I liked it. Thought it made a decent job of the tricky balancing act between celebrating a psychopath, and sanctimoniously condemning him.

Also liked the way it was gritty and low-rent, not too glamorous.

I really enjoyed it, and I don't know that I ever would have heard of it without your suggestion, ufez, so thanks for that.

I'd also never seen Eric Bana before, and I thought he was GREAT. The way he could veer through several emotions in the space of seconds, showing the addled state of Chopper's mind, was excellent. Also, his face was downright SCARY when his temper would start flaring, like in the scene with Chopper and his girlfriend sitting in her car outside the club.

Another thing I enjoyed was the fact that we have an unreliable narrator, and therefore some of the scenes were almost dreamlike, such as the stabbing of Chopper in prison. That was almost absurdist the way it went on and on, and it couldn't have really happened like that, but I'm sure to hear Chopper tell it, it did. I like seeing fantasy and reality blur like that.

Speaking of which: the effect used during the meth-snorting scene made me laugh out loud. Perfect. Just subtle enough to work without being silly.

And finally, I liked the way it ended. Kind of anti-climactic, but deliberately so, driving home the point that after all this, he's just a fuckhead in a prison cell, who could not get his act together and make anything real of himself.

Criticisms: the second prison term seemed kind of unexplained and rushed- one minute he's on trial, the next he's been in prison long enough to have written a best-seller. There seemed like there were scenes cut out between those two points. Also, I thought some of the monochromatic lighting (the blues in the first prison segment, and the green fluorescent in Ritchie's apartment) were overdone and made it hard to see what was going on at times. This might have been a problem with the DVD transfer, and not the original movie.

I was whelmed, I guess. Not over-whelmed, or under-whelmed. Just whelmed.

It's one of those movies I have heard all about for years, and have been meaning to watch for ages too - mostly because Mark Brandon "Chopper" Read is my friend's uncle.

It was quite funny, and quite well done, but I guess it was exactly what I was expecting. No more, no less.

Ronnie Johns doing Eric Bana doing Chopper. (nsfw video)

Chopper talks about Ronnie Johns doing Eric Bana doing Chopper. (video)

Meta meta meta!

I'm more along the lines of jonathanstrange. I didn't so much dislike it, but it was a bit disjointed and lacked just about any sense of drama or suspense for my taste. It almost seemed like an hour and a half long character-study via multiple vignettes, if that makes sense.

Bana's performance was quite good, and I like a lot of the stylistic/visual elements (and I'm with BoPo, the meth-snorting scene was fantastic) but when it ended, I just kind of felt like "okay, and there's that, then". Not bad, but nothing I'm in any hurry to watch again.

I'm glad it didn't blow though, seeing as how I selected it.

Would anyone like to volunteer to select a movie for September?

I'll pick one if no one else speaks up.

So what is it BP?

Uh-oh, I bet he picks Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles...

theophile, I have that DVD on order! :D. (Have you seen the contest Criterion is having, BTW? Make a vid of yourself cooking something that the character in the movie does, and you might win a PS3. Weirdest promo contest EVAR. )

Yep, I saw about the contest.

Also feel curiously tempted to get the DVD, even though I know I'd watch about 20 minutes of it, think "this actually isn't so bad", find something else to do, mean to go back to it, and never do...

I have to be in the right frame of mind for movies like this (or Greenaway's "The Falls" or Tarkovsky's "Stalker") but I generally enjoy them once I give them the time they need.

I have a week off coming up and hope to watch it then. I just saw "Last Year At Marienbad" recently and am looking forward to seeing Seyrig in another role.