Unlike the MPAA we do not assign
one
inscrutable rating based on age, but 3 objective ratings for SEX/NUDITY, VIOLENCE/GORE
and PROFANITY on a scale of 0 to 10, from lowest to highest,
depending on quantity and context.
A seemingly
disparate group of people living in the San Fernando Valley -- including a game show host,
a misogynistic motivational speaker, a terminally ill man, a boy genius, a police officer
and an estranged daughter -- find that their lives intersect during the course of a day.
With Jason Robards, Julianne Moore, William H. Macy, Tom Cruise, Philip Baker Hall, Philip
Seymour Hoffman, John C. Reilly, Melora Walters, Jeremy Blackman, Michael Bowen, Melinda
Dillon, April Grace, Luis Guzmán, Ricky Jay, Orlando Jones, Alfred Molina and Michael
Murphy. [3:05]
SEX/NUDITY 7 - Lots of sexual innuendo (including several references to
fellatio) and a few kisses. In an extended scene, a man teaches a misogynistic course to
men on how to manipulate women into having sex with them (this includes several graphic
sexual references). We briefly see a man thrusting on top of a bare-breasted woman and a
man thrusting into a scantily clad woman from behind (he's not wearing pants but his shirt
covers his buttocks). A man thrusts his hips as if having intercourse. We briefly see a
close-up of a woman's bare breasts and panties on a TV program; also, we see a blurry shot
of a woman's bare breasts through a glass shower door. We see a man in his underwear.
VIOLENCE/GORE 6 - A man puts a gun to his face, then we see blood splatter
on the wall behind him as he pulls the trigger; also, a man holds a gun to his cheek and
then something crashes through the ceiling and hits his hand, causing the gun to fire (we
see blood spray on his collar as he falls to the floor). In a scene shown a few times, a
boy jumps off the top of a building and is shot in the chest on his way down (some blood
is visible). Twice, we see an old film clip of a few people being hanged. A man lunges
across a table, tackles a man and punches him repeatedly. A woman throws pillows and
screams at a man, a woman slaps a man's face and screams at him, a man grabs and shakes a
boy, a man overturns a table, a man threatens to kick some dogs, a police officer
handcuffs a woman to a couch, a man throws a chair against a wall and a man suddenly leans
toward a woman menacingly and she pushes him away. Thousands of frogs fall from the sky,
bombarding a few cars (blood and brown ooze is visible on the cars), crashing through a
skylight and knocking down a man climbing up the side of a building (he hits the ground
face-first and gets a very bloody mouth and several bloody facial cuts). A man drives into
a storefront's window, a woman crashes her car into a wall and an ambulance flips on its
side (no one appears to be injured). A couple instances of threatening with guns; in one
scene a man is shot at and slips down a hill. Throughout the movie we see a dying,
emaciated man lying in bed, sometimes moaning and obviously in pain. We see a few corpses
(one is discovered in a closet and another is seen on top of a tree); also, we see a body
bag being carried out of a house. A woman sits in running car with the garage door down
for a little while before getting out (it appears that she's trying to commit suicide) and
a woman takes many pills and loses consciousness (she appears to be dead, but is later
taken to a hospital and revived). A man collapses to the floor and is later revived. We
see a man with some bloody streaks on his face. A boy urinates in his pants; also, a man
vomits and then lays his head on a toilet rim.
the review continues below...
PROFANITY 10 - At least 175 F-words, lots of anatomical references and slang
terms, lots of scatological references, lots of mild obscenities, some insults and a
racial epithet. [profanity glossary]
DISCUSSION TOPICS - Dysfunctional families, terminal illness, misogyny, quiz
shows, drug use, murder, incest, infidelity, abandonment, coincidence, suicide, making
amends.
MESSAGE - Everyone makes mistakes; some are easier to fix and forgive than
others.
A CAVEAT: We've gone through several editorial changes since we
started covering films in 1992 and some of our early standards were
not as stringent as they are now. We therefore need to revisit many
older reviews, especially those written prior to 1998 or so; please
keep this in mind if you're consulting a review from that period.
While we plan to revisit and correct older reviews our resources are
limited and it is a slow, time-consuming process.
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