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The Informers (2009)
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:99
Fresh:14
Rotten:85
Average Rating:3.6/10
Consensus: As miserable and insipid as its protagonists, The Informers fails to provide anything to think about after the sheen of fake blond is gone.
Rated: R [See Full Rating] for strong sexual content, nudity, drug use, pervasive language and some disturbing images.
Genre: Dramas
Theatrical Release:Apr 24, 2009 Limited
Synopsis:
In such works as Less Than Zero and American Psycho Brett Easton Ellis brilliantly dissects contemporary American society, a culture in which too much is never enough. Now, adapting his own...
In such works as Less Than Zero and American Psycho Brett Easton Ellis brilliantly dissects contemporary American society, a culture in which too much is never enough. Now, adapting his own acclaimed novel for the screen, he returns to the Los Angeles of the early 1980's with a multi-strand narrative that deftly balances a vast array of characters who represent both the top of the heap (a Hollywood dream merchant, a dissolute rock star, an aging newscaster) and the bottom (a voyeuristic doorman, an amoral ex-con).
Connecting all his intertwining strands are the quintessential Ellis protagonists -- a group of beautiful, blonde young men and women who sleep all day and party all night, doing drugs -- and one another -- with abandon, never realizing that they are dancing on the edge of a volcano. Filmed with uncommon glamour and grit by acclaimed Australian director Gregor Jordan (Ned Kelly, Buffalo Soldiers), The Informers is an alternately blistering and chilling portrait of hedonism run amuck. --© Senator
Starring: Billy Bob Thornton, Kim Basinger, Mickey Rourke, Winona Ryder
Starring: Billy Bob Thornton, Kim Basinger, Mickey Rourke, Winona Ryder, Jon Foster, Amber Heard, Brad Renfro, Chris Isaak, Austin Nichols, Lou Taylor Pucci, Mel Raido, Rhys Ifans, Jessica Stroup
Director: Gregor Jordan
Director: Gregor Jordan
Screenwriter: Nicholas Jarecki
Studio: Senator Entertainment
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Reviews for The Informers
| Tomatometer | Critic | Review | Category |
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Rating less than zero on the sophistication scale, The Informers is thus a totally faithful adaptation of Bret Easton Ellis' novel--and an accurate look at early '80s-era Los Angeles. Full Review |
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Imagine American Psycho with less violence but more nudity, transplanted from New York to California and stripped of all self-awareness. That's The Informers. Full Review |
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...a ninety-eight-minute snooze-fest. Full Review |
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bleak, boring and bloated. Full Review |
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It has a good cast and a terrific 1980s soundtrack (Devo, Simple Minds), but it also has the superficiality of a TV soap. The Informers is not so bad that you can’t sit back and enjoy it, but nor is it good enough to go and see. Full Review |
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In structure and location the film resembles Robert Altman's Short Cuts, though it's much inferior and far less interesting. Full Review |
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While it's an occasionally unsettling piece - and comes with a big-name cast - the story never goes anywhere. Full Review |
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We may not care about these cokeheads, but only rarely does Jordan fall into knee-jerk retribution. Full Review |
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A lurid, soapy, moralistic melodrama so mucky you'll need a shower. Full Review |
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Directed by Gregor Jordan, Ellis’s aimlessly dissolute collection of stories just doesn’t hang together as a coherent whole. Full Review |
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There is a weird, almost comic absence of insight and perspective here. But it is a joke without humour and without a punchline. Full Review |
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This self-penned adaptation of his 1994 short story collection - a period piece set in 1983 Los Angeles - has supposedly been cut to ribbons, and it shows. Full Review |
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Jordan gives all this an entirely appropriate sheen and the cast play well through glazed eyes. The film will fascinate those who love to see the tormented lives of those who seem luckier than the rest of us. Full Review |
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Failing to work on so many levels, The Informers operates as a time capsule of 1983 and a time when substance was negated in favour of style. Sadly, this movie is severely lacking in both of those departments. Full Review |
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For diehard Ellis completists only.
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It's an empty shell entertaining a nasty streak of misogyny, a single note ensemble piece that's very much less than zero. Full Review |
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This film is bad - really, really bad. Full Review |
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A star-studded mess. Full Review |
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Bret Easton Ellis pens a mean tale, in all adjectival senses. His prose is artfully maleficent; he is a laid-back Severus Snape of the sex-and-drugs generation. You need a smarter directing hand, though, than Gregor Jordan’s. Full Review |
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Director Gregor Jordan seems to have gone into reverse since his 2001 Buffalo Soldiers, aiming for the LA rondeau of Altman's Short Cuts but missing all the vital ingredients – wit, humanity, charm, nuance and meaning. Full Review |
Latest News for The Informers
August 24, 2009:
RT on DVD: Exclusive Informers clip, Dungeons & Dragons, and more!
This week in home releases, we have a Bret Easton Ellis adaptation (The Informers, which we present with an exclusive clip), a classy Criterion release (The Last Days of Disco),... More...
April 24, 2009:
In the buff naughty boobs 'n buns bad parenting sex and drug addiction romp. And a weird cry for help cinema probing wasted LA youth without adult supervision in sight. Though with sly hints on where all those hallucinatory Hollywood plots arise. ![]()
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April 23, 2009:
Critics Consensus: Fighting Is Down For The Count
This week at the movies, weve got bare-knuckle bouts (Fighting, starring Channing Tatum and Terrence Howard), the wonders of nature (Earth, narrated by James Earl Jones), a... More...
January 16, 2009:
New: Unrated Trailer ![]()
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