Word: viewer
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...better or worse, this is the scene no viewer of The Meaning of Life will ever wipe out of memory. In it, a grotesquely bloated Terry Jones waddles into a posh eatery and angrily orders at least a double portion of everything on the menu-and a bucket in order that he may conveniently throw up. This he proceeds to do endlessly, finally unwatchably, the while continuing to gorge himself until he literally bursts. It sounds horrible. It is horrible. It is also extraordinarily funny. For the headwaiter, sublimely played by John Cleese, hovers fussily over...
...christening tub at the local Baptist church; he tries to make peace with his rebellious daughter (Ellen Barkin); he visits Dixie's Tara-size mansion to say an elegy over a dead marriage; he tosses a football around with Sonny. Attuned to the movie's rhythm, the viewer will see wounds heal, friendships ripen, a bond sealed between the film makers and the audience...
...Robert Morley as the deranged businessman Bentik also keeps the movie from taking itself too seriously, camping up his malice and insulting his manservant. And the 12-year-old in all of us giggles at serial stunts and big battles from which the heroes emerge safely. The viewer's grin on leaving is partly habit--you're supposed to like movies like this. If you absolutely loved Raiders of the Lost Ark, see High Road to China. On second thought, see Raiders again. Seth A. Tucker
Most simply the viewer joins in Nick and Honey's initial reaction of wanting to leave and not intrude upon Martha and George's venomous attacks on each other. Yet as George and Martha succeed in drawing their visitors into their vitriolic waltz, the audience is also drawn...
Going to an independent American film can be like watching an event in the Special Olympics. Handicapped by budgets as low as $50,000 (when the average Hollywood movie costs more than $10 million), struggling with unknown actors and make-do shooting schedules, independent films demand the viewer's rooting interest to see them over the rough spots and through the inevitable longueurs. Indulgence has its own rewards though. When independent films clear their high hurdles, they can point to new ways of looking at both cinema and American life and demonstrate that film has other pleasures to offer...