George Hickenlooper's impressionistic biopic Factory Girl is a strange little affair, and not a wholly successful one.
Factory Girl (2007)
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:110
Fresh:20
Rotten:90
Average Rating:4.7/10
Consensus: Despite a dedicated performance by Sienna Miller, Factory Girl delves only superficially into her character, and ultimately fails to tell a coherent story.
Theatrical Release:Dec 29, 2006 Limited
Box Office: $1,566,027
Synopsis: Best known for playing muse to Andy Warhol, Edie Sedgwick was a dazzling young socialite who found herself at the apex of the pop art scene in 1960s New York. In FACTORY GIRL, Sienna Miller is the... Best known for playing muse to Andy Warhol, Edie Sedgwick was a dazzling young socialite who found herself at the apex of the pop art scene in 1960s New York. In FACTORY GIRL, Sienna Miller is the enchanting, enigmatic Edie, offering a moving characterization of the extremely troubled model/actress. The film kicks off as Edie, the daughter of a well-to-do horse rancher, leaves art school and moves to Manhattan in the mid-'60s. Her friend Chuck Wein (Jimmy Fallon) introduces her to Andy Warhol (Guy Pearce), and Andy is immediately taken with the waifish, wealthy Edie. He welcomes her into his Factory, the silver aluminum-foil covered loft where an assortment of artists and oddballs assisted him with his projects. Edie quickly falls into the hard partying, drug-addled scene, starring in Andy's experimental films and becoming his constant companion. She becomes well-known for her unique style, and the fashion industry taps her as its very first "It" girl. Edie is flying high on Andy, speed, and stardom, when she happens to meet the Bob Dylan-esque "Folksinger" (Hayden Christensen). She falls in love with him, and in doing so, falls out of Andy's favor. Her drug addiction spirals out of control, her parents cut off her cash flow, and her very bright star seems to burn out almost as quickly as it rose. As with most biopics, people are sure to quibble over the accuracy of FACTORY GIRL, and whether it offers fair portrayals of so many larger-than-life cultural icons. However, viewers are sure to agree that it makes a poignant statement about the pitfalls of fame. When Warhol tells Edie's mother that her daughter is going to be "super famous", Mrs. Sedgwick coldly responds: "And what exactly would be the value of that?" Judging from the very tragic, short life of Edie, there wasn't much value in it at all. [More]
Starring: Sienna Miller, Guy Pearce, Hayden Christensen, Jimmy Fallon
Starring: Sienna Miller, Guy Pearce, Hayden Christensen, Jimmy Fallon, Peter Bogdanovich, Beth Grant, Illeana Douglas, Mary-Kate Olsen, Mena Suvari, Tommy Perna, Samantha Maloney, Captain Mauzner, Daniel Newman, Don Novello, Tara Summers, Alexi Wasser, Colleen Camp
Director: George Hickenlooper
Director: George Hickenlooper
Screenwriter: Captain Mauzner
Producer: Aaron Richard Golub, Bob Weinstein, Harvey Weinstein
Screenwriter: Captain Mauzner
Story: Simon Monjack
Screenwriter: Aaron Richard Golub
Studio: Weinstein Company
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Reviews for Factory Girl
If not for Sienna Miller's engaging portrayal of Edie Sedgwick, Factory Girl would have little to offer.
Whatever substantial qualities it might once have possessed have been wasted, picked over by rumor and gossip, and sullied by the pawing of many hands.
Edie Sedgwick may have been too elusive and too fractured to be easily explained. Factory Girl is a good try with some great acting. But as with its subject, it's both too much and not enough.
A spectacle of bad accidents, VH1 aesthetics, sketchy (almost nonexistent) period detail, and armchair psychology.
Miller bears an uncanny resemblance to Sedgwick and gives a striking, emotionally raw performance that deserves a much more richly imagined and vividly rendered narrative backdrop than the superficial one provided by Factory Girl.
Sienna Miller gives a sexy, emotionally intense performance, but the film is so poorly conceived and structurally messy that it fails to illuminate the starlet or her times--add it to the growing list of failed indies about Warhol and entourage.
A brisk, superficial treatment of the tragic supernova life of Edie Sedgwick, Factory Girl disappoints as both biography and drama.
Miller is undeniably engaging. That’s probably not enough to save the movie from obscurity, but it should, at the very least, guarantee bigger and better things for its star.
Director George Hickenlooper captures the energy and ultra-irony of Warhol's scene, but his attempts to give the film a conventional biopic arc end up wallowing in dime-store psychology.
Though Sedgwick embodied everything that glittered and grated about the era's counterculture, director George Hickenlooper evinces no deep interest in the time and place, resulting in a film that feels removed from its source.
Sienna Miller captures much of Edie’s physical manner and some of her voice (though she’s nowhere near deep enough), but there’s nothing she can do with material that requires her to mope and pout for the bulk of her screen time.
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