Lovesusti The Worst Film Ever

Actuakers One of my all time favorites.

Voxitype Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

Bea Swanson This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

MBunge This is the story of a largely mute French Canadian whose trip to see a one night stand results in her getting mixed up with a smuggling operation gone wrong. The main character risks her life to avoid momentary embarrassment, gives a pep talk to a dog, wanders around the only city in Canada where no one apparently speaks French, has an intense hatred of having her picture taken and frequently fantasizes about being on the Moon.That sounds like the makings of a comedy, right? Unfortunately, Picture Claire is a drama that is all quirky and stylized and sucky.After her apartment is set on fire by a couple of thugs, Claire Beaucage (Juliette Lewis) decides to leave Montreal and ride the bus all night to Toronto. There she hopes to hook up again with Billy Stuart (Kelly Harms), a young photographer she picked up in a Montreal bar one night. Before that happens, Claire winds up in a diner bathroom as smuggler Lily Warden (Gina Gershon) meets an accomplice in the dining area and kills him. Though she doesn't know it, Claire is blamed for the murder and then finds out Billy has a live-in girlfriend. In an amazingly stupid move, Claire ends up swinging from Billy's balcony into the apartment below…which just happens to be where Lily lives. She grabs Lily's purse and flees, unknowingly taking with her the thing Lily was smuggling. As Lily takes off after Claire, two more of Lily's accomplices take off after her and two flatfooted detectives also join in the search for Claire. A lot of lame going hither and yon ensues, resulting in an ending that goes from marginally clever to hugely idiotic in about 15 seconds.The best thing about Picture Claire is the performance of Callum Keith Rennie as one of Lily's accomplices. He plays the character with the flair of a theatrical killer and ends up exactly the way theatrical killers would in the real world.Other than that…ugh. Characters repeatedly have to do incredibly dumb things to get the story from one point to another. For all her carefully established traits, Claire is basically a non-entity played pretty much that way by Juliette Lewis. The script tries to compensate for that by giving the other characters more to do and say, but it never bothers to give the audience any reason to care about any of it. Director Bruce McDonald is also incessantly breaking up the screen into smaller boxes with different images in them. It's a mildly engaging visual technique that gets very old, very fast when it becomes clear that McDonald is only doing it because he thinks it looks cool.Picture Claire isn't an aggressively atrocious motion picture. It's just one of those lame indy flicks that aren't nearly as hip and cool as they think they are. If you've never seen those kind of movies, you might find this one just barely worth your time. However, there are a lot better films out there for you to watch.

filmguy2003 This Canadian cult film is littered with strong and reputable American and Canadian actors, and reminds me of some of Brian De Palma's work - like "Sisters" and "Blow Out." It's got that eerie noirish mystery feel that sets it apart from the standard type of Hollywood "suspense thriller." I LOVE Mickey Rourke's appearance as the sleazebag pusherman, and of course Juliette Lewis blew my mind - having loved her work on "From Dusk Till Dawn" and then almost not being able to recognize her as a French-Quebecois woman in this film. Also check this movie out for Callum Keith Rennie. His slow, sadistic manner of delivering his eccentric anecdotes and theories is really entertaining, and he and Mickey take home the billing for "top badass" in this picture. The first 20 minutes pull you in with an exciting street vibe and punchy editing reminiscent of "Run Lola Run," and your eyes stay glued to the screen. The script's dialogue also has its moments where you'll find yourself laughing out loud. This sweet little ditty is for sure worth checking out!

Shearwater After all the bad press this film received, I was curious to watch it to see if the criticism was justified. It was. I am a Callum Keith Rennie fan and watched it mostly for him, but watching 80 minutes of eye-rolling tripe that made me yell at my TV screen was not worth it for the five minutes of (great) psychopath Rennie. Most of the fancy frame-in-frame-in-frame shots were annoying and did not add anything at all to the story. Claire was ridiculously stupid and there were plot holes in this thing you could drive a truck through. And the plot, such as it was, moved at a snail's pace. I kept wondering when something was finally going to HAPPEN already. Hated this film. A waste of celluloid.

youridol This film premiered last night (Sept. 10, 2001) at the Toronto International Film Festival. Tasty and original. An exceptional performance by Lewis in the lead. Also, Mickey Rourke and Camilla Rutherford tear ass in their cameo and supporting roles, respectively.The film is quite simply gorgeous. The colors are rich and the edits are sharp. And this is not to downplay the story, which is entralling. This film is a euphoric ride which will keep you intoxicated until well after the last credits roll.BONUS: Juliette is on the soundtrack!