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The Chumscrubber (2005)

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All Critics
Top Critics

Average Rating: 4.9/10
Reviews Counted: 58
Fresh: 20 | Rotten: 38

This derivative poke at suburbia falls short of delivering a scathing indictment of upper middle-class disconnect.

Average Rating: 4.8/10
Critic Reviews: 8
Fresh: 3 | Rotten: 5

This derivative poke at suburbia falls short of delivering a scathing indictment of upper middle-class disconnect.

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Average Rating: 3.5/5
User Ratings: 38,618

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Movie Info

The death of a troubled teen throws a suburban neighborhood into chaos in this darkly satirical comedy. Dean (Jamie Bell) is a disaffected teenager living in a California suburb that's beautiful on the surface but populated by families who live emotionally vacant lives, with the parents often too wrapped up in their own problems to pay attention to their children. One day, Dean discovers his best (and only) friend, Troy (Josh Janowicz), has killed himself. While Troy's mother (Glenn Close)

R, 1 hr. 47 min.

Drama, Comedy

Directed By: Arie Posin

Written By: Zac Stanford

In Theaters: Aug 5, 2005 Wide

On DVD: Jan 10, 2006

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The Chumscrubber Trailer & Photos

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Cast

Jamie Bell
Dean Stiffle
Camilla Belle
Crystal Falls
Justin Chatwin
Billy
Glenn Close
Mrs. Johnson
Rory Culkin
Charlie Stiffle
Thomas Curtis
Charlie Bratley
Tim DeKay
Mr. Peck
William Fichtner
Dr. Bill Stiffle
Ralph Fiennes
Michael Ebbs
Richard Gleason
Parent
Caroline Goodall
Mrs. Parker
John Heard
Officer Lou Bratley
Lauren Holly
Boutique Owner
Jason Isaacs
Mr. Parker
Allison Janney
Mrs. Stiffle
Josh Janowicz
Troy
Carrie-Anne Moss
Jerri Falls
Lou Taylor Pucci
Lee
Rita Wilson
Bratley Terri
Neal McDonough
Ben Jelen

Critic Reviews for The Chumscrubber

All Critics (63) | Top Critics (9) | Fresh (23) | Rotten (38) | DVD (13)

An impassioned and occasionally mesmerizing first effort that's at once messier, more complex and more ambitious than many recent suburban dystopias.

November 10, 2005 Full Review Source: Los Angeles Times

| Comment (1)

Carina Chocano

Los Angeles Times

Top Critic

An appallingly clumsy and stupid take on drugs, kidnapping and suicide in suburbia.

September 9, 2005 Comment

Peter Travers

Rolling Stone

Top Critic

There are some very good performances and some strong writing.

August 8, 2005 Full Review Source: Ebert & Roeper

| Comment

Richard Roeper

Ebert & Roeper

Top Critic

It's neither funny nor sad, and it's filled with cheats, phony come-ons and red herrings.

August 5, 2005 Full Review Source: Orlando Sentinel

| Comments (2)

Roger Moore

Orlando Sentinel

Top Critic

Exploring suburban malaise is nothing new ... but The Chumscrubber puts a fresh coat on the arguments.

August 4, 2005 Full Review Source: Arizona Republic

| Comment

Bill Muller

Arizona Republic

Top Critic

A shallow, synthetic critique of suburbia loaded with more hand-me-down quirks than it can justify.

August 4, 2005 Full Review Source: Minneapolis Star Tribune

| Comment

Colin Covert

Minneapolis Star Tribune

Top Critic

The entire strange magical realism and stinging emotional bite of Chumscrubber's burb wasteland are as captivating and disturbing as can be.

October 5, 2007 Full Review | Comment

Prairie Miller

WBAI Web Radio

It's a surreal, offbeat comedy where the kidnappers are hopelessly inept while Bell feels hopelessly at sea.

June 8, 2007 Full Review Source: Times [UK]

| Comment

James Christopher

Times [UK]

Despite the top-drawer cast assembled for his debut feature, the director Arie Posin's account of emotional dislocation in the 'burbs is stymied by a fatally uneven tone and a growing suspicion that we've been down this road many, many times before.

June 8, 2007 Full Review Source: Independent

| Comment

Anthony Quinn

Independent

A strong cast promises great things, but The Chumscrubber loses itself on the way to its indie aspirations.

June 8, 2007 Full Review Source: Film4

| Comment

Film4

Sadly, despite Bell's eye-catching performance and Glenn Close's disturbing Stepford Wife portrayal, I found this messy movie as self-absorbed as most of its characters.

June 8, 2007 Full Review Source: Sun Online

| Comment

Johnny Vaughan

Sun Online

Ten years ago, The Chumscrubber might have seemed groundbreaking. Today, it's not just unoriginal but as dull and nondescript as a Barratt home.

June 8, 2007 Full Review Source: Daily Mirror [UK]

| Comment

Daily Mirror [UK]

It is witty and subversive, with flashes of magical realism and apocalyptic CG that both provokes and unnerves.

June 8, 2007 Full Review Source: Total Film

| Comment

Total Film

A tragic waste of acting talent, with nothing new to say. Can we please now politely close the door on middle-class repression before we get really angry?

June 8, 2007 Full Review Source: Empire Magazine

| Comment

Olly Richards

Empire Magazine

Much like its characters: decorative, entertaining and emotionally empty.

June 7, 2007 Full Review Source: Time Out

| Comment

Anna Smith

Time Out

Even though it feels derivative, this blackly comical suburban drama is loaded with terrific details. And it features yet another excellent performance from Jamie Bell.

June 2, 2007 Full Review Source: Shadows on the Wall

| Comment

Rich Cline

Shadows on the Wall

Posin aims for are out of his reach and he's left to scrabble desperately for a story to plug in the gaps.

May 26, 2007 Full Review Source: BBC

| Comment

Stella Papamichael

BBC

Such is the sordid state of affairs in that emerging genre that might be termed suburban noir, as it inches ever closer to horror and the supernatural.

April 19, 2007 Full Review | Comment

Prairie Miller

Long Island Press

An agonizingly bad movie.

March 1, 2007 Full Review Source: Film Journal International

| Comment

Shirley Sealy

Film Journal International

The complex screenplay is admirable for its plot structure, its dark humour and its storytelling tricks, but the film ends up playing like a well developed project about teen-parent alienation, while itself alienating many of us in the audience.

June 5, 2006 Full Review Source: Urban Cinefile

| Comment

Urban Cinefile Critics

Urban Cinefile

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Audience Reviews for The Chumscrubber

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A high school student is blackmailed into recovering a stash of drugs from his dead friend's house by the school bully who kidnaps an innocent boy for leverage. The plot of The Chumscrubber is basically an "indie" version of Alpha Dog, and the whole thing comes across as a patchwork of ideas stolen from American

May 24, 2007

xGary Xx

Super Reviewer

In suburbia, a teen who recently discovered the dead body of his best friend must recover the dead kid's drugs before his classmates kill a kidnapped boy.I was reminded of Alpha Dog when the victim of a drug-related kidnapping rather enjoys the experience compared to the stifled restrictions of suburbia, but there is

June 22, 2011

Jim Hunter

Super Reviewer

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