The one thing they have in common is each other, and the real "why" they want what they want. It's haunting and captivating. A tale of lost love. A story about reconcilling life choices..those things we sacrifice everything for, and how we sometimes forget, what we were trying to do in the first place. It's a tale about that reality check. Fielding coming to terms with his conscious. The "whys". Maybe the true realization of his own destiny - and his true love, and what this all means when you find out maybe you somehow got lost on the way... It's also a lesson. Love doesn't come - or go so easily. It haunts and reminds you of why you love in the first place. Sometimes the hardest choices, are the ones you don't really get to make. We long to be whole. We "need" that part of us that we are lacking or miss. For whom chooses who and why we love? It's a tragedy in the traditional shakespeare sense. A great story, and great movie. A story of two people who "need" each other to fufill their own destiny, and they do. Sarah just has to remind Fielding what it's all about. Even it's only his heart reminding him.
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Summary: Haunting and Imperfect...Yet it Works
Review: This film is fascinating. Who would have thought that the son in Rodney Dangerfield's "Back to School" would grow up to become the talented Keith Gordon, Director/Writer? Not me. Not that I ever entertained the thought, but you get my point. This film is haunting, sad, moving, and engaging. It is not perfect and at times it can be frustrating. Yet, it worked. Usually, I like to have answers at the end of a film (that is my issue, not Gordon's). Yet, this film didn't tie up all the loose ends--part of it's power is that you don't seem to care that it doesn't. The film will also stay with you. It is shot beautifully. I have some minor quibbles with the film--Connelly (in a fine performance) sometimes loses her "southern" accent (whereas the English Janet McTeer is flawless) and the sub-plot about the Korean hooker and Fielding's brother danny was a waste. Still, overall there is a quality to this film, that despite some flaws, it gets you think--and it gets you to feel. This is more than I can say about much of what Hollywood puts out there today. The DVD has a fascinating audio commentary and some terrific deleted scenes. You see more of a good performance by the solid Hal Holbrook. Ed Harris is almost unrecognizable in his small role--he contines to be one of our most talented actors. The film looks and sounds great on DVD. Kudos to Billy Crudup on another great job. Jennifer Connelly is wonderful as well. See this DVD.
Rating:
Summary: Work of Art
Review: So rarely do I see a film that I consider "art," but I believe that Keith Gordon has painted a near-masterpiece of the vibrant "hues" of two decades in our country's history. On the surface it is a love story, but as you begin to scrape away the layers, much more is revealed. "Waking the Dead," in its non-linear structure, opens in 1974, as Fielding (the always brilliant Billy Crudup) is hearing news that his girlfriend Sarah (Jennifer Connelly) has been killed in a car bombing. We are then taken to 1982 when Fielding is being chosen to run for a seat in Congress. As he comes closer to reaching his life-long goals, Fielding begins to be haunted by the past. He believes that he is seeing and hearing Sarah. Did she really die? The film continues to flash back and forth between the two eras, in order to inform us of the impact the past has on the present. Sarah is an allegory: whether she is really alive is irrelevant. She represents Fielding's lost passion and idealism. He needs to feel these again if he is truly to fulfill his "destiny." Director Keith Gordon colors each era in appropriate thematic tones. The 70s (passion, nurturing) are drenched in rich, sun-kissed hues and the settings are warmly accessorized: bookshelves and kitchen cabinets overflow; colorful rugs and tapestries abound. The 80s (greed, cynicism) are cold and blue. The floors are bare; the kitchen has only rice cakes. Many scenes are shot in painterly composition. The cinematography is breathtaking. And the acting...well, it is superb. Billy Crudup so inhabits this character that he takes you with him on his journey to madness and back again. I know of no other young actor who could so capably convey an emotional breakdown without descending into schlock. Jennifer Connelly is convincing as the girl who would haunt you forever. There are some wonderfully realistic exchanges between the two, particularly one that is a three-minute, unedited scene of an argument. The DVD is a worthy investment. The colors are more vibrant and the letterbox format allows you to take in every detail. And the director's commentary and deleted scenes are well worth the $15. You will learn that much of the acting was improvisational - which makes it all the more amazing - and you will learn how scenes are lit, rehearsed, etc. There are certainly a few flaws in the film - the dialog is a bit clunky at times ("ambition is the ice on the lake of emotion" ???) -- but this is a brilliantly directed, beautifully photographed and well-acted film.
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