Customer Reviews

Simple Men

5 star:		(18)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

For all you Hal Hartley fans who have desired having a copy of Simple Men on DVD, your time has come. Simple Men will be released on DVD widescreen format January 27, 2004. I can't wait to get my copy!!!

After repeated viewings, I still find Simple Men a refreshing escape. A true autuer, Hartley's characteristic stripped down style becomes immediately apparent. His use of a revolving cast of regulars, including William Sage, Robert Burke, Martin Donovan and Elina Lowensohn lends to the creation of a Hartley-esque paradigm. His world consists of quirky loners with abstract philosophies, unlikely lovers, and down on their luck drifters.

In particular, Simple Men is a road movie following Sage and Burke, who play two brothers looking to find their escaped-con father, a former baseball hero. Their journey provides a Rosencrantz and Guildenstern type odyssey filled with false starts, false leads and false love. The subtle musical accompaniment serves as an interjection to the sparse use of dialogue and camera work, a true stamp of a Hal Hartley film. I find some of Hartley's traits as a filmaker are comparable to David Mamet, especially in the way he shapes his characters around their method of speech. Some may find the pace of this film slow, however I find it lends to enhance the determination and perseverance of the characters search for their father, as it allows them to find themselves along the way. Isn't that the point of any road movie when it comes down to it?

This is one of Hartley's lesser efforts.
He recycles characters and mannerisms to
the point of tedium. It's too bad
considering his many other fine films.

A few years ago I was looking for some movie in TV when in wrong move I put one of this channels you never watch cos the quality of the image is bad and the movies are in my spoken languaje (spanish, I prefer with subtitles). I don't remember what scene but I remember the face of Robert John Burke from Robocop III, talking some very clever dialogues. After just a few minutes I couldn't change the channel till the movie ends leaving me absolutely impress.
Just a few weeks later by the same reason I catch "Trust" and from this same moment I became fan of Hal Hartley.
Why?
Because after years watching more than one hundred different movies of any style and director, Simple men and the rest of the Hartley's work show me another vision of life and another way to make movies, thinking more in a good and very deep script with a few good actors than a good budget with great special effects.
It reminds me the movies of Terrence Malick, because in the chaos of the existence both directors show the path of the real survivors, not those guys who are born to be heroes, just those one only wanna some moment of peace and true love, that's it's more than all the glory of the universe.

When i bought my DVD player two years ago, I was desperate not to find the three first movies from Hal Hartley. Those are my absolute cult movies with a couple a Takeshi Kitano movies. I hope that "Trust" (my favourite) will also be available very soon... Thanks to whoever is responsible for this !!

This is a great film, and it's crazy that it hasn't been available on DVD until now. I think it's HH's best work. Now where is 'Trust?'

Great flick, one of Hal's greatest. Finally on DVD!!! I'm so happy Tristar has been releasing Hal Hartley's movies on DVD. Great to add to any indie collection. Witty dialogue and clever storyline.

This is one brilliant film and, like some other reviewers, I must say that it is my favorite film ever. Contrary to other reviewers, I would not dismiss the plot. The plot of two young men, one an "experienced" criminal and one an "innocent" student, searching for their "heroic" but "outlawed" father, is fundamentally mythic, in a way necessarily ironized by the beautiful paradoxes of the film's characters: the older brother's ultimate innocence in his rawness, the young brother's sophistication in his cool rationality -- perhaps most powerfully, the revelation of the father as disappointingly banal and extremely self-absorbed. (A scene near the end in which he reads aloud from a rebellious manifesto of Count Malatesta and has everyone around him repeat the words in unison brings this out in the film's most keenly satirical moment.) Every single character embodies the simultaneous pain and joy of life in an unusually poignant way -- and, by the way, Karen Sillas's performance as Kate is heartrendingly compelling in this regard.

A feature of Hartley's ingenious conception is the juxtaposition of two sharply opposing genre elements. The dialogue is stylized and beautifully rhythmic, very much in the tradition of modern stage drama -- Samuel Beckett, Harold Pinter, Sam Shepherd, John Guare. But the cinematography -- far from "washed out" as one reviewer says -- is rich, with beautiful compositions, dynamic angles, and gorgeous colors in a poignantly bare East Long Island landscape. Thus the dialogue tends toward abstract and stylized art, the cinematography toward realistic or naturalistic representation. The dialogue is "theatrical," the cinematography ... "cinematic." This tension brings out the ironies in the plot and characters, so that every aspect of this work of art corresponds to its overall theme. At every moment, the viewer is simultaneously quite absorbed in the emotional turmoil of the characters and their plot-driven pursuits, while also ironically hanging back and viewing the whole as something of a caricature of "the mythic plot" or "the telling character." It is this play of irony and emotional engagement that makes _Simple Men_ a crowning achievement of art and one that should far outlast its own time.

I should mention that performances of subordinate figures are also quite splendid, including those of the police chief, the auto mechanic's assistant, the Catholic high school girl who helps the younger brother find the address that goes with the phone number, and even the security guard at the beginning. None of these actors are named in the Editor's Review, so I don't know who they are.

I very much hope that this film will come out in DVD to help ensure the shelf life of its physical medium that its artistry deserves.

Seriously, I love this movie. This and Trust are my two favorite Hartley movies. I think it's criminal that they are not available on DVD. To me the dialogue is absolutely true (not to mention hysterical) in a completely different way than I've ever seen done by any other filmmaker, plus the deadpan delivery just cracks me up. I can't even really do it justice, you need to see it for yourself. However - be warned, if your idea of a quality flick is one directed by Tom Green, you will not appreciate the subtle charms of this movie. If you have half a brain, however, you should be able to get into Hartley's strange but ultimately satisfying groove.

Hal Hartley's ultra clever, purposely stylized, dialogue driven "Simple Men" seems like an exercise in clever wordplay. The characters appear to be mainly props or mouthpieces for Hartley's witty and caustic repartee. If that was all there was to this perceptive film, one could admire the words but dismiss the film as one would a puppet show. Paying close attantion to what is being said, however, will reveal that the film has great heart and depth and is a mediatation on relationships and the pain of lost love.

Two brothers are on the trail of their outlaw, left-over-from-the sixties- radical, father. Along the way, a multitude of serious subjects from politics to sexual exploitation of women to the nature of right and wrong are humorously bantered about by the characters. What truly drives these characters, however, is their utter loss to explain why their relationships constantly fail and cause them so much pain and heartache. The sheriff sums up most of the characters' feelings in a brilliant, stream of consciousness, monologue and says that "love is like sticking an ice pick through your forehead...Why do I do it?"

Hartley's question is what most of us have asked ouselves after a failed relationsship. Why do we keep coming back for more when the result is always pain? One is reminded of a similar theme and question in Woody Allen's "Annie Hall". The answer, of course, is that we need it no matter what the cost; just like we need original filmakers like Hal Hartley who are willing to experiment, take risks and present ideas in innovative and creative ways.