You won't be disappointed!

Truly Dreadful Film

A lot more amusing than I thought it would be.

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

For Young Americans this film may hold some interest as a snapshot of some the issues they face. For the rest of us, this is a depressing tale of wannabeism and unfulfilled sexual angst.I wanted to like it as initially the main character had boyish/idealistic charm, yet after a short time it became clear it was lack of experience and education ( which features in this film). Unfortunately, I know Americans who have grown up in insular environments, but there are no redeeming features from this movie. 'Realism' does not a good movie make.While I realise that the American Dream is just that for many in the USA, 'gritty' dramas about the brutality of the daily existence of many in the USA does not good cinema make. Disappointed and frustrated that issues that were touched on were not expanded (prostitution) while others such as Viet Vets were made painfully overexplained. Could have been so much more.

It's all John Steinbeck's fault. He's to blame. Well, Steinbeck and the educational system that validates his works. News flash. Mice and Men is crap. There's nothing poetic about stupid people doing stupid things. Not 65 years ago, not ever. If you're writing a movie and the only substantiation you can find for a particular character making a particular choice is that he's a nitwit, it's time to choose another profession. Dumb characters making idiotic choices do not good cinema make.One would think that with 5 years of reading some of the best scripts television has to offer, Kevin Connolly would be able to tell the difference between a good and a bad script.With this film, it's quite obvious that he cannot. Take Clerks, subtract the humorous dialog, and to that add Unbreakable, but without M. Night Shyamalan's brilliant cinematography and engrossing story. To all this, add a suffocating dose of dreariness and... voilà, you've got Gardener of Eden.On the bright side, the acting was very strong by everyone involved. They did the best that they could with what they had to work with. And although it lacked the artistry of Unbreakable, it wasn't aesthetically challenged. Connolly executed a vision. You could definitely see that both cast and crew were very earnest in their attempt. I give it an A+ for effort.Unfortunately, though, a good script is the foundation from which everything is built. Without it, the whole structure crumbles.

Adam (Lukas Haas) is a burnout twenty-something living with his parents in Burnoutville, New Jersey. Kicked out of college for paying a prostitute to service him in his dorm-room, he spends his days making sandwiches at a shoddy deli and hanging out with his dead-end friends, who've worked out an elaborate barter system where no one in their circle ever has to pay for anything. Life for Adam, if not bad, is at least comfortably negligible, but things take a turn for the worst when an argument with a co-worker costs him his job. Fed up with his listless behavior, his parents kick him out of the house. Adam gets drunk at the local bar, decides his situation is intolerable, and takes off down the alley vowing to beat up the first person he sees. Lucky for Adam, the first person he sees happens to be a five-time rapist, and an assault that might otherwise have landed him in jail catapults him to the status of a hero, a role he becomes increasingly comfortable with, even after the public loses interest.You can't knock the premise on this one, nor the casting of Haas, who has the perfect face for the role, nor the stupendous performance of Giovanni Ribisi as Vic, the creepy local drug-dealer, who quickly becomes one of Adam's worst enemies, yet the film suffers from being too in your face with its convictions, always pushing its agenda at the expense of plausibility.Ever since Taxi Driver, American movies have fascinated themselves with the unlikely superhero, whose obsession with justice leads him or her into vigilantism, into working outside of the box. Within this tradition, Gardener of Eden takes a bold stance, going so far as to suggest that the heroes in our midst are not only inhibited by society, but are flat-out unwanted. I admire the effort, but I'm less impressed by the movie's lack of confidence in our capacity to grasp this concept for ourselves. The dialogue is forced, and the situations often come across feeling contrived or inauthentic, all a by-product of the movie's clumsy and excessive effort to drive its message home.

I take issue with my fellow reviewer, who complained about the movie being "in your face." While the film lacks a certain subtlety, that doesn't change the fact that a sad majority of modern moviegoers don't get what a film is trying to say unless it spells everything out to them in alphabetical order. Go subtle and everyone misses the boat, and they scratch their heads and wonder just what in the world they spent the last two hours watching. What's the value in that? Moreover, harping so hard on the film's mode of presentation implies that the theme of a movie is subordinate to its form, when in fact it should be the other way around. It's one thing to tell a good story, to make it flashy and tastefully packaged, and quite another to give it something to rest on; an idea that's perfectly timed, perfectly handled, perfectly memorable.Thematically speaking, "Gardener of Eden" is powerful in the extreme. Amidst a nation gone wild over terrorism, war, and global disaster, the movie takes a step back and reminds us that the greatest threats to society are, and always will be, domestic; that as long as drug dealers can set up operations outside of a high school, and as long as the legal structures of society condemn the individuals who try to stand in their way, the problem will remain systemic. It will never go away.In targeting the extent of this issue – this cultural illness, if you will – Gardner of Eden offers not only a scathing critique of the apathy at the root of society, but also a rousing call to action for all those inclined. It's moving, poignant, and darkly humorous, and bears many a viewing, a fresh discovery pending with every push of the "play."