Pas aussi pourri que le film d'avant,mais qu'est ce que je me suis ennuyé !

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different tastes I guess...

Author: bill smith from Canada
16 August 2012
 

Wow. I don't get the love this movie is getting here. I would argue that the Rotten Tomato reviews are more objective. Just my opinion- The trouble with this movie for me was the screenplay; the dialogue and characters are just not believable. The sudden outbursts, the random conversations- they were just bizarre. Oral sex on the bus, spitting on, and threatening a teacher without repercussions. It all lacked reality. The random animations, direct to camera speaking, and shaky camcorder feel didn't help. Watch Season 4 of the Wire if you want to see powerful, yet accurate, character portrayal and dialogue associated with this topic.This just seemed forced, in-your-face, and came across as trite. Again, just my opinion.

Author: alexulumend from United States
14 April 2012

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

This movie was well acted yes-very. but there was not one single character who was a true stoic and kept coming back to embracing the positive and evolving as a human even the main character who was wise and kind yet was a coward in the end why must all the people in this film who are not drones who do have a conscience who do desire greatness also be doing actions that are so destructive and negate anything admirable within even though they are aware? the writer of this film has a very one sided bleak point of view that is weak the writer gives no hope thanks but we don't need another reason to slit our wrists.Tell the truth yes but than show people what to do with the truth -to use the truth as a tool to overcome, to know what to oppose to learn what is worth fighting for. guess what?

there are people in life who have been through very dark times and overcome them and are better people now.... another unrealistic aspect of this film is that no one has any regret I understand why some of the people harmed themselves with self loathing acts but when you have a realization that it is no longer what you should do or want to do you also have a period of feeling upset that you did that, the girl who was a hooker she would in real life have felt a period if not for years and years of deep sadness to anger to shock that she had allowed herself to be treated so horribly by others and herself yet in the movie she just goes from being totally screwed with to screwing herself over to being happy and healed just like that. we did not need to see suicide as the answer in this film because it is never an answer. again the writer makes an angel a hero out of someone who chooses to do the worst acts of all to themselves.

That's not heroic.. weather you harm another or harm yourself it is just as wrong. Worst of all was the torture and murder of an innocent cat.That was by far totally disgusting and the reaction in the end was "well the kid felt like the cat" again the writer trying to show some "honesty " by that as answer to harming and killing a totally innocent being-that was the biggest load of crap in the whole film-that sort of behavior is psychotic. I personally have had a very hard life myself, I have been violated, I have been abandoned as a child, I was homeless, I have overcome drugs and this is why I feel this movie is misleading un-realistic and weak because with all that happened to me I never harmed an innocent animal and I did feel horrible for any self destructive things I did after I realized they were wrong and I did not obviously kill myself as an answer.This film is not brave and frankly it could have been.

It chose to show those who harm and than those who realize the harming is going on but do very little about it.Everyone -every single character just acted like their were stuck, frozen in self pity,smothered by disappointment, paralyzed by pain.We can not choose what happens to us most of the time but at some point after we can always choose what we do about it.This film is just a dead end and a cop out.I wish I had not wasted my time watching it.

Author: Winston Lee from United States
18 July 2012

Having notable celebrities, an "emotional" storyline with a obvious, cliché message, tragic characters and cheap sappy music playing in the background and other bait that of which the Oscars or any award show would consume is the case of The Detachment, a 2011 indie film which won several awards.

We often see this type of deprived, artistic and emotional piece about a substitute teacher trying to help illiterate or with poor grades, poor or terrible school filled with stereotypes and bullies that at first, terrorized and bully the school and having one teacher turn it around in the end, well the director seems to get a great idea to make another annoying high school drama film or more specifically a teen- angst film.

Tony Kaye who is known for American History X tries to convey his elements of his previous films and try to make the most melodramatic and artistic movie that seems to be derived from other movies related to this.

I am not sure what the director is thinking, the fact that we see thousands of films like these and people tend to get suckered into the bad melodrama and the obvious plot lines with poorly drawn characters with terrific actors performing them. I mean how did they get people like Adrian Brody, Christina Hendricks, Bryan Cranston, James Caan to even Lucy Liu — seriously, she went out of her way to get this terrible role? I felt like this was just a money deal for them and they were just told what to do.

I don't want to begin what the film is about, I seriously doubt the plot would even care less as well; it's about a clinically-depressed substitute teacher who's been moved to the most illiterate and bad school that of which is being sold off (or trying to) by Mr. Mattias (Isiah Whitlock Jr.). Adrian Brody plays the substitute teacher, Henry Barthes who is this clinically depressed lemon (as one of the students called him) who isn't like the other teachers although the fact that the other teachers don't fend off the bullies are just as much as him.

Anyways, after his father had passed away, he lives a fellow irritating, homeless female student, Erica (Sami Gayle) and has to teach a class full of stereotypes and bullies who try to imitate and scare off the teacher.

The film is mainly about this substitute teacher drifting off from classroom to classroom attempting to connect with his fellow students while dealing his own personal demons as well. Oh there is also a overweight artsy student that loves photography, taking pictures of Mr. Wiatt (Tim Blake Nelson) who has gone insane probably because of all the bullying.

The film consists of so much stereotypes and bullies that I am baffled why people actually like this movie. I mean, the first few minutes when the Brody character comes to class, there is a stereotypical black person with an attitude problem that threatens him and in the next scene, we also see other teacher, Ms. Sarah Madison played by Hendricks being spit on and threaten to get "gang-bang" by a black girl. It's really baffling that people think this film is "powerful and gripping" even though the writers of this film clearly play the "racism card" of having all to most black people in the school that have either an attitude problem or presumably be in some gang threatening teachers. It's like every teacher in the school are wimps that don't stand against them, even other movies that related to this plot have gangs in the school and there are less emotional people in those movies.

I cannot stress how irritating this movie is, everyone in this movie is either an annoying, irritating human being or some pathetic, emotional person that does not have an inch of hope on improving their students. I like the fact that the director try to convey Brody's character feelings through him looking straight at the camera and the cheaply done artistic chalkboard drawings that attempts to convey some emotional impact. It felt like the director just wanted to have this movie be drenched with awards and have a melodramatic message and theme, terribly implemented to make it dramatic to the audience.

In the end, people who think this movie is even good is either have bad taste in movies or some sucker who get cheaply suckered into the melodrama and say things like "the movie has a gripping subtext that of which could easily related to real life or not." So the fact that everyone in this film is some kind of bully or some helpless person relates to a bunch of people online? Wow, where did I see that be implement in a dozen movies that has been produced years ago? Seriously, I do not see the slightest thing right with this movie and I am usually prone to these movies.

Author: jnanasakti from United States
2 June 2012

The movie does not achieve it's objective to show what a state of "detachment" is; how it comes about and how it is dealt with. The problem is both script and direction. It's scene after scene of tremendous conflict, a lot of which I would say is exaggerated. Every f-in character is conflicted. The movie tries to round out some humanistic side - but the main problem is that it pushes too far in every scene. Granted I'm all about reality and the gravity of the human condition and being real...but in trying to achieve that, this movie overshoots - big time.

Reviews that give this movie high markings are from people who are impressed with the cast just for who they are (and they are great actors), and the desolation depicted. Rating on movie on it's ability to execute - the script and direction suck. Like I said, there's a reason the movie wasn't released in theaters...with such amazing cast - the movie must be pretty f-ed up not to make it to release and it is.

Author: lukas8 from United States
15 August 2012

I had high hopes about this film, but it left me feeling annoyed.

First, the positive. The cinematography is attractive and the scenes are well constructed visually. If you are looking for open-ended existential questions, you will find a few of those. If you are looking for Adrian Brody to do his sad eyebrow face, you will not be disappointed. There are a few cameos by other great actors, if you are in to that sort of thing.

Now, the negative. This film does not offer any valuable insight into any of the problems that it addresses. It gives a sensationalist portrayal of the difficulty of being a teacher in a failing school, the apathy of students and teachers, and the aftermath of childhood abuse. It emphasizes each of these problems without offering any kind of understanding beyond the expression of listless angst. All the vague statements that Adrian Brody says into the camera are certainly less than the sum of their parts.

I don't expect all films to offer insight. When the subject matter are issues that people care deeply about, it is nice, but if a film doesn't offer insight at least it can offer entertainment. Well, not this one. The story is aimless and meandering. The child actors are not believable.

Instead of watching this movie you might consider just sitting in a corner to think about how bad life can be, and then blame it all on parents without really trying to understand the situation. Same effect.

Author: bdem from United Kingdom
22 July 2012

I'm afraid I have to count this among the few films this year that I was quite excited by but ultimately left me disappointed.

I found a lot of it was quite cheap (mostly from a good deal of the melodramatic acting on display) and throughout the film I couldn't wrap my head around the choice of shooting.

The camera-work felt very out of place. For example, one scene could have five or six different angles with one using grain, another with use of quick zooms and then another with quick pans and the culminating effect felt very fake, as if belonging to a run-of-the-mill TV crime drama. It genuinely hampered my viewing of the film.

Adrien Brody does well enough despite wearing almost the same facial expression for most of the film and the few touching moments of the 97 come from his interaction with Grandpa. There's chemistry there but there are simply no sparks between other characters.

There are a few good cameo performances from Bryan Cranston and James Caan yet they don't seem to add anything to the film and this is amongst dubious performances from the supporting cast (Marcia Gay Harden, Christina Hendricks and Betty Kaye). There was a lot more to be left wanting from them. On the other hand, that's possibly the result of the writing as their characters don't feel overly convincing.

I hate singling an actor out as the worst but I can't not mention Lucy Liu who overacted just about every second she was on screen. She was the main culprit of the melodramatic acting scattered amongst this film. Cringe just about does it justice.

One of it's bigger problems is that it tries to handle too much. Education, youth, family problems, childhood trauma and prostitution amongst others and the result is that none of these issues are tackled full-on instead being treated bit by bit.

Bryan Cranston said he took his part in this as he liked the script and believed in it. I don't doubt his judgement, personally, but if that's the truth then I'm very surprised by the film's execution of it. A long way off for a director who (just about) gave us American History X.

I loathe being so negative about a film, one of which there were elements to like, but I guess it stems from the great sense of disappointment and dissatisfaction Detachment left me with.

Author: Bob_the_Hobo
21 November 2012

Mr. Barthes (Adrian Brody) is a wandering substitute teacher assigned to work at a high school that seems to be imploding with every waking second of its being. Teachers and counselors alike burst at the seams as they argue and fight about their futures, taking their counterparts with them on a long, angsty look at high school life.

Alright, I know, this is a deep and fulfilling movie that "I just didn't understand". But high school is pretty normal. The nicely built brownstone that the film takes place in just doesn't seem like a reasonable nesting place for gangsters and prostitutes. The faculty here are people that would have been fired long before they scream and threaten students in the way they are portrayed. High school just isn't this angsty.

Adrian Brody does an admirable job. He's a fine actor and proves himself worthy of his string of recent independent films. But his performance never seems live enough to keep you interested. His dead demeanor matches the rest of the film's depressed atmosphere. My complaint is not that the film is not happy, but rather that it never grabs you, except when it shows you some blood or sex, where you tend to be too repulsed to notice.

Brody seems to be the main character, but the film is more of an ensemble with several fantastic character actors. James Caan has some perfect scenes as a...teacher? Councilor? Who knows, he just seems to be the only character with any interest in his job. We suspend the reality that Lucy Liu would be long fired when she screams at students for not applying themselves. Marcia Gay Harden loses her job. Maybe. She spends most of the movie being sad about something, that was probably it. William Peterson and the exceptional Tim Blake Nelson are underused.

This is an experimental film, and the results are probably what the people behind it expected, perhaps wanted. But "Detachment" is off- putting in a bad way, and never seems to latch on to exactly what its message is. If it is perhaps that we are so detached from reality that we are a paradigm for these characters, then why bother to watch the movie?

Author: mittens-and-matches from Seattle
5 September 2012

First lets start off with the good:

- Cast: Wow, great cast...Adrian Brody, Christina Hendricks, Bryan Cranston, James Caan, Lucy Liu.

- Acting: I generally like Adrian Brody. He is perfectly cast for this part. Generally there is nothing to complain about regarding any of the acting in the movie. Very well done.

- Dialogue: Good dialogue is important. Especially for a movie like this which is entirely character driven. Adrian gives some nice moving speeches and James Caan has some quite witty humorous lines. Overall, the dialogue is good.

- Vision: The creators of the movie were trying to create a movie that showed the reality of hopelessness in struggling urban school environments. I understand the 'detachment' they are trying to convey and applaud them for trying not to dress it up to much with a Hollywood tale. However, there are some problems with the execution of the vision which leads me to...

The bad:

- Script: If a strong script is important to you: avoid this movie. The story relies on sucking you in to the emotional performances of the characters to create its meaning.

- Poor directing/Tries to hard: Unfortunately, many of the scenes are a little over the top. In its attempt to make us feel we witness scene after scene of extreme behavior. The chance to connect with the subtle emotions of real life drama are lost and we are caught up in a melodrama. The movie tries hard to make you "FEEL" something. Its a little like a sales pitch for sadness. I found myself getting annoyed at certain moments like I was in a live showing of Dave Letterman and the audience 'laugh' sign pops up to tell you what to do only here its this is your cue to "feel this _____ emotion".

Overall, I found myself feeling like Rick Groen of the globe summed this movie up the best saying: "Ultimately, Detachment invites us to feel precisely what it warns against, detached." I enjoy curling up with a tub of ice cream and feeling depressed about life as much as the next person. However, I need my movies to be the whole package if they are going to take me there. Here about halfway through I found myself wanting to skip ahead some scenes because they were boring me. Indeed I felt a little detached.

Want to watch something that deals with similar subject matter yet doesn't overdress it? Watch HBO's series "The Wire" with a 9.5 rating on IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0306414/

Author: Connor3820 from United States
25 November 2012

I had high expectations for this film. Tony Kaye had not come out with one since the excellent "American History X" almost 15 years ago, In which he took on some very controversial issues and made a very ambitious and thought provoking look at how racism effects individuals. With "Detachment" it's as if he tried to one-up his last film, which resulted in a pretentious, contrived roller coaster of emotions and extreme characters. This film is a fine example of simply too much going on. The film is well cast, but that doesn't save a bad storyline. Stylistically the film must have been shot on a DSLR, and it looks as if the operator walked around with it freely in his hands for most of the movie, due to shaky camera work.We have numerous characters that are all dealing with what would seem to be their rock bottom. Instead of taking a few characters and delving into what brought them to this point, we have a movie that goes 0-60 in the opening scenes and stays that way throughout the whole film. There is no down time, it's just a constant bombardment of extreme conditions and emotions, which just doesn't feel real and is definitely not wholly believable. The reason I didn't give it a lower rating than I did is because It kept my attention the whole way through, but it wasn't for the right reasons.

Author: Chris L from France
30 July 2013

Tony Kaye draws up in this Detachment a dark portrait of a teacher's job and the US educational system, and delivers a striking but unfortunately not totally convincing movie.

The film's interest lies mainly in Adrien Brody's totally nuanced and excellent performance as a troubled teacher on the verge of breaking point, within a very good cast perhaps a bit too under exploited.

As for the script, it's not uninteresting, far from it, but the omnipresent darkness turns boring: after the hour mark, the viewer has enough of seeing all those depressed teachers and this completely depressing prevailing fatalism.

The other big problem is the cinematography, a lot too stylized, clearly lacking coherence in its approach and ultimately turning out to be too messy, serving the story badly.