Diagonaldi Very well executed

Cathardincu Surprisingly incoherent and boring

Dirtylogy It's funny, it's tense, it features two great performances from two actors and the director expertly creates a web of odd tension where you actually don't know what is happening for the majority of the run time.

Isbel A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

grantss Chuck Barris is a successful TV producer and presenter. Behind this façade lurks a secret - he is a CIA assassin.George Clooney's directorial debut, and it's a great one. (Also worth noting that the screenplay was written by Charlie Kaufman, of Being John Malkovich, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Adaptation fame). Excellent movie, mixing humour and drama. Plot is superb - you're kept guessing at what is real and what is not, and where it all will lead. The movie, however, is made by the acting of Sam Rockwell. His performance is mind-blowingly brilliant.

Python Hyena Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (2002): Dir: George Clooney / Cast: Sam Rockwell, Drew Barrymore, George Clooney, Julia Roberts, Rutger Hauer: Remarkable debut for director George Clooney in a film about the secret lives we hide. It regards game show host Chuck Berry brought in by a government agent that trains people to kill. Berry is best known as the creator of The Gong Show and The Dating Game. Sam Rockwell is inspired casting as Berry bringing out the frustration and paranoia. Clooney casts himself as an ominous contact. Drew Barrymore is charming as Berry's patient girlfriend who awaits outside his door for his emerged humanity but finds nothing but a hallow shell of who he was. Julia Roberts is icy and controlling delivering one of her best performances. She is given a great sequence where Berry must figure her out on the spot and out maneuver her. Rutger Hauer makes an effective appearance as a German-American Spy who befriends Chuck. Tracking Berry's life from 1940's to 1981 mixing comedy and suspense and tense drama. He will stand unshaven reflecting his complications while the woman he loves awaits outside but all contact and love is gone leaving her with no choice but to walk away from his double life. On one side he wanted to express his ideas and entertain. On the other side he pulled the trigger and looked over his shoulder ever since. Score: 10 / 10

Ryan F I always love the work of screenwriter Charlie Kaufman, to the point that I can't watch his stuff subjectively. Especially not after Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Being John Malkovich. Fortunately, I didn't know that he wrote Confessions of a Dangerous Mind until the credits, giving me the chance to watch it for what it is. I'm not kissing any butts here that I haven't already, but it didn't happen while I was watching. It had his feel to it, George Clooney did a great job, though he's not known for directing, and Sam Rockwell accurately portrayed the young, ambitious Chuck Barris. And that character journey plays out quite well.You may not expect to see a movie about a game show host. You may not expect to see one who happens to be a CIA hit man. You MAY expect that these separate the story into two different movies running on the same screen. That's not the case. The two sides of Chuck Barris' life play into each other and play with him. It's definitely a look at how a double life can destroy someone.Tonally, this movie is lying on a city street, getting peed on by Kaufman with his weird, signature vibes. Remember now, children, that in the absence of UTIs, urine is cleaner than the skin on your movie-going face. You may not believe me about how sanitary it is, but Charlie urinating on a movie is the best thing that can happen to it. Kaufman's style is this: it's weird, but it works. It may not make sense at all times, but does. Chuck Barris is one of the most interesting characters I've seen in movies recently and his change is believable, as is his relationship with Penny, that's not tacked on or overly present, but makes sense and adds only what it needs to. Often, the life-story dynamic in movies leaves us with little narrative and feels direction-less, but his life tells a story with a beginning, an ending, and a clearly defined objective and plot.This movie was well-acted and beautifully shot. It discusses what happens when someone has too much on their plate, particularly when that plate is broken in a pile of corpses and insanely good characters.

secondtake Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (2002)Like the better known George Clooney directed film, Good Night, and Good Luck, this one is about the early days of television. But the similarity ends there. Filmed in color, with a second story about the CIA, and sometimes inventive filming moving from one space to another freely, or showing fantasies that get confused with the truth. Confessions almost feels like a crazy dream. And a good one, an interesting tour of a man's off-kilter mind finding escapes in brilliant flashes of success. And the writing is by the great Charlie Kaufman, which is reason enough to get involved.The period is great (1960s and 70s), laced with the Cold War and peripheral drug use, and lots of bright colors. "The Dating Game" gets started on hippy-esquire t.v. sets and then suddenly we see a gruesome assassination, making for a wild ride. And there is a star-studded cast, with Julia Roberts prominent and Brad Pitt and Matt Damon definitely not prominent (but their two seconds making maybe the best single moment in the movie). The intrigue compounds when our leading man, a very non-fictional Chuck Barris, becomes a target himself.The lead, Sam Rockwell, has the problem for me of not creating a sympathetic character, so when things go wrong, and even when things go right, he seems like a jerk, and I couldn't quite get absorbed in it. Instead, everything just "happens." But such things! Could they be true? The movie is based on Barris's autobiography of the same name, and yet the CIA denies Barris had anything to do with them. Good stuff for a surreal, bouncy movie, anyway. No strait jacket required.