Probably Director Todd Solondz' most mature work to date, Storytelling is split into two parts `Fiction' and `Non-Fiction' - yet similar themes underlie both and pose questions about what we call reality when it comes to prejudice and taboo subjects. Whilst in previous attempts (such as `Happiness') Solondz' work has merely been controversial, in this film he berates political correctness more accurately and more entertainingly. It exposes ridiculous attitudes in the name of political correctness, whether it is the student with an awful essay who almost escapes criticism because he has cerebral palsy, or a black teacher who gets away with being a pervert because his victim doesn't want to entertain thoughts of racism. Nothing is sacred: Jews and the Holocaust also come in for merciless examination. But part of the film involves the story of a `documentary' being made within the main story, by an exploitative screwed up filmmaker who wants to do his own thing in the name of art, so in this sense, Storytelling even turns on itself and questions the validity of using the subject matter that it does. A controversial, worthy, and very entertaining film that stretches your ability to make moral judgements within a convincingly coherent framework.
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After reading about Palindromes and finding myself oddly attracted to the subject matter of several of Todd Solondz's features, I bought this film. It would seem that it has a reputation as being his worst work to date(at least as far as theatrically released movies go)... I must say, if the rest of what he's done is this powerful, I will have to keep my eyes open for it. You seldom see movies that are this unpleasant. There are films that are far, far harder to watch... but this is still not one you put on to enjoy yourself. As many other viewers, I didn't care much for the first half(well, part... it's a third of the projects full length, with a running time of about 25 minutes), "Fiction". I felt I had gained little after it was over, though I will say that the concept and themes explored are quite interesting. "Non-Fiction" proved to be far more worth-while, in my opinion. The writing and direction is excellent in both. The pacing works well... I was never bored, and while it wasn't exactly a "good" time, it moved along as it should, never really too slow or too fast. The characters were incredible... the sheer amount of development, through so little time spent on each... that's talent. As its title indicates, Storytelling goes into different methods of telling a story... and displays some of the most impressive storytelling that I've seen to date. There is some humor, but it's quite black, and throughout the film, I was unsure of whether I should laugh out loud... or cry my eyes out. The film is strongly satirical, very direct and seemingly almost aggressively anti-PC. Dealing with several subjects of taboo, Solondz pulls few punches, if any. Certainly not a film for everyone. Both parts seem to end somewhat abruptly, but that may be intentional. I will say that my rating would almost certainly have been higher had the first part been improved upon... or removed entirely. It's difficult to say who I'd recommend this to... cynics or realists with a strong threshold for the some of the ugliest sides of human nature, I suppose. From what I understand, though, it's less provocative than the other films of Todd Solondz. 8/10
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It's pretty rare when I am at a loss for words, particularly when I am weighing an opinion on a film. Even more rare is when I'm speechless about a film by a favorite filmmaker. And to further the irony, the film is titled "Storytelling". Written and directed by Todd Solondz ("Welcome to the Dollhouse", "Happiness"), "Storytelling" is actually two short stories within the same film.
Being a fan of Solondz's work, I can't possibly pretend to be surprised that "Storytelling" is depressing. Anyone who has seen his other work knows what he or she is in for going in. One thing that I felt about "Storytelling" more than any of the other two Solondz films I've seen is that it seemed a lot more personal. The character of Toby is clearly a representation of Solondz, and a depiction and answer to and of his critics who say that he is a horrible person for "mocking" his characters, etc. In the film, when a fellow filmmaker criticizes Toby, telling him it is "glib and facile to make fun of those people", Toby denies this, simply saying "I love them." Looking back on his past work, and looking back on reviews I have written of those films, there is a definite pattern with the characterizations and the situations that Solondz writes them into. The situations are painful and the characters are sympathetic (or pathetic, depending on how you look at them), but the pain comes from Solondz not turning the camera away from the subject when they are at their most vulnerable. Most filmmakers, in order to make a more commercially acceptable film do not inject the kind of honesty that Solondz does, which naturally ends up creating criticism for him because it is "different".
Also notable is his defiant decision to, rather than cut his film according to MPAA standards to give it an R rating instead of NC-17, create a ridiculously large red box to mask the sex scene in "Fiction". Apparently he was told that the scene either needed to be cut or he would get a higher rating, (an absolutely ridiculous notion because the action itself was not overly graphic, it was the details of the scene that were disturbing) so in his refusal to cut it, he decided to throw it back in the MPAA's face and call it what it was: Censorship.
Out of many "disturbing" scenes, there was one scene that I found so profound that it has not left my mind since I watched this film last night. Scooby decides that he wants to see the footage that Toby has shot thus far, so he travels into New York City to see him. Mike, who tells him that Toby is actually screening the footage elsewhere as they speak, greets him at the door. When Scooby gets to the screening, where various intelligista are gathered, he sees himself on the screen, giving his inner thoughts, while the audience is laughing. Other than to turn to the footage on the screen, the camera does not leave Scooby's face, which has been transformed from a look of hopefulness to a mask of grief. Later, when he returns home to an unexpected tragedy at home, among the various policemen, etc., Toby runs up to Scooby with Mike, camera in tow, saying, "Oh my god, Scooby. I'm so, so sorry." To which Scooby, providing the last line of the film says, looking right into the camera, "Don't be. Your movie's a hit." That scene, those words, and the rest of the film made "Storytelling" shockingly and almost unbearably good. Solondz, who has made a career out of turning his eye to the fraying suburban ideal, is at his bleakest with this film. I've read criticism that he is "too" dark, which make his films somewhat unwatchable; a notion I find absolutely ridiculous. True, his films are like repeatedly ripping scabs off of a wound, never allowing it to heal, but their profundity is almost tangible. "Storytelling" was so thought provoking and effective that I found myself too numb to fully react until I actually began to put my thoughts into words, at which point I felt like I wanted to cry my eyes out. In a society where films like "Guess Who" and "Miss Congeniality" rule the box office, I find this to be a really difficult film to universally recommend, but there are definitely those out there who will appreciate this film. An extremely strong 8/10.
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Now from reading the trivia provided by IMDb, it can be learned that their was originally going to be three stories. After learning this, I can somewhat understand the format of movie the director was going for. However, having only two stories (which are disproportionate in the amount of time spent on them) is completely distracting because you find yourself looking for the parallel between them. The theme was their but that wasn't enough. If Solandz would have just pulled one character from the first story and show a glimpse of them in the second, I would have found the movie a lot smoother around the edges. Since he did not do this, I am forced to evaluate the second part of the film more due to the time spent on it as well as plot development.
Format aside, I loved the second part of storytelling. All characters are lovable and easy to relate to, especially Scooby. Scooby represents a normal teenager trying to find his own with many confrontations with his parents. So much so, that he can almost be looked at as a theme more than as a character. The portrayal of the oldest, middle, and youngest child is dead on. Parents are a cliché but it only adds to the plot. *SOMEWHAT SPOILER* The beginning shot of the director makes you sympathize him which then leads you to trust his intentions. Everyone, even the viewer, is betrayed by his depiction of the family. The movie ended perfectly, as there was nothing else that could be said or done and I give props to Solandz for being able to leave it perfect and raw. -
tedg17 November 2003Spoilers herein.
Solondz is a modern Woody Allen. Both are obsessed with how film fiction and life reinforce each other. But where Woody filled his empty spaces with love and gentle angst about love in a slapstick context, Solondz cavorts darkly. He sees the penalties.
In both cases, most viewers really think the reason for the films to exist is the stuff used as filler: that Woody's films for instance are about city life and love.
Nah. And many people will be similarly distracted here and comment on matters of race and generational distance and various exploitations. Nah, again.
The very point is that we are so easily distracted and enmeshed in narrative that we cannot tease out the mechanics of life from that of film. The notion of `race` is a fiction made real by popular art. The notion of sex in love as well. The notion of truth is a deliberate fabrication of fiction in order to give itself power.
I give credit to Solondz. He hits the same sweet spot Woody often does by proving his point by using that point to confound us. Where Woody entertains, Solondz distracts.
Watch this only if you are interested in thinking about film.
`Safe' is a much more subtle and effective essay on this same matter. It actually enlists the actress (the multilayered Moore) in the endeavor, something that Solondz apparently cannot do.
`Death on the Seine' is more stimulating to my mind because it explores restoring reality.
Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching. -
stefan-1446 January 2003I was fascinated by Todd Solondz's HAPPINESS, a spell-binding drama every minute of it - sometimes terribly naked. There are such tendencies also in STORYTELLING, but only in the second of the two independent parts.
The first part, called "Fiction", is significantly shorter than part two, "Non-fiction". This is as it should be, but the best would be to exclude it completely. The story about emotional tension between a college girl with ambition to become a writer, her frustrated CP boyfriend and their impressive/monstrous teacher, the successful writer, is just as conventional as the stories the students write in the film. This may be intentional, to cause multiple layers of meta-effects, but it doesn't save this part of the movie from being pretty predictable and boring.
And the story ends before it should. A sort of coitus interruptus (if the term is allowed), which demands some kind of return or closing-up later on in the movie - but there is none. I got the strong impression that this part was only included to make the movie full-time.
The second story, "Non-fiction", is clearly stronger, and told with much more passion from the writer/director. Here, many facets are explored, the characters are complex, the drama intricate - and the tension builds, right below the drab suburban surface. It is impressive how elements common in just about any family life, here add to the suspense and the sense of doom. The thrill of trivial life, but not at all trivially portrayed.
This might be the reason for the title "Non-fiction", since the lives and fates shown in the story feel so real - contrary to what happens in "Fiction".
Still, this story, too, has been told insufficiently, as if abbreviated, or halted at points where it was about to erupt into infernal drama. Pity. Did Solondz retreat from his own vision? Did he censor himself to get more of a general audience?
I hope that it's not the case. His portrayal of human life, although unpleasant indeed, is fascinating and uniquely his. So he must be true to it. -
addicott23 March 2008Writer/director Todd Solondz last rocked my world with Happiness, which was the sharpest, most unflinching black comedy I'd ever seen. He does it again with Storytelling, keeping his impeccable edge while exploring some intriguing new turf. No doubt wary after his previous ventures, Solondz attempts to circumvent some of the criticisms that less savvy viewers are bound to make. Sure enough, they go ahead and make them; the reviews are polarized. But the film is a masterpiece.
The film has two parts. The first part, titled Fiction, focuses on a creative writing student Vi (Selma Blair), her Cerebral Palsy-stricken boyfriend Marcus (Leo Fitzpatrick) and their professor Mr. Scott (Robert Wisdom).
The classroom setting provides an unusual venue: a story writing workshop within a story. Solondz puts one of the characters through a perversely traumatic experience, which we witness as viewers of the movie. Before we have a chance to pass judgment on Solondz, his character writes about the event in the 3rd person and reads the story in class. All accusations one might level against Solondz (namely: bad taste, plus every "ism" in the book) get made by the fellow students, who detest the story. But in the context of the movie, they're condemning an account of an event that actually happened! Very clever...
In spite of some of the grotesque twists, I found myself laughing out loud fairly often. Solondz has a gift for rendering subtle ironies that become overwhelmingly funny.
The lead characters are fascinating and multi-layered. Vi seems innocent, but if you pay close attention, you'll notice she's not particularly sincere. One would like to root for Marcus, but his condition doesn't excuse him for being a lousy writer and a self-absorbed a**hole. The professor may be a monster, but he is also very frank.
The second part Nonfiction is also highly self-aware. It covers the making of a two-bit documentary. In the process, the dialog once again anticipates many of the charges some will make against Solondz (that he exploits his subjects and creates a sensational freak show for us to snicker at). There's a cameo role with Mike Schank, who was featured in real life in American Movie. The similarities between the documentary American Movie, the fiction Storytelling and the documentary within a fiction (tentatively titled American Scooby) are uncanny.
Scooby (Mark Weber) is the ultimate apathetic suburban slacker teen. While very much spoiled and sheltered, he is also alienated from, and resentful of, his elders. He perks up a bit when there are no grownups around, but most of the time the "stupid" barrier is up and his eyes are half-closed and red from smoking pot. He's such a lost cause, he attracts the attention of an aspiring documentarian (Paul Giamatti).
As you might expect, the rest of Scooby's family is a real piece of work. Scooby's dad (John Goodman) is loud and domineering. His mom (Julie Hagerty) is idiotic. His younger brother Brady (Noah Fleiss) is a jock, perhaps the closest to what we'd like to consider "normal".
The brainy youngest brother, Mikey (Jonathan Osser) is a real standout. He tags around with the overworked El Salvadorian housemaid Consuelo (Lupe Ontiveros) and asks her lots of questions. His curiosity is cute, but his conceited insensitivity truly boggles the mind.
Solondz definitely favors the sordid, but I'm not sure he does so gratuitously. I think he simply refuses to pretend, as so many other do, that the world is a tidy, simple place. (Those who seek to preserve such a notion are guaranteed to abhor his work.) But is it fair to berate Solondz just because he dares to present what others systematically avoid? Whose vision is more skewed: Solondz for pointing out the dog***t on our shoes, or the mainstream for ignoring it?
I wish I could agree that his writings are contrived and distorted, but I don't think they are. Through the media, through the grapevine and sometimes with my own eyes, I've seen events that are every bit as twisted and "wrong" as those Solondz creates. Everywhere I look, I encounter people who could easily be incorporated into a Solondz script.
Every storyteller recreates the world according to his/her own vision. Todd Solondz just happens to be vastly more perceptive and talented than most. Storytelling is one of the most insightful, clever and thought-provoking films I've ever seen. Watch it multiple times for maximum yield. -
CitizenCaine17 November 2008Todd Solondz' follow-up film to Happiness and Welcome To The Dollhouse is not as successful as those two films. Solondz divides the film into two sections: fiction and non-fiction. Selma Blair stars in the fiction section which turns storytelling on its ear when a creative writing student borrows from real life experience to tell a story, only to have her peers criticize her for its pretentiousness and unbelievability. The story opens with Blair being manipulated by her college lover who has has cerebral palsy. When his story is ripped by the class as well as the professor, He breaks up with Blair. Blair, whose own story was trashed off camera, is determined to succeed in the class, so she goes home with her instructor and subjects herself to a degrading sexual escapade in order to write something honest fiction. While doing so, she discovers the class intellectual has been involved in kinky sex with the instructor as well.
The non-fiction portion of the film stars Paul Giamatti as a loser, would-be documentary filmmaker who attempts to portray a suburban family with a troubled high school senior, played by Mark Webber. The portrait turns into an exercise in self-indulgence for everyone involved, including the Giamatti character. Giamatti of course is acting as Solondz' alter ego. He vacillates between making a "meaningful" documentary and accepting changes along the way as it suits the would-be success of the film. Initially, the film attempts to get at what makes the teenager click, but we discover there isn't much to explain it. He's just another typical teen slacker. We also discover the ignorance and bankrupt values of average America. Some of the dinner table conversations are sure to remind some viewers the banality and stupidity of their own experiences with family and friends.
As in the fiction section, Solondz seems to be saying that storytelling, whether fiction or non-fiction, is entirely subjective and the success of any story told often relies upon luck and/or factors out of one's control. In fiction, the author's attempt to fictionalize a true story went awry, possibly due to the limited, politically correct mind-set of her peers. In non-fiction, the documentary's focus was modified as other events occurred throughout filming: the teenager being an inappropriate focus, his family's lack of character, his brother's accident, etc. Mike Schank from American Movie fame has a cameo even, underlying the notion that luck plays a part in any storyteller's success, just as it did with the film American Movie. The audience must be willing to accept the storyteller's premise. In American Movie, the audience accepted the premise of a loser filmmaker with no talent thinking he could produce a film. In this film, audiences failed to accept the premises in the fiction and in the non-fiction sections.
Both sections of the film indicate the role of the audience as one of the chief determinants of the storyteller's success. The creative writing class reacted negatively to Selma Blair's "true" story. The class intellectual was revealed to be a sell out herself for yielding to the instructor sexually. What price are storytellers willing to pay to succeed? The test audience trashes Giamatti's documentary and finds it unexpectedly funny, contributing to a series of cataclysmic events. The film is funny at times but less entertaining at other times. It is not as successful at illustrating the storyteller's dilemma in creating as it is at illustrating the mind-numbing ignorance of today's youth and the lack of character and direction in their lives. **1/2 of 4 stars. -
Rogue-3211 February 2002Another completely original, dark, deeply skewered and audacious commentary on society from Todd S., whom we've come to depend upon for this sort of thing. Not as focused as Dollhouse or as filled-out as Happiness, Storytelling does seem sparse, and that's one of the things I like best about it (I've seen it 4 times now)- how T.S. didn't feel the need to conform to what the majority of film goers (even his OWN crowd!) expect when they enter a theatre.
It's divided into two parts - Fiction, with its heavy sexual, presumably-racist and ironic elements, a searing affair that many people seem to have found offensive without getting the underlying satire, and then there's Non-Fiction; amazing how much spot-on societal jabs T. S. squeezes into this one, and plus it has another great, multi-layered performance from Paul Giamatti, always a major selling point of any film, for me.
The bottom line: I believe T.S. deserves credit for his audacity alone, his unwillingness to compromise his vision, however unacceptable it might be. Or he might be consciously tailoring his vision toward the unacceptable, sort of like Andy Kaufman did - getting off on just making people react, shaking them out of indifference. Or maybe, like some people have suggested, he's run out of ideas (or he peaked with Dollhouse) and he's just rehashing the same stuff, hoping nobody will notice. Or maybe he WANTS us to notice, maybe it's a cry for help, in which case I would recommend a writing class, but NOT one that has Robert Wisdom as the professor. -
mattymatt4ever17 August 2002"Storytelling" is interesting, dramatically effective and well-acted. It just left me wanting more. Those who were heavily turned off by Solondz's last effort, "Happiness," (a film I still regard as brilliant) might not be as turned off by "Storytelling." Other than an explicit anal sex scene (which is blocked off by a cheesy red box in the R-rated version), the material is quite innocuous. But "Happiness" not only had a provocative edge; it also had closure. It didn't leave any loose ends, having the audience wonder, "What's next?" This movie has Solondz's provocative edge, but it needs closure.
The characters and situations are colorful. I've always loved the director's use of brutal honesty in telling stories of otherwise straitlaced white collar suburbanites with skeletons in their closets. His films possess a unique realism that we almost never see in today's movies.
Selma Blair gives her best performance up to date, her first character role. There's a greatly powerful scene in which she's taunted, by her fellow classmates, about her short story which was based on a true situation between her and her tough-as-nails professor. John Goodman is terrific as the strict, suburban dad who simply wants his family to be normal. Leo Fitzpatrick is great as Blair's lonely boyfriend with a speech impediment. After seeing him in that awful movie, "Kids," it was great to see him in a decent role in a halfway decent movie. I'm guessing he really does have a speech impediment. The little boy got annoying at times. Though I know it was part of his character, there were times where I just wanted to put my foot through the TV when he would go on rambling. And the underrated Paul Giamatti delivers a fine, low-key performance as a geeky documentary filmmaker.
I wouldn't say this movie is anywhere near terrible, and I still look forward to Todd Solondz's next film, but it just needed more. It would've made a great television pilot, but for a film it would need a stronger narrative. In the second story, "Nonfiction," we get to know a fair deal about these characters, their backgrounds and their aftermaths. However, in the first story, "Fiction," I felt there could've been a lot more background to the characters and what happened after Vi's dreams were crushed after her fellow students gave their hypocritical opinions on her short story? As I said before, it's an interesting film, but not altogether satisfying.
My score: 6 (out of 10) -
richard_sleboe11 August 2008This is a story of continuous failure and humiliation, told through the eyes of feature film maker Todd Solondz, using the perspectives of an aspiring writer (Selma Blair) and an actor-turned-documentary film maker (Paul Giamatti, of "Sideways" acclaim), who use pen and camera to distance themselves from their subject matter in turn. While the writer is her own subject, the filmmaker finds a teenage outcast to tell his story of "American Scooby". So what we see is three to four levels removed from reality, whatever that may be. Sounds glum and complicated? Uh-huh. Solondz gets a few cerebral kicks out of the whole truth-and-fiction hodgepodge, but it's all a bit too academic to be much fun. Fans of Selma Blair, however, will not want to miss it. 20 minutes into the movie, and already she has gotten her kit off twice. Ironically, the movie's second segment is actually the more interesting, perhaps because John Goodman makes such an imposing dad. If you liked "Happiness", find someone who liked "Little Miss Sunshine" and go see a movie together. It doesn't necessarily have to be this one.
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At first viewing I though this was the weakest of director Todd Solondz films, however like all of his works, it's impossible to forget once seen. Todd Solondze absorbed criticisms about exploitation, showing misery for misery's sake, and just generally being a "meanie", and turned them into the cinematic equivalent of a "dis song"(rap term for song made specifically as an attack or "beef" with another rapper), with Solondz against critics, carefully trying to explain the notions of "Storytelling". Our first story deals with sex, political correctness, race, and fiction writing, as a young liberal college girl has unpleasant and ironic sexual experience with her Black writing professor. Our second well...with the same subjects just this time with non-fiction in place of fiction. Here Solondz shows us yet another dysfunctional upper middle class Jewish family in chaos, but this time as a "documentary", which shows us the pathetic film maker, the cruel or otherwise ignorant family, and the audience who laughs and scoffs, at it all.
This is a rare film, because it's a film maker addressing his critiques, himself, and his audience all at once. And it has plenty of Solondz trade mark cringe scenes, that veer drastically from comic to dramatic in a matter of breaths. The results are absorbing but like all Solondz it leaves a bad taste in your mouth, and makes you honestly question your own moral compass. They say satire is dead if the audience cannot be shocked, but it's also dead if the audience cannot be shamed, in the days where South Park and Family Guy, are on non cable TV any afternoon (l love both shows), shock and shame are concepts so familiar they've lost some of their power. Thankfully just when we've seen it all and were sure that nothing matters and nothing can surprise, startle, or offend us, Todd Solondz will be there to show things can always get worse. -
SnoopyStyle1 August 2022College student Vi (Selma Blair) is in a writing class with black teacher Mr. Scott. They have a disturbing one night stand. Failed actor Toby Oxman (Paul Giamatti) is trying to make a documentary about teenagers. He recruits apathetic student Scooby Livingston and his parents (John Goodman, Julie Hagerty).
The first story is terrific and it has a great ending. At that point, I assumed that there are two more similar stories and somehow they may or may not be connected. Paul Giamatti starts the second one very well. Then the movie follows Scooby and his family. It's not as tight and it goes on too long. The smaller kid is a brat. He's meant to be funny but I would rather slap him around. I try to imagine the Livingstons as their own movie and I'm on the fence with them. The laughter with the documentary seems forced. The footage is not actually funny. There is apparently a third story but my version of the movie does not have that. This Todd Solondz film has his sense of pessimistic suburban existence but maybe he should split it into different movies. -
jordnthoms29 December 2010Having never seen a Solondz piece, an Italian friend though I should see this movie along with Palindromes.
I was engrossed in the film by the "fiction" portion of the movie, which was graphic and fast-paced. The questions posed by the students were neither uncommon nor unpredictable; however, Catherine and the professor force the story forward by asking the hard questions and giving the hard analysis. A majority of the students are stuck in their analysis of the piece (much like most viewers and readers): It is realistic? It is graphic? Is it rape? ... but Solondz named this piece "fiction" -- though one could easily interpret it as non-fiction (with the exception of the readers/listeners presented by Solondz). Without the select words of two characters at two moments in the segment (totaling no more than one minute each) the entire "fiction" segment would go nowhere.
"because once you start writing, it all becomes fiction"
Solondz then moves on to "Non-fiction." This segment was utterly unbelievable. A sociopathic 5th grader who manipulates his father, a homosexual teen with absolutely no psychological issues (or capacity, really), a filmmaker who settles for a clearly mundane subject, and a murderous maid -- all clearly fictional. Cliché mother, father, and brother figures aimed to fit the mold of non-fiction are tossed in with the unbelievable characters for some sort of contrast. However, the contrast is truly lacking without further probing of these characters. Again, I will point out that in the screening, the viewers (like most viewers and readers) are stuck in their analysis of the piece: Are their dreams realistic? Are they capable of achieving their dreams? Haha, simpleton.
The biggest message I got from this movie relates fiction and non- fiction. Both segments conveyed a non-fiction story, but the first was received as fiction and in the second the viewers so distanced themselves from the subject that it might as well have been fiction.
Overall, the movie confused me. I found most of the characters to be utterly unbelievable; I found the division into fiction and non-fiction intentionally deceptive; and I thought the bulk of the movie was anticlimactic and boring. I don't know how everyone is seeing an assault on political correctness. Vi was simply reflecting the racist (albeit positive) stereotypes her character has and was criticized for the assumption of the criticizers that her character was raped. I think everyone who has ever written about race has been called a racist. The maid was El Salvadorian... so what? The mother was Jewish... not relevant.
4/10 -
Gjutarn10 May 2003Just another movie that strives for well, nothing. It seems like the will to actually tell something was replaced by the will to get another award. For me this is just another Robert Altman wannabe at work. But he just can't get the story straight. Deconstructivism sometimes seems, as well as irony, to be used when you are to insecure to tell the whole story. It takes courage to make a straight story (like Lynch), based on really good storytelling. By making the movie a bit arty and confusing you're not putting your ass on the line. You only put the responsibility in the hands of the audience. Sometimes it works, sometimes it don't. This time didn't work, for me at least.
Furthermore I didn't really see how the two parts interacted in a interesting way. But maybe I've forgotten my Derrida... -
rosscinema3 March 2003While I did find this film pretty interesting it still seems to be lacking something compared to his previous two efforts. It doesn't have the emotional impact of "Welcome to the Dollhouse" or the sharpness and coherency of "Happiness" and both of those films each had a standout performance in them and this one does not, although Selma Blair is pretty good. The two parts "Fiction" and "Non-fiction" just seem to be missing some element. Its not that we don't understand what he's doing and what he's trying to say but it just doesn't have the closure that seems to be needed. The first part "Fiction" is shorter and just seems to end without allowing what it had just conjured up to play out. I do like Todd Solondz and the way he writes his films in general. He possesses a very dark and cynical view of both political correctness and the suburbs. I also think it was important for Selma Blair to be in this film. Her career seemed to be playing the stars friend or appearing in teen comedies. Here she plays a lead role and a somewhat controversial one at that in what might be her first nude scenes. I think its good for her career to be in something serious like this. I know I'll think of her in a different light from now on. Not anywhere near Solondz best films but interesting enough to recommend and anyone who likes Solondz (like myself) should see it.
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abyoussef20 February 2004by Dane Youssef
The writer/director of this one is Todd Solondz, so you all know what to expect. For those who saw his heavily acclaimed (by critics and audiences alike) "Welcome To The Dollhouse" a movie about the hell almighty on earth that is junior high school.
I was not one of the film's many admirers. Yes, I felt like just about everybody else that the film did have some poignant truths, but... I pretty much already knew them all. It all felt kinda redundant. I was in high school at the time and every scene I was watching, I thought, "Yeah, no sh*t."
I mean, I know it's supposed to be a satire, but I felt too much like I was watching what I already knew and thought and what has been said too many times before. Solondz was preaching to the reverend there.
His next film, "Happiness" about three sisters and their lives... and how adulthood is even less as mentally unbalanced as junior high school. About three sisters and how their lives aren't as well-adjusted as they seem. The seemingly ideal perfect sister is dry, secretly dull and lives such a sterile life that when an obscene phone caller calls her... she starts stalking him.
The best line in the movie "Happiness"... that almost encapsulates the entire film:
"I'm not laughing at you, I'm laughing with you." "But I'm not laughing."
The film is about two different forms of storytelling: "Fiction" and "Non-Fiction."
In the first story, "Fiction," Solondz shines an interpretive light a creative writing class.
A woman with writing aspirations and her cerebral-palsy boyfriend with the same. Vi has broken up with her boyfriend after his obviously autobiographical story is panned horribly by the school teacher who scathes it. He especially takes some kind of pleasure in attacking the title: "The Rawness of Truth."
Vi's boyfriend is furious with her for not giving it to him straight. Marcus' "Rawness" is about how Vi gave him confidence and made him feel... "completely cerebral."
Most of the whole class warms up to it... except for the teacher's pet... and the writing teacher himself, a Pulitzer-winner author of a novel entitled, "A Sunday Lynching."
Vi, stricken, gets hammered, lights up and... well... let me just put it this way... after having her last story ripped to shreds by the professor, her next story is certainly something of an improvement. And she's definitely evolving... because he's finally got something to say.
The professor has a poetic line about the writing process that rings incredibly true: "Whenever you write... it all becomes fiction."
"Non-Fiction" skewers reality and human experiences with life with a scalpel. Often at times, those documentarians seem to be roasting and attacking their subjects with great anger and fury... but are they just trying to get heat for their film... or is that how they really see it?
Who knows? Many artists are former victims, grown children with bad experiences and hell-bent on vengeance. "Non-Fiction" revolves around the exploits of a documentary filmmaker and his desire to make a documentary about teenagers and what they're feeling now.
Have things changed much? Drugs... suicidal feelings... self-loathing... loathing of the world around them... of the way society treats them, pressures them, conforms them and disposes of them... how do teenagers put up with it? What's ahead? Mark Webber is Scooby Livingston, a depressed, moody teenager who's completely lost and like many teenagers, his all-purpose requests to every question is "I don't know," "I really don't care" and "Whatever."
He always seems deep in thought and in need of answers. He has no aspirations... When asked how he plans to attain his dreams of stardom, he answers: "I don't know, see if I have any connections... whatever..." After a meet-strange with a documentarian Toby, both seem to be exactly what they're looking for and maybe their seemingly unobtainable dreams might have a chance of coming true after all.
The family's not enthusiastic about this... especially the father who doesn't want the family's dirty laundry to be aired out. But after some hard questions and earnest promises, he agrees.
No family wants to be exploited... and this family certainly would provide more than enough of such material. I think the boy represents Solondz as a young teenager (Solondz himself's vegetarian) and of course, Giamatti as Toby is Solondz as a filmmaker (Solondz dresses up Giamatti to look exactly like him). There's pressure all around from every angle and sadly, no way out in sight. College doesn't sound appealing to Scoob. Will there be a place for him. Since Scooby grew up to be Solondz himself, there must be hope. But I think Scooby represents all teenagers. He reflects our generation. God, how many teens out there are EXACTLY like Scooby?
Like all of his other efforts, this is about how ugliness and unsettling rage lives in middle class suburbia. You can't watch this movie, see/hear some of these people and not think of someone you know or have met or seen randomly on the street. Solondz is from Suburbia, New Jersey and is talking about what's going on there. I like how he talks about things that most people shy away from. He wants to criticize, satirize and get you to ask yourself... "How many people are really like this? And... is there hope for us? How many of these people exist... and more importantly, are they in our neighborhood? Not many... hopefully."
Like all of Solondz films, people will either be mesmerized by it or despise it, but it's a movie that many should see. Perhaps a movie for cynical teenagers and aspiring storytellers. Just know what you're getting into. Like all of Solondz's pictures, this cuts deep... and leaves a mark.
--A Natural Storyteller Oneself, Dane Youssef -
evetilly27 July 2019Todd Solondz has a rare skill. He can find humor in the darkest, most depressing subject matter. In Storytelling, he answers his own critics who tell him that certain subjects should be treated with kid gloves and not made fun of. In this film, he makes fun of disabilities, race, death...all the good stuff.
The first 30 minutes of the film focus on a creative writing student (Selma Blair) who's having a hard time finding inspiration. After breaking up with her disabled boyfriend, she had a fling with her African American professor and uses the experience as a basis for her next story.
The rest of the film is about a failed actor (Paul Giametti) turned documentarian who decides to make a high school slacker and his family the focus of his next project. It becomes obvious that the documentarian is the stand in for Solondz himself and he gets to answer the critics who call his work mean spirited or like a freak show where he's making fun of his subjects.
In classic Solondz tradition, there are tons of moments you'll feel bad for laughing at, but you won't feel too bad, because this is one of his best works and it's not as if he's not telling the truth. -
Storytelling is an indictment of repressive suburbia, but it is also an indictment of the postmodern, ironic, and politically correct intellectuals, and how both parts of society control and restrict people from being truly who they are. It is also about, well, storytelling and how easily stories and plots are manipulated for effect.
The first half hour, "Fiction," is devoted to a story of a college student, Vi, who is tired of "dating the undergraduates" and ends up a violent and racially charged sex scene with her African American creative writing professor. Solondz pushes the limit on all of the society's buttons in "Fiction," from the handicapped to race relations to sexual politics, and it is almost like he was simply out to shock the audience. The short film comes across as even trite and cliched, although now I realize that I'm quoting a scene from it almost directly, so perhaps this is Solondz's point. Still, if you ever seen any other of Solondz's movies, you can see the whole point of this section coming from a mile away (the dangers of political correctness, the prudishness and hypocrisy of the American middle class, even those claiming to be liberal or progressive, etc.) And I just couldn't believe that Vi would only say "Don't be racist, don't be racist" in the bathroom scene. I think "I gotta get the hell outta here" would be much more logical.
However, the brilliant last hour, "Nonfiction," more than makes up for the first half. It tells the story of a listless and intelligent teenager who lives with an angry and sad family in suburban New Jersey, and also about the documentary that is being made about them. Truly, I wish this were the whole movie, it is that good. Yes, there's plenty of postmodern film-within-the-film winking, but that quickly falls apart as we reach the heartbreaking and disturbing ending, when the movie suddenly becomes painfully real. What is also funny about "Nonfiction," which is supposed to be "real," is that it contains completely fictional and even forced plot points: someone is injured and slips into a coma, someone else is hypnotized and told what to do, and even the final, terrible act seems more to come out of a bad TV movie than real life. (I also especially enjoyed the not-so-subtle digs at American Beauty and American Movie.)
Do we want our lives to be more like an episode of "Friends," wrapped up neat and tidy, with minor quibbles that are resolved in a half hour (or, during sweeps, maybe a "two-part special")? Is political correctness just a big cover up for uncomfortable yet still very real desires and thoughts? Which is worse: being told what to do, or being told what to think? Are the two the same thing? Storytelling does address these questions, and I think if "Nonfiction" were stretched to feature-length, it would answer them brilliantly. But, because of the ho-hum first hour (yes, ho-hum, even with "that scene" and all), all the pieces don't quite fall together. To change the lyrics of a certain Scottish band, "It could've been a brilliant movie."
Storytelling is worth seeing for the great acting (in both "Fiction" and "Nonfiction") and the excellent second section, but you can clip your toenails or stare out the window for the most part during the first half hour. I was expecting more of a cynical irony-fest as in Happiness, but I was truly touched by "Nonfiction," and it will stay with me for quite awhile. -
Spanner-225 February 2002This film, from indie director Todd Solondz is really two different movies, both of which have to do with storytelling of a sort...the first tale set in a college writing course has Selma Blair as a young woman involved with a cripple who has an affair with her professor and the second story is about Paul Giamatti as a down and out documentary filmmaker who follows a depressed high school kid and his family (including John Goodman and Julie Hagerty) around. Both stories are interesting and offbeat featuring solid acting work and good and involving storylines..They alternate between amusing at times and disturbing at others, often both, though sticking a big red box over a disturbing rape scene is more amusing than it should be... still a fine piece of filmmaking that is definitely worth the price of admission. GRADE: A-
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Marty-G16 February 2002I think the fact that this movie seems to have received reactions ranging from outright praise through to total contempt will probably save it from languishing in a sea of mediocrity.
Sadly, it is a little mediocre compared to two of his previous efforts - 'Welcome to the Dollhouse' and 'Happiness' - both of which had a few more endearing qualities.
Not that this a terrible film by any means. The first story is prepared to tackle a controversial subject, and it does it honestly and takes no prisoners. I found that to be good filmmaking, even though I found it a little laborious at times dialogue-wise.
Perhaps the second longer story is a little more punchy, but frankly it doesn't work as well. There's some great performances and some wonderfully dark humor to sustain the piece, but on the whole it seems a little flat. It has its moments - Solondz's characters are satirical figures after all, there's a few digs at other 'suburban malaise' movies, and there's a message here for sure... just quite what that message is, I'm not sure. The first story certainly had a bang to it, the second kind of fades out with a whimper.
Nevertheless, Solondz is still streets ahead of many directors out there. Controversial, at times, yes, but there are others who have been as controversial for sure. Comedic, definitely - I think perhaps Solondz could be a master of the blackest type of comedy ever.
Too bad then that 'Storytelling' doesn't quite hit it off completely. It's still compelling for sure, and it's brutally honest, it seems like it could be an 'important' movie, but it's no masterpiece. -
Spleen12 October 2002I don't know why audiences tolerate such photography: grimy, grainy, murky, under-exposed, ugly. Yes, it "matches the subject matter", in the same artless way that a shoe shop built in the shape of an enormous shoe matches ITS subject matter, but anyone can see that Solondz, like the architect, is cheating, and short of ideas.
He cheats in other ways, too. Perhaps stung by critics in the past, Solondz tries to anticipate every possible criticism one might make of his film and have it voiced by one of the characters IN the film. But he hasn't refuted his critics, merely beaten them to the punch. "Storytelling" IS contrived, unbelievable, mean-spirited, unfocused, misanthropic, racist and ugly; it DOES try to shock us simply for the sake of shocking us; Solondz DOES wallow in his own superiority to his characters; the dialogue IS flat-footed; the craftsmanship IS poor. I'll admit there's some wit and cleverness in the way Solondz weaves every single one of these complaints (and more besides) into the fabric of the film itself, but that's all the wit and cleverness there is; and this doesn't change the fact that the charges are - every single one of them except for the incomprehensible one levelled by Catherine against Vi's story in the first segment of the movie - true. And since they're true, this ought to be the end of the discussion. Yes, Todd, you HAVE made a miserably bad movie. -
hetzevendegeitje20 February 2002Storytelling has two parts. Fiction and non fiction. In fiction Tod Solondz tells us how we have to watch part two, as soon as you start writing (filming in this case) everything becomes fiction. It is not surprising that the first part (fiction) seems to be more non-fiction than part 2 (non-fiction). The first part is the very raw and painful story about a young girl who is raped by her literature teacher. The second part is the story of a documentaire filmmaker who tries to make a film about teens in suburbia. The guy is a looser, and nobody believes his film will be succesful. But the family he follows (by accident) gets involved in a serie of dramatic events, and the film becomes a hit. When the filmmaker tells his subject he is sory for what happend to him, scooby tells him not to be sorry, because his film is a hit.
Tod Solondz is a genial storyteller. He doesn't follow the normal structure of a hollywood film, a protagonist with an dramatic purpose, an antagonsist with an invert purpose, ... Like the bad guy in part one tells us, the second story is way better, this one has at least a begin, a middle and an end. In fact Non-fiction has a begin, a middle and an end, but that is not the reason why you will like the movie. The dramatic events that will happen to the family livingstone are not the motor that makes this movie turn. As in happiness, it is the way Tod Solondz shows us how we really act in life, different than how we think we are acting. watching a Tod solondz movie is like when you watch yourself in the mirror early in the morning when you aren't completely awake. there is an ocean between where i live, an where tod Solondz films his movies, but everytime again, i see myself reflected in the personages of Tod Solondz. That is wath makes his films so wonderful painful, you see people doing stupid things, but you can't blame them, because you know you should do the same thing. You love the personages you are laughing with.
Well, i love Tod Solondz, in my directors all-time ranking i'll put him on the same level as lars Von Trier, just under Ingmar Bergman, and igmar bergman, that is the top. -
ivona02120 January 2005This movie consists of two parts which are related only by the director's attempt to make inverse points. Part 1 was called "fiction" and it was about 20 minutes long. Part 2 was called "nonfiction" and it was ... well, the rest of 70 minutes.
After seeing this movie, I understand why people usually make trilogies or omnibus films with three parts: for the same reason that major musical pieces have introduction, middle, and repeat (and an optional coda)-- the need to wrap-up... It isn't that we LEARNED to like the 3-part structures; but because with 2 points, you can only draw a line; for anything 3-dimensional, you need another point, a reference. If at least the first and the second part were of equal length, the movie would have been better, although it would have still felt like 2 movies. But at least you wouldn't feel that one story is less important than other. If the director felt that the second story was so much more important, why even bother with the first story? If the point of the director was exactly to trivialize the first story, he should have arranged his movie differently, because it doesn't flow well as a movie.
In "fiction", we learn that any nonfiction written as a story becomes fiction. The young author is not being true to herself out of confusion; she thinks she needs to be cool to write, and is trying way too hard; her insecurities are crushed by those same people she's trying to use to achieve coolness.
In "nonfiction", we see a guy who wanted to be an actor when he was a teenager, succeed in making a hit documentary about a boy who wants to be an actor; the documentary feels real but funny, while the boy's life is completely artificial. But I can't make a clear parallel with "fiction". Is it that any story drawn from a fiction is a non-fiction? Or is it that in this case simply life is unreal and story is real? Or am I too rational?
Exploitation of geeks and minorities in life and in art and of course their revenge is a key lite motif in this movie, as well as in other Solondz movies, I love the cynicism on the politically incorrect side. The heart of both stories is no matter how you write a story, people find in it what horrifies them the most - be careful what you write about, since you're writing for an audience, and the audience might not get it... or it might get something else out of it.
So there is a lot of wonderful acting, good cynicism, and all in all, a good potential in the material, my vote is only a 6 because the movie doesn't flow well, the parallels (conclusions) are unclear, and the third or concluding part is
Yeah, what??? Oh. Yes. It's missing. -
Watching this movie was the biggest waste of 85 minutes in a long time. Now don't get me wrong, I love strange, quirky, quiet little films. I loved "But I'm a Cheerleader" and "Lost in Translation". I almost enjoyed "Dirty Pretty Things", and really liked "Requiem for a Dream". Not the same types of films as this, but it shows I have an open enough mind when it comes to non-mainstream films.
But this film was worthless except as a reminder that going to film school and making one good movie like "Welcome to the Dollhouse" (which I enjoyed) doesn't guarantee you can't make a piece of crap later.
I seriously kept waiting for the punchline, but all I got was a lame ending that seemed to be trying to teach me something, but wasn't sure what it wanted to say.
If the only problem were a confused message, then maybe the message could be its very lack of a message. But unless Solondz was actually trying to express how hard it is to make a decent movie with a message, then he's failed whatever it was he tried to achieve.
This movie was so bad that I actually registered on IMDb just to post this review. I'd advise against wasting your time with this unless you need a lesson in what not to do when writing a screenplay.