User reviews

I've seen Closer described as a cinematic triumph, but it's precisely not. The film wears its theatrical origins on its sleeve, and the presence of the camera is mostly irrelevant.

It also fails in a more subtle way. Initially, I watched four apparently amoral people, devoid of depth or shame, being clever at each other in increasingly hurtful and exploitative ways, and my mind rebelled. This can't be right, I thought, people don't talk like this. Hell, people don't *act* like this.

Then the light dawned. The characters seemed inhuman because they are. They aren't people at all, they're philosophical positions. When they talk, they're not talking. They're saying the things that people only dare think, asking the questions that haunt anyone whose relationship has gone horrifically pear-shaped. This isn't the story of four people and four relationships, it's an attempt to compress everything the author believes about human relationships into a film and bend it into a story. It feels artificial because it is.

With that realisation, I actually began to enjoy it, because Closer is a very clever film. I wish I could disagree with more of it, because many of the things it has to say about human relationships are painfully true. Every mistake you've ever made in a relationship is in here, and it's guaranteed to make you squirm at least once. It's also blackly funny in many places.

Without exception, the performances are fantastic, with the honours going to Natalie Portman's emotionally scarred escapist who wears lies like they were armour, and Clive Owen's brutal, perceptive, and ultimately absolutely human dirty doctor.

Be warned! The marketing campaign may lead you to think it's a comforting rom-com, but it's not. I wouldn't advise going with your partner unless you're rock-solid. You may leave asking some uncomfortable questions, and wondering how well you really know them...

Dan (Jude Law), an obituary writer, falls for stripper Alice (Natalie Portman) who is new in London. Later Dan writes a book about Alice, and meets photographer Anna (Julia Roberts). Alice knows she's losing Dan. Dan tricks dermatologist Larry (Clive Owen) on an internet chat, and Larry meets Anna. Larry marries Anna but the wander eye strikes again.

Director Mike Nichols is going minimalist with Patrick Marber's play. This is a movie with four incredible performances. Clive Owen is brutal. Natalie Portman is hurt. Jude Law is childish. Julia Roberts is wonderful. They are doing some of their best work here. Don't come for a rom-com. This is emotionally vicious, damaged, pathetic human relationships.

Mike Nichols directed, in my opinion, one of the three best adaptations from stage to screen. "Who's afraid of Virginia Woolf" (The other two being Sidney Lumet's "Long day's journey into night" and Elia Kazan's "A Streetcar named Desire) After the extraordinary television adaptation of "Angels in America" I also would have pleaded with Mike Nichols to do "Closer" Sorry I'm rambling. What I'm trying to say in a rather convoluted way is, simply, thank you Mr. Nichols. Adult themes, conceived and performed by adult artists. I hope it makes zillions of dollars so we can have more of it. Jude Law is a Peter O'Toole without the steroids, Julia Roberts a Jeanne Moreau with an American passport, Clive Owen is a child of John Garfield and Peter Finch and Natalie Portman a Jean Peters with a college degree. I saw the film twice in a row, I hadn't done that in years. Not since "Drugstore Cowboy", "Apartment Zero" and "Sex Lies and Videotape" The unfolding of the dark happens in front of our eyes and it feels chillingly familiar. Lies we tell each other with so much conviction with so much honesty. The only real thing is the pain and the loneliness. It doesn't sound like a very entertaining night out but believe me, it is. Go, see for yourself. You may have to confront something you didn't want to confront. That's part of the process call growing up. Who's afraid of that?

This movie is a big game of narcissistic people who treat each other as puppets. There is no love, no truth, no good. In the beginning we all try to find a hero in the story, someone to sympathize with only to realize what we have is a bunch of mentally ill people making themselves suffer. Dan (Jude Law) is just a big kid longing for attention and a new toy, which he only cares for about 5 mins. Anna (Julia Roberts) is also desperate for attention and love since her ex left her for a younger girl. She is confused and unreasonable, her ego makes all the decisions instead of her mind. Larry (Clive Owen) is an agressive jerk, playing along Dan's little game, while Alice is just a naive, traumatized, young girl who falls in love and decides to avoid all the red flags and becomes part of this sick 4 some. Brilliant movie. Honestly not the ending what I hoped for tho (I just wanted all 4 of them together in a room while Slim Pickens rides the atom bomb there).

Because Closer is, in a way, like sneaking a peek behind the closed doors of people we know, or more so, like looking in a mirror when we are at our most base and humanly human, some people seem to be viscerally turned off by it, as is apparent by a few of its more negative reviews.

To me, the very fact that it opens the door to such "voyeurism", if you will, is part of its deep emotional appeal.

Who among us can say we have never been tempted to be lured away from what we believe is love, by what we momentarily believe to be love? In closer, however these moments go beyond temptation, into lies, deceit, infidelity, misery, painful truths, abandonment, tears and suffering. "Love", in Closer, is shown to be against everything we've been taught to believe it should be, such as: honest/truthful, enduring, constant ... and faithful.

In short, it is a rabidly anti-romantic film, where, unbelievably, somewhere within each of these broken, self-serving, selfish, emotionally-underdeveloped people, brilliantly played by Jude Law, Julia Roberts, Clive Ovens and Natalie Portman, we find beauty, and in the end, a deep satisfaction upon seeing that love of self can lead to release and rebirth.

It had been a while since I watched this, and I am happy to say that I loved it this time around as much as the first time I laid eyes on it. And isn't that the mark of real love? That it endures?

Closer, is one of my favorite films.

9.5

While I thought the characters were interesting, I found it very difficult to watch, as my own marriage disintegrated in a fashion too familiar to these characters. The lies, the half-truths, the inability to distinguish truth from lie after being told so many lies. I could completely relate to the characters in this movie.

Though I could laugh with it, it was nevertheless painful to watch. I couldn't recommend this movie to anyone except my ex-. Even then, I have trouble believing she's understand any part of it.

This particular film was more like a documentary shot without the shaky hand-held camera. But, like the still photographs the movie mocks as being false, Closer allows only glimpses of the truth behind the myriad lies.

I want to be entertained at a movie and I cannot think of a single person to whom I'd recommend this movie. It was very well acted, scripted, and executed on all parts. But it was more painful than pleasant or enlightening.

I've been hearing lots of negativity about this movie. I think a lot of people have been shocked, frankly, by the raw and rough nature of the film. Having read the play, I've been looking forward to it for about a year now, and it's honestly one of the best plays I've ever read. Mike Nichols presents it in an amazing way, very faithful to the words as they're written (and they should be, for the movie is also written by the man who wrote the play, the brilliant Patrick Marber).

It's a brutal topic, sex and love, especially when they're combined. I thought the movie was amazing. It captured all of the vulnerability, caustic harshness, and acerbic flirtation that the play vibrated with. All of the cast brought the movie alive. It uplifts and then brings you way down, but that's the point, and yet at the end, I didn't feel depressed or saddened, just really really awake and curious. It's the feeling you get when you get "closer", I suppose.

Natalie Portman, in a tour-de-force performance, is the standout by far. Maybe it's because she's the youngest, and not expected to be that awesome, but she is. Anyways, her Alice is flirty and sweet, caustic and manipulative, evasive and yet very open, sexual and gloomy all in one character. She has the best chemistry with the men - whether it be purely sensual with Clive Owen, or innocence and affection with Jude Law. She comes alive with the two guys, and their scenes are ones to look forward to.

Julia Roberts, whom everyone looks towards, is not bad in this film. She's very understated and good, but she is outshone in nearly every scene by whomever she's acting with.

Clive Owen is absolutely astounding, and he's definitely on everyone's radar screen. As the man of experience and "simplicity", as Jude Law's character comments, he's brash and hotheaded, but also extremely clever. Owen perfectly plays the sleazy, unlikeable character, but somehow manages to appeal to the audience and even though he's a disagreeable character, I think many managed to find something all right about him - Owen's human sense in Larry.

Jude Law is simply very very good; neither astounding nor bad. The only reason he does not stand out is the fact that we've all expected him to do a good performance. And he does, he has a great performance. He and Portman have amazing scenes together, and he's always on par.

Simply put, the movie is not for everyone (especially not for seeing with a parent or young child); it's a mature adult flick, and does not back down from anything. It's high drama - with all the uplifting romance and brutal arguments of relationships. It's a story about people.

People aren't having fun. The world isn't nice and reality is cruel. The deep core of relationships consists in the end of pure self-humiliation. The human heart looks like "a fist covered in blood" and we should "try lying for a change, it's the currency of the world". This is "Closer". Four people that go around in circles through each other, exploring the art of heartbreaking. By the credits, all of them has been (and cheated) with each other. In the beginning, nobody is particularly happy. In the end, nobody is particularly happy.

This has been seen before, but seldom in Hollywood. It is very understandable that there has been a hype surrounding this film, given that it is an American film and not, specially not, European. The raw and totally unforgiving tone is daring indeed. Mike Nichols, on the other hand, has always been dancing around the thin line of what is sentimentally "under-the-top" and his very raw directing is of course a given trade of success for "Closer". The precision of the work in this film is, at moments, pure brilliant. The Production Design is always reflecting the hollow and artificial, the music is symbolic to the very last (wether The Smiths "How Soon is Now?" or Mozart's "Cosí fan tutte", translated "So do they all") and while the audience never gets to witness any real love sequences, the characters are constantly finding aways of avoiding emotions when faced with them. It is very well-made and the collaboration between the elements are giving a solid rock foundation for the film which makes it deliver it's punches.

There are problems, though. In an absurd way, while the themes are heavy, there is something very "easy" about the film. If there ever was a "feel-good"-movie playing with the audience instinctive emotions, "Closer" is quite the "feel-bad"-film, doing just the same. And while "Closer" has a realistic portrayal of the real life, the film also feels somewhat unrealistic at points. The screenplay is filled with smart and overly coherent dialog, but it doesn't give anything else. In all the wit of the dialog, the coherence vanishes. The characters, specially Julia Roberts', tend to come off blank and fuzzy, going from one point to the other constantly and without any reason. Nichols' directing makes "Closer" look the real world, but the screenplay shows us things that, without being exaggerated, still come off like something that simply doesn't happen.

Still, "Closer" is a refreshing American film. It's too shallow and unambiguously written to be any near a masterpiece, but the good craftsmanship makes it a worthwhile and recommended tragedy.

What a treat. Most of the people who came with me, left, half way through the film. I stayed to the end and I loved it. It moved me. A rarity this days. The face of Jude Law is, still, so full of possibilities. He seems unafraid of darkness. Strong. This is his most grown up performance. I can't wait to see what he'll become. (If he stays away from Hollywood as much as temptations permit, and keeps that purity, that makes his darkness so powerful, as intact as humanly possible). Julia Roberts is wonderful in a performance part Margaret Sullavan, part Jeanne Moreau but all her own. Clive Owen is a force of nature. Dangerous, compelling, human to the hilt. And what about Natalie Portman? Wow. No surprise here. But what a surprise. I'm sure she is going to amaze us for years and years to come. I'm really glad I stayed to the end.

I like some romantic comedies like the Holiday and Love Actually, but I was disappointed in Closer. It wasn't terrible, but it was very disappointing. It does benefit from a very good acting ensemble. Julia Roberts, Natalie Portman, Jude Law and Clive Owen all give very creditable performances, Owen the standout of the four. They are helped by an above average script, that is surprisingly intelligent. The cinematography is beautiful, fluid and sensitive.

However, there were a number of things that made Closer disappointing for me. The biggest problem was the pace; the film is at approximation just under two hours, however the film takes a long time to get going, and the pace is very uneven, sadly it never recovers. The direction from Mike Nicolls is very sluggish, and lacked credibility. I will admit I liked the premise of Closer, but when I got round to seeing the film, its structure is disappointingly episodic and even underdeveloped. My next complaint is more of a semi-complaint. I really liked the overall music, but I disliked the song at the beginning. I think that was mainly to do with the singing voice of the vocalist, I found it very flat for my musical ears.

All in all, Closer isn't a bad movie. Unfortunately, despite the fine acting ensemble, there were a number of things that didn't work for me. 6/10 Bethany Cox

This is the most honest film I've ever seen. Although I'm sure there are critics out there who will comment on the explicit language rather than the story, anyone who's ever been in a dysfunctional relationship can relate to at least some part of this film. I for one found it a very personal and shockingly accurate depiction of how human beings use love and sex to unintentionally destroy each other. The performances were magnificent from all angles. Mike Nichols has done it again. This film is "Carnal Knowledge" for the new millennium. If the Academy does not recognize "Closer" as a Best Picture candidate, then the Academy should no longer be recognized as the authority on achievement in film... yes, it's that good.

I couldn't wait to see this movie. Now, I realize I should have waited to see this movie until it could be rented.

This is a very cold film about some very unpleasant people who don't seem to be able to make up their minds about much. I liked the way it was done, I loved the acting, and I loved the use of "Cosi Fan Tutte" throughout the film. Yet it left me feeling empty. I never saw the play, but I imagine it was quite powerful. As a film, it had a deadly detachment.

Certainly when one looks at a film like Virginia Woolf, also based on a play, also directed by Mike Nichols, also about some unpleasant people, one wonders why Woolf came off so well and this one didn't (for me, anyway). I think it's because Virginia Woolf is an incredible love story - at the end, when George explains that they're childless, and Martha says "We couldn't" [have a baby], one realizes what's underneath all of the unpleasantness. In "Closer," there's just no payoff. Four people change partners, hurt one another, are seemingly incapable of doing anything else, but no one tells us why. Only the Natalie Portman character shows some humanity. But some isn't enough.

Mike Nichols is a fabulous director, but the direction wasn't the problem here. It's the characterizations. I can't agree with some of the other posters that the film was fascinating. I didn't find it so. The theater was packed because of good reviews. I suppose the critics are hungry for something intelligent, and obviously the ticket-buying audience is, and who can blame them? But don't tell me this is the best you can come up with. When everybody walks out of the theater complaining, as they did after the showing I attended, there's a problem.

I prefer when a movie is a movie. But when a movie is a very good play, we should be happy as well because there just aren't that many good things around.

This is a play, there's no mistaking. All the dynamics in it are seated in the words, all the motives in the four beings. There is no cinematic device used or necessary, except the revealing of the passport at the end, and I am sure that was handled differently in the stage version.

Mike Nichols makes a living out of taking constructions that work well on the stage and adding a few cinematic glosses so that the thing gives the impression it was born as a screen being. I find his tricks in this regard distracting, even a bit offensive because he hasn't adapted as the visual vocabulary has.

Never mind. Just eliminate the film components of its being and focus on the stage components and you still have something worthwhile, because here Nichols is still fresh.

You can read other folks to learn the story. It hardly matters. What matters to me is the clever, deep way the writer has constructed the thing. The visceral effect is from the panic and desperation of love. Nothing new there. What makes this effective, I think, are two things. Writerly things.

The first is that he hasn't just described the tippy balance of living in a romance. He hasn't just displayed the radical fuzziness and unpredictability of a world where that is all you know. He's made it the root of the story. This story has absolutely none of the logic to it that you expect when you see a love story. Everything seems real and natural after it has happened, but there's no way at all to predict what will happen next when you are in the thing. Its a great help in storytelling; you have to cling fast to what is happening. Its the best type of engagement, sucking you in by simply making you wonder, even worry about what is going to happen next. Its rare. Its good.

I'd like to point out how the four characters are constructed. A popular writing technique is to take one whole soul and break it into bits. Then the bits can get fleshed out imperfectly and interact so that the interaction has a being. In this case, start with a movie. What four pieces do you need? The writer (Dan), the photographer (Anna), the actor (Alice) and the director, the person concerned with the "skin" of the thing.

Its no accident, I think that it is impossible to settle on any one of these characters. You can go through this experience time and time again, each time tracing a different person's path, or the path of a relationship or even an urge.

This part is great too. Apart from Nichols' cinematic naivety, there's only one blot: Julia Roberts. She just doesn't understand what it means to be part of an assembly. She's not an actress in the real sense, the theatrical sense that Nichols knows how to sculpt. No wonder he wanted Cate Blanchett instead.

Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching.

The chronicle of an overlapping pair of relationships done up in raw 21st century life-is-pointlessism.

Loved it until the final scenes, when it all stopped being in any sense of the word believable, and even resorted to done before cheap gimmickry? The rest however is rather good, and the acting by all four principle characters is to a person, first rate. Another problem I have is, I don't associate Natalie Portman with the 'rare uncultivated beauty' we're supposed to believe she is, quite the opposite actually. While I realize that is purely a matter of taste, I am sure I am not alone in believing her part was terribly miscast. The dialog is provocative, and definitely cuts to the quick on a lot of issues, but more importantly keeps you watching. But I wouldn't go overboard with the praise heaping on this film, because in the end its main tool is shock through brutality, crassness and vulgar lower the bar even more pillow talk. It is startlingly intelligent and even fresh, yet I don't care how its dressed up, or who the director is, the film is not dark as everybody labels it, but base. I don't know of any enduring literature or art that is patently vulgar, think about it.

It's once in a very rare time that I go to the movies and I'm treated as an adult. I see a film that is intelligent, thought provoking, provocative and rawly realistic. Closer is that film. It present an honest portrayal of four severely unlikable characters and they screw with each others love lives back and forth. The film is told in adult sporting complexity through the growing plot points , the way it's filled and it's tasty advancing dialogue. Everyone in the film turns in a powerhouse performance worthy of Oscar consideration. Ms. Portman is wonderful as Alice shedding her blockbuster star wars acting skills and portraying someone multi dimensional with heart and pizazz. Julia Roberts stars as Anna in a cold, subtle performance which will leave audiences appreciating her acting believability as she pounces through each of her scenes with charismatic force. Jude law and Clive Owen are the real surprises here both turning in wonderfully appealing performance. Strong, weak, flawed and memorable. Especially whose last outing was the entertaining but mediocre action summer pic King Arthur. The film has wonderfully tight direction and sports beautifully placid colors and a fine adult score. The film draws dangerously close to being a near perfect film. I only wish it could've gone on for abit longer I wasn't completely satisfied to the ends of the characters on which we were give. but life itself isn't perfect or satisfying and this is a slick of someones life. Rush out and go see Closer! Oner of the best film's of the year!

As Clive Owen's Larry often comments, "how could he leave you?" The idea of Jude Law's Dan leaving the sexy, exuberant and very snarky Alice for the plain-Jane Anna is a hard concept to wrap your mind around. You simply must believe in the concept of two souls so unbelievably drawn to each other that nothing else matters.

I feel as though I am giving Julia Roberts the short end of the stick, she acts the part with moderate success, only shining on the rare occasion that her dialog exceeds anyone else's. The movie is a tale of deception and love and complicated a complicated love...square?

Where this film exceeds more spectacularly is not only in Owen and Portman's brilliance, but in the outside character development. In many movies with similar story lines the two characters who instigate the affairs have significant others that are either a) unsatisfying and dull, b) too nice for their own good or, c) one who is not up to par with their partners. In this case, none of the above apply. Alice shimmers and turns heads everywhere she goes and despite her love Dan still finds it fit to cheat on her relentlessly. How he goes from attempting to convince Anna to see him to being loving boyfriend in a split second is quite amazing.

I am not the first to say that the two nominated for Academy Awards in this picture are truly the greatest, there was no oversight whatsoever for the other two leads. Jude Law does have chemistry with Alice that makes their relationship all the more believable, but you cannot help but wonder...why in God's name would he leave her?

Closer is the story of two couples whose lives end up entangled through a series of confrontations and chance meetings ripe with lies, regret and pain. It is consistently engaging, sometimes pretty funny and the characters are generally easy to relate to. Although there are some fairly prominent themes present including the uglier sides of human nature and dysfunctional relationships, I felt that it wasn't a particularly deep film.

I thought the performances were quite good (especially Natalie Portman) but I often felt something was missing from the characters. Although I appreciated the way the film focused on their nastier sides in an uncompromising kind of way, perhaps the characters could have used some more development as responsible adults to contrast against their arguably childish behaviour. Maybe the characters were intended to be as shallow and insecure as they came across but I think without some fundamental redeeming qualities they become less interesting. For example, many of the verbal jabs thrown around seemingly only to cause pain came across as unrealistic for the most part.

To the movie's credit, despite these weaknesses, I always found the characters interesting and the scenes engaging. It just meant I didn't feel Closer was very effective in expressing some kind of deeper meaning. Actually, while watching the movie, I got the impression that it was primarily intended to entertain and just hint a little at some more substantial ideas without actually having the commitment to pursue them.

In this way, Closer works just fine. Some parts are funny, some parts are a bit disturbing or even touching in various ways and most of it is enjoyable to watch. So I thought it was good, quite good, just not great though I don't think it was meant to be.

Synopsis: Dan (Jude Law) meets Alice (Natalie Portman) after she is hit by a cab. She's just moved to London from NYC. He takes her to the hospital, where they chat and become friends. He writes obituaries; she's a stripper.

A year later, Dan and Alice are living together. He's finished a novel and falls for the photographer that takes the picture for his book jacket, Anna (Julia Roberts). He introduces Anna to Larry (Clive Owen) and the four people become sexually entangled over the next few years.

Review: Closer is a respectable effort. The film had a lot of potential, but failed in so many ways. Closer can be seen as the anti-date movie. It's hard to like the characters, and even harder to like their actions. Even so, it paints a picture so close to reality.

A controversy revolving Closer was the sexual content. While sex never occurs on screen, it's a prominent topic and is actually the plot (if there is one) to the film. The only nudity is seen at the strip club, but the dialogue is almost repulsive. Most is not needed, or could have been better if it was only implied. A scene in the strip club with Alice and Larry is probably the height of the vulgarness.

Julia Roberts and Jude Law turn in good performances, but are easily out acted by Natalie Portman, who proves to be an adult, and Clive Owen, who shows incredible emotion with his sleazy character.

Closer is the perfect example of love at first sight. The tag line for the film states: "If you believe in love at first sight, you never stop looking." That's essentially the core of the movie. Were these people truly in love? If they were, why would they be so unfaithful to their "true love"? Is appearance and first impressions an important factor in determining who we're going to spend our life with?

Each character in Closer has their share of lies. Lying to their current lover, lying to themselves. It effectively shows that men will do anything to get what they want, and how quickly the women will fall for it. I'm not saying that the female characters are any less guilty in immorality or whatever you'd call it, but they seemed to be the more naive of the four.

Closer contains a great deal of good, but in all, it doesn't add up to a complete motion picture. The sexual content could have been reduced, thus unneeded in many instances. A very depressing film, but thought provoking nevertheless. Good performances abound, but do not make up for holes that could have easily turned this average film into a more compelling motion picture. Viewer discretion advised: Closer is not for everyone.

C (6/10)

The strength of Closer, both as a play and a motion picture, is the flawless, mature and beautifully crafted dialogue. Patrick Marber's screenplay is a testament to his truly great writing ability, as not much of the original text needed to be adapted in order to work appropriately and effectively on screen.

The raw emotion and base convictions of these four tragic characters (all acted exquisitly) is given to us primarily through their words and those words are all we need.

If you need more than words and are looking for a feel good love story, steer clear, you will only be disappointed.

However, if you are looking for a piece that will intrigue your senses, causing you to examine your own soul, your own convictions, then I highly recommend Closer.

Like Shakespeare, Williams, and O'Neil, whose words are a testament to the condition of their lives and times, Marber, through his language and presentation of these four exquisite lost souls, forces the mind to acknowledge and deal with the most base of our natural tendencies, painting a brutally honest portriat of the human condition in the 21st century.

Mike Nichols' film "Closer" is simply a study in human relationships. Other than the four main characters, everyone else is an extra, with minimal dialogue, if any. Jude Law is Dan, a struggling writer who is a member of the Obituary staff at a London paper. One day he catches the eye of Alice, (Natalie Portman) who is walking down the street toward him, newly arrived from the United States. They lock eyes (in the film it seems like minutes, but is probably seconds) before she steps into oncoming traffic and gets hit by a car. Her injuries are not serious, but they are the beginning of a long and painful relationship. Some time later, Anna (Julia Roberts) a photographer, is snapping a photo of Dan for his upcoming debut novel when he promptly hits on her. The attraction is obviously mutual, but she manages to hold him off since he is involved with Alice, and she is newly separated from her husband. Some time later, he is messing around on the Internet, pretending to be a woman and chatting with a completely clueless doctor, Larry (Clive Owen). Dan arranges to meet Larry at the aquarium and tells him his name is "Anna". Of course, Anna is sitting there, Larry thinks she is the one he talked to, she is clueless, but figures out that Dan played a joke on both of them. Soon, THEY begin a relationship. Throughout the next year or two (the passing of time is so off-handedly managed that it is hard to determine exactly what time frame we pass) relationships get blurred, soured and, I hate to create a pun here: closer.

The tagline for "Closer" is "If you believe in love at first sight, you never stop looking". According to the action in the film, truer words were never spoken. The moral of the story is that everyone cheats. And if they don't, they are excessively co-dependent. (And actually, there are some cheaters who are excessively co-dependent.) While the story was very intricately woven, impressively so, it was still hard to take, particularly during a scene in which Clive Owen confronts Julia Roberts about her infidelity. The pain that these people cause one another is so pervasive that it becomes almost a character itself. And while the sleaze factor was so high I wanted to shower with a particularly abrasive soap the second I got home, the film's story was actually extremely thought provoking and discussion-worthy. Just driving home, my boyfriend and I got into a discussion about the characters, and he said that Anna was the most despicable character Julia Roberts has played, while I thought that Clive Owen was a bit much. I think the film acts as both a solidifier and divider between men and women on a few different levels, a sign that the film obviously succeeds in proving its thesis.

The acting in "Closer" is first-rate. I have never seen any of the characters in better form, quite honestly. Portman, an actress that I have marginalized as mediocre since every performance after her stunning debut in "The Professional", also impressed me; she subtly exhibited both weakness and slyness in a manner that made her character purposely hard to read. I actually consider Jude Law's performance as Dan to be his best since his role in "Road to Perdition". (Certainly a feat considering he was featured in no less than 653 films in 2004.) Roberts was actually mesmerizing (she's come a long way since the insipid "Pretty Woman") and I look forward to seeing Owen have a well-deserved prolific film career. As for the direction, Mike Nichols is flawless. He has really become a master at his trade. This doesn't necessarily mean that he is ceaselessly compelling, though he made all the right decisions in "Closer" from the pacing to the soundtrack, particularly the Damien Rice track that plays a couple of times throughout the film, (though I would have liked to have heard the Suzanne Vega song that is featured in the trailer) I would not go out of my way to see a Mike Nichols film based on his name alone, but I put him higher on the cred ladder that Ron Howard is also on; the films are usually good, but they don't always completely enthrall me.

This was not the case with "Closer" however. I walked out of the film not liking it at first, but I think that was because it was such a depressing commentary on relationships. The more I realized I was thinking about it even days after seeing it, the more I realized that it actually was a good movie with an unpleasant theme and some great acting. Whereas I would have given it a lower score right out of the box, I give it a supportive 7/10 now.

--Shelly

I won't reveal what ultimately happens in Closer but I will confess that I was disappointed that it didn't end with a fiery double-decker bus crash that left no survivors. This film would have been stale 20 years ago, but it's completely ridiculous now. The "truths" about relationships that the movie attempts to reveal are just nuggets of stereotypical nonsense that you could see in a TV movie(Men thrive on conquest and dominance, Women can't resist being treated like whores, etc.). The film, like it's characters is shallow and dishonest underneath the pretty exterior.

Of the four main actors, Natalie Portman fairs the best. I didn't buy her character, but I didn't want to beat her with a lead pipe either. The other actors aren't so lucky. Clive Owen is in total stage actor mode. I have long suspected that Julia Roberts is actually computer generated or a state of the art robot and this film offers more compelling evidence in support of my theory. Jude Law is a total non-presence here which is a shame because he shows hints of charisma in other films.

I am absolutely dumbfounded by claims that this movie is in any way truthful, real or gritty. It's incredibly stagey and the dialog in no way resembles the way people talk when they're not performing on stage. I thought Neil Labute's The shape of Things was a low water mark that no film adaptation of a play could surpass in awfulness. Not the case. I am intrigued yet horrified that this film seems to resonate with a large chunk of viewers. The characters are total constructs: the Arbus rip-off photographer, the duplicitous writer, the educated yet primitive doctor, the wise stripper.

Maybe the film is realistic in the same way that Iraq was full of WMDs and privatization will solve the country's social security "problem". The real truth seems to be that most folks aren't interested in reality. It doesn't look like four pretty people in London.