A sober drama set in a maximum-security prison where a middle-aged "King of the Yard" mentors an inexperienced middle-class young man.
Animal Factory (2000)
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:30
Fresh:25
Rotten:5
Average Rating:6.7/10
Runtime: 1 hr 34 mins
Genre: Dramas
Synopsis: For his second film as a director, actor Steve Buscemi (TREES LOUNGE) brings ex-convict Edward Bunker's poignant jail drama to the screen. Trapped with a long-term prison sentence in a Pennsylvania... For his second film as a director, actor Steve Buscemi (TREES LOUNGE) brings ex-convict Edward Bunker's poignant jail drama to the screen. Trapped with a long-term prison sentence in a Pennsylvania state penitentiary, 21-year-old Ron Decker (Edward Furlong) feels like a terrified fish-out-of-water. His cellmate, Jan the Actress (an impressively unrecognizable Mickey Rourke), is a cross-dresser who won't stop talking. Enter Earl Copen (Willem Dafoe), an aging convict who has been in prison so long that he runs the show. Earl takes Ron under his wing, and a strange and intense relationship develops between them. However, the relationship offers Ron the protection he needs and gives Earl the feeling that he is a father figure. After Ron's appeal is denied, ensuring his place in the penitentiary for five more years, Earl thinks up a dangerous plan of escape that will either set them free or cost them their lives in the process. Buscemi's drama successfully balances the brutality of prison life with the touching, intimate relationship between Ron and Earl, providing ANIMAL FACTORY with a sensitivity that most prison films rarely contain. The movie features an atmospheric score by actor-musician John Lurie. [More]
Starring: Edward Furlong, Willem Dafoe, Seymour Cassel, Mickey Rourke
Starring: Edward Furlong, Willem Dafoe, Seymour Cassel, Mickey Rourke, Steve Buscemi, Tom Arnold, John Heard, Danny Trejo, Mark Boone, Eddie Bunker, Chris Bauer
Director: Steve Buscemi
Director: Steve Buscemi
Screenwriter: Eddie Bunker
Producer: Julie Yorn, Elie Samaha, Steve Buscemi, Andrew Stevens
Composer: John Lurie
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Reviews for Animal Factory
What it does lack is a performance by Furlong that's the equal of Dafoe's.
The bleakness and myriad cruelties of the prison system are telegraphed with a graceful touch.
The most disturbing thing in Animal Factory is watching sleepy Edward Furlong try to act.
there are two reasons to fast-forward this offering when it's released on video: (1) Mickey Rourke's over-the-top bejeweled drag queen and (2) Tom Arnold's truly rotten performance as a baddy who has the hots for boy-buns. Roseanne's finally gotten her re
Where Darabont's drama is an overlong 142 minutes, Buscemi's is a just-right 94, and where Shawshank is predictable, Animal Factory surprises.
Here we see prison as we’ve seen it before, but with a touch of originality.
A picture about adapting one's instincts, and Mr. Buscemi's deftness works well in this context.
Perhaps at 95 minutes, the film is just too short to do justice to all these matters, and maybe one needs to read the Edward Bunker novel to fill in the blanks.
Similar to "Shawshank", "Animal Factory" is a far-less-established outing, but never the less interesting. Without the weighty support cast it mightn't have been as intriguing though, because there's a lack of depth missing from the screenplay
Prison flick from ex-con screenwriter is raw and realistic, with powerful acting.
The prison atmosphere of constant danger was fully captured, as the film had a gritty, realistic look.
We may have seen this type of Animal before, but Furlong and Dafoe's work -- and Buscemi’s honest, caring touch with these fringe-dwellers -- make it seem fresh.
"Animal Factory" shows in unflinching scenes of stabbings, race riots, drug use, attempted rape, and constantly boiling chaotic violence, how hardened criminals are formed by incessant molding inside American penitentiaries.
Gets much of its power from Willem Dafoe's potent portrayal of Copen.
One has to admire Buscemi's film not only for its achievement, which is considerable, but also for the traps it gingerly avoids, which were equally great.
It's the relationship between Willem Dafoe, as Earl, the hard-time veteran, and Edward Furlong, as Ron, the new boy he takes under his wing, that makes the film so compelling.
| Tomatometer Percentage | Movie |
|---|---|
| 15% 15% | The Ugly Truth |
| 98% 98% | Up |
| 36% 36% | G.I. Joe: The Rise of … |
| 52% 52% | The Taking of Pelham 1… |
| 45% 45% | Ice Age: Dawn of the D… |
| Tomatometer Percentage | Movie |
|---|---|
| 36% 36% | Angels & Demons |
| 68% 68% | Funny People |
| 25% 25% | Four Christmases |
| 45% 45% | Shorts |
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