As unkempt and inscrutable as Joaquin Phoenix himself, I'm Still Here raises some interesting questions about its subject, as well as the nature of celebrity, but it fails to answer many of them convincingly.
As unkempt and inscrutable as Joaquin Phoenix himself, I'm Still Here raises some interesting questions about its subject, as well as the nature of celebrity, but it fails to answer many of them convincingly.
"I'm Still Here" is a portrayal of a tumultuous year in the life of actor Joaquin Phoenix. With remarkable access, the documentary follows the Oscar-nominee as he announces his retirement from a successful film career in the fall of 2008 and sets off to reinvent himself as a hip hop musician. The film is a portrait of an artist at a crossroads and explores notions of courage and creative reinvention, as well as the ramifications of a life spent in the public eye.
[A] disaster, a bratty, self-indulgent demand to be paid attention to, complete with the expectation that it will be paid attention to, because celebrity simply really is that irresistible no matter what it's doing...
I'm Still Here, despite its shrewdness and its occasional brilliance, never becomes more than the sum of its parts; its deliberately clichéd design limits its effect.
Phoenix and Affleck aren't merely concerned with teaching everyone a lesson -- that would be cheap. They offer us an opportunity to step through the looking glass and see the human being that sits behind the famous personality.
If Phoenix and Affleck are engaged in an extended performance-art piece, their message ? that America?s celebrity culture is empty and soul-crushing ? isn?t anything that hasn?t been said before.
Taken as satire, where Phoenix is the Trickster, I'm Still Here is a rare piece of provocation cinema, infiltrating the mainstream and casting an ugly light on a torrid, superficial society.
Casy Affleck is trying to claim that I'm Still Here is 'gonzo film-making'. And I'm right with him on that point. It DOES look like it was made by a muppet.
...it took something like courage to make it, and it has some ofthe same iconoclastic power of punk rock, with the same edge of sneering cynicism ballasted by a canny sense of the market.
What Affleck and Phoenix have attempted is more than a film. I'm Still Here chronicles a two-year performance-art piece that's bold and, just maybe, brilliant.
Joaquin Phoenix: Did someone just human shit on me? I think everyone is over thinking I'm Still Here. It's a mocumentary and a damn good one at that. Phoenix wasn't just acting in a movie, but acting in front of the whole world. The David Letterman interview is absolutely hilarious and Phoenix makes it so believable.
You have to give Letterman some credit for going with it though. I can't believe he was able to make it through that interview. I'm Still Here is hoax documentary about Joaquin Phoenix quitting acting and trying to pursue a rap career. Phoenix's performance is off the charts. He kills his performance and really sells the hoax that all this stuff is really going on. He embarrassed himself in front of the whole world just to make this mocumentary. How awesome is that? He faked having a complete mental breakdown. I think it's absolutely brilliant.Besides the Letterman part of the movie; the next best scene is when he gets into a verbal argument with an audience member at his show. It is simply hysterical. It really is kind of irritating how bad the response has been to this film. It's a mocumentary, but a believable one. It's awkward. It's funny. I guess Casey Affleck almost went broke trying to make this movie and had to actually stop filming it in order to be in The Killer Inside Me, so he could finish the film. Just go into it knowing it's a mocumentary and view it as a work of fiction. It's incredibly funny if viewed that way.
August 13, 2011
Melvin White
Super Reviewer
WARNING - SPOILER ALERT!This one is sort of a review of 2 halves for me. The Documentary reveals a whole different Joaquin to the one we see in films as the Actor, it's clear from the film that Phoenix's explosions and tantrums are similar to a young child's outbursts, he is ironically egotistical for a man who feels
he affects people in a positive way, hugely controlling and very much a Diva with a small entourage pandering his every need.He then faces a world where he just wants to dive in at the deep end. It's arrogant and very cringeworthy at times and shows Phoenix in a totally repulsive state.There were hints throughout the film as to it's authenticity and whilst Brother-in-law Casey Affleck Directed the film, this could very much have been watching Joaquin commit Career suicide....and so it is revealed this is a Mockumentary! Toward the end you are almost hoping that it is and of course turns everything in my review around and of course, Phoenix and others acted their roles very realistically, it was a great stunt and it was pulled off well!
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