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A stunning, crazy, messy and beautifull funny movie...but the plot is crazy and gets ever crazier, so you have to stay on the ball otherwise you are lost in the maze of intreagues and doublecrossings and start thinking about suicide or finding the off-button.

You must undergo the torture of watching it at least 2 times-but who has the courage to do that?

I could hardly muster any sympathy for all those Moscow-folks. They all have a neurotic behaviour and are rather dammaged when their trials and tribulations begin. The 2 main actresses are really hysterical cows and their reactions to certain circumstances are hard to watch-I'd call it overacting. Too much happens too fast to be credible-and the stupidity of the personae is sometimes hard to believe.

Yes, I dare say out loud: I was bored out of my mind and couldn't finish the film. Having read all those enthused reviews with all those desperate attempts to analyze the plot, I am astonished about all that helplessness concerning the meaning of the narrative. The film was tediously stretched out with endless pauses,had no real structure, lacked dramatic development (at least in those 70 minutes I watched it) end even the great Gyllenhaal couldn't save it. If I have to watch the film together with my Psycho-analyst in order to get an satisfying answer to its meaning then it's a lost cause for me.

Why did they decide to give Jay Baruchel the young lead? He is an awful actor, cartoonish looking with an awful nasal voice and extrem nerdy body movements. For me he ruined an otherwise quite interesting film totally.

Well acted, interesting but a bit confusing story.If you aren't into gambling and if you aren't that great in math it gets rather boring after a while.

The first 15 minutes are quite interesting...and then the film begins a long tortuous slide into an ugly horror abyss. The lead actor seems to suffer from withdrawal symptons, the villagers are daft and the 2 villains sadists. The director can't decide what the the narrative should be: abuse of religion, keltic myth or simply a horror movie done with cruel sadism.

Quite a few commentators have rated this great flic as "boring".."nothing happening"..."no action"..".bad camerawork" etc.etc. This shows, how todays Hollywood-Block-Buster-Movies have corrupted the taste and sensitivity of many spectators. They don't have the patience anymore to listen to a narrative filmed in ways of an audio-play...they have lost to their capabilities to LISTEN to a beautifully told story filmed in extremely lomg shots without cuts and with a minimalistic budget. One night in a smallish "retro-town" full of suspense and surprises. Well, it's a film for true cineasts and nothing for Trump-voters.

Hofstetter is an old pro now. His material is clever and very witt and the way he presents it is funny. I Knew him only as a heckler-killer from YouTube-but this 1 hour special shows a comedian with great potential!!!

It really is a rather lousy show. Written for much younger actors, KIDS, but acted but by young adults The siblings should be 12-but a fully developed 17/18 year old are playing them. It looks and sounds ridiculous, when the doctor sister tells them:: "You are in a difficult age now, your voice breaks, your body changes, you're are confused about many things."..and there are sitting two strapping , well developed guys whith shaven chins and hairy legs. the serious is slow moving, repetetive and ometime wuite boring. The over the top grandmother (?) seems to be running the show -aand the villiain is the headmistres of the school acting likke a mixture of Frankenstein's Bride and Ilse Koch. After two periods I fled the scene.

I don't get it ! so many reviews state: " a film about nothing"..."totally boring"..."I lost 2 hours of my life"..."bad acting"..."whyt an award for this uneventfult, pretentious crap"..."artsy fartsy" etc.etc. And then again: "outstanding"...great actors and roles"..."an important piece of film history"..."incredible"..."beautiful and truthful".....etc.etc.

I liked the film. You have to have a kind of sensibility for this kind of film and the problems its dealing with. The first 30 minutes I got almost angry with that totally silent and withdrawn child and the environment he has to live in...but when you understand why things are what they are you begin to like the film. Sure, I would have written some charakter-straits of some roles differenty. The mother-son relationsship is sometimes very irritating. Some things explain themselves at the end only-but I have to respect the writers and the directors point of view. It certainly is a film you can debate for hours about, and it certainly does not meet the expectations of people with hollywood-blockbuster tastes and it certainly isn't a film for small town movie goers in the bible belt of the USA. And I feel sorry for those lovers of gay films, who had hoped for juicier minutes. (no pun intented). It's more an arthouse film for NewYork/London/Berlin audiences.

While the 1.part was quite amusing, full of action and funny dialogue, part 2 is-in my eyes-a most boring film without pacing, stilted dialogues, hardly any action and undecided in which direction it should go . I didn't have the stamina to view it 'til the end and can't understand all those comments praising this most unfortunate endeavor of a sequel.

Action doesn't substitute for a logic storyline. Nothing make sense here, nothing is explained-and the kids are running and running and running headlessly into an empty story. I got so fed up with those never ending outbursts: "come on...hurry...come on guys...hurry...over there...hurry...come on ....ad nauseam.

This is a great film with very good actors-especially young British (!) guy named Joe Alwyn. It has a rather devastating outlook on (American) society at it's worst. "We are a nation of children"...how true. I am very d'accord with the review of darmstrong562. He describes best the intentions and strongpoints of this film. I have nothing to add to his view of this GREAT MOVIE !

This is one hell of a mess. plots like this have been done a 10000 times-but better-script simply lousy, actors from heinously to undescribably bad, the actions illogical and badly executed-and the rest is silence. I can't understand for the life of me, how some people can earnestly state : "great film, great story, great actors." Where do those hicks live ? Have they gone to school ? have they ever seen a real good movie ? Sorry, but those "commentators" have the mentality of the sociopaths shown in the film. They shouldn't be allowed to write "film critics".

A coming of age film , done in a different and somewhat unusual way. I do not share the opinion of "Horst in Transition/10th ofJuly 2018" who belittles the whole endeavour as forgettable. Sure, the stories about coming of age are often similar ( the story of "Romeo and Julia " has been told over and over too) and the idea of becoming "liberated" through "art" from a miserable social background-- has been the theme in "Billy Elliot" and "Fame" and many other films too. But I liked the way this film was done with flash-backs, with a slow moving rythm, with impressive actors-especially the poor white trash family, and the sharp contrasts between the heroes former life and the seemingly aimless search for his destiny in Paris among the rich, the "artsy fartsy", the "would be's" and the losers. Having some knowledge of fine arts, theatre and the gay world helps to like that film- It's not a american popcorn blockbuster for the masses !

Horrible bad acting from both "stars", horrible script, horribly cheap CGI-effects. Travolta with his horrible beard and horrible accent looks like a bad Baron Cohen caricature, and de Niro is looking for his paycheck in the wildernes. Both men inflict horribel torture wounds unto each other,but keep on chasing each other, surviving a horrible carcrash 2 miles downhills without safety belts on and keep on yapping and yapping. It takes a lot of patience to sit through this crap !

It's the old problem : how does one execute a gay/coming of age movie without wading in too many cliches ? This film tries to avoid them and is quite successful at that. While I can still tolerate and understand the behaviour of the parents of the (lovely !) young boy-couple-the really hateful reactions of the schoolmates and the passive reaction of schoolboard/Teachers is A BIT OVER THE TOP for 2016. As a director I would have considered to let Louis be successful with his suicidal attempt-just to punish the school, the unrelenting prick of a father (Louis father) and society as a whole. Otherwise the film is great-good actors,very well directed, script okay.

I've read the book some years ago. I remember being fascinated by the almost fantasy-like world in which our hero and his family live. They are funny, warmhearted, easygoing and freewheeling -and there is some magic secret waiting to be uncovered. And the strange boy has secrets too and is shrouded in mysteries. In the film almost all of the females are shrill borderline cases, acting way over the top most of the time. Our hero is weak willed and confused (which is okay for a teenager coming of age) and must be constantly advised and be comforted by those females who can't master their own affairs. The other boy comes across as a blunt, sexy, needy and selfish guy without any mystery in his life. Being gay myself I appreciate the nicely filmed sex-scenes (guys have sex in the nude and are not covered in linen and shorts like their american brothers ). Louis Hofmann and Jannik Schümann are believable in their roles (as the director sees them) but the MAGIC which hovers about them in the book can't be felt here.

Being gay myself and having seen quite a few gay- and coming out- and coming of age movies I found this film rather tedious, way too long, rather sad and without any real story, without a beginning, a middle and an end ! The supposedly straight friend Martin is a slow, not very determent , drifting aimlessly through the day type of guy-but constantly having sex with some girl or another. He seems to be a lifelong friend of of the other, guy, who is obviously gay and has a life-long crush on Martin. Both have never had any sexual encounter with each other-and then, in the last 5 minutes of this sad little,pretentious ,badly filmed "artwork" they seem to remember that -and dutifully rush through a bedscene-after which Martin, who is afraid of the beach and the water, takes a long swing in the cold, wintry wavy ocean. NO, that's NOT one of the must see gay movies.