Fierce People (2006)
Average Rating: 4.7/10
Reviews Counted: 46
Fresh: 11 | Rotten: 35
Fierce People's premise of a teenager studying rich people like animals is grating and self-satisfied, and Anton Yelchin's smug performance makes the film even harder to agree with.
Average Rating: 4.4/10
Critic Reviews: 18
Fresh: 4 | Rotten: 14
Fierce People's premise of a teenager studying rich people like animals is grating and self-satisfied, and Anton Yelchin's smug performance makes the film even harder to agree with.
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Average Rating: 3.4/5
User Ratings: 8,590
Movie Info
Actor-turned-director and producer Griffin Dunne (Practical Magic, Addicted to Love) teams up with scenarist Dirk Wittenborn for the slice-of-life ensemble drama Fierce People. As summer encroaches, 16-year-old Manhattanite Finn Earl (Anton Yelchin) would love nothing more than to trek off to South America and spend the year's sun-drenched months near the equator, embarking on thrilling adventures with his estranged archaeologist father, whom he's never met. Alas, the bonds of family rein in
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Cast
-
Diane Lane
Liz Earl -
Donald Sutherland
Osborne -
Anton Yelchin
Finn Earl -
Chris Evans
Bryce Langley -
Kristen Stewart
Maya -
Elizabeth Perkins
Mrs. Langley -
Paz de la Huerta
Jilly -
Christopher Shyer
Dr. Leffler -
Blu Mankuma
Gates -
Will Lyman
Documentary Narrator -
Garry Chalk
McCallum -
Ryan McDonald
Ian -
Dexter Bell
Marcus Gates -
Robert Clarke
Herbert the Butler -
Dirk Wittenborn
Fox Blanchard -
Kaleigh Dey
Paige -
Aaron Brooks
Giacomo -
Jeff Westmoreland
Whitney -
Teach Grant
Dwayne -
Chris Shields
Cop -
Alan Giles
Dignified Old Man -
Sibel Thrasher
Creamsicle -
Eddie Rosales
Iskanani Shaman
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All Critics (49) | Top Critics (19) | Fresh (11) | Rotten (35) | DVD (5)
Director Griffin Dunne, working from Dirk Wittenborn's adaptation of his own novel, pounds away at the analogy between the inherent cruelty of the tribal rituals of the Iskanani and those of the well-heeled.
Top CriticOn balance, it's a movie worth seeing with its artistic inserts, appropriate soundtrack and organic performances.
There are lots of potent things floating around in it -- sexual initiation, drugs, fantasy-land wealth, brute violence, primitive rituals, Diane Lane and Donald Sutherland -- but the mix just sits there without producing any notable reactions.
Rarely has self-pity become so monotonous so quickly.
A buoyant coming-of-age adventure welded to an amiable wealth fantasy.
After a promising start, Griffin Dunne's film bogs down and simply turns into a predictable mish-mash of a movie that is shrill and heavy-handed and totally trite.
divine performances from Lane and Sutherland
...the movie's abrupt (and downright graceless) transformation from jaunty comedy to heavy-handed drama strips the proceedings of any momentum it may have had...
With a screechingly affected voice (think Nicholson mixed with a sick Chihuahua), Yelchin is all tiring, syllable-pulling raw nerve here; a blinding pitch that holds the film back from needed dramatic expression.
Smart-but-grim coming-of-age tale best for adults.
Watching the idle rich toy with people can only go so far, then you want more depth and this doesn't have it.
Miscalculated at every level, it's a vacant drama full of ineptly drawn characters.
Desperate, manipulative.
Dunne's messy, unpredictable, yet weirdly vital movie veers from one extreme to another without finding a consistent tone, but Sutherland never strikes a wrong note.
Fierce People is no ordinary dud. This seedy soap opera is the most outlandish, campy romp through the mud since Showgirls.
The laughs suddenly cease after a brutal rape sequence, and Dunne desperately and vainly tries to re-work the remainder of the movie as a metaphysical coming-of-age story.
There is little in life sadder to see than a film that thinks it has a great deal to say of a revelatory or profound nature, but doesn't
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Movie: ID: 385329293 Title: Fierce People Release Date: 2005-04-24 00:00:00.0 MPAA: 4 Status: 1
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What a pleasant surprise! This was a really quirky little low budget film - highly original and dealt with a topic I have never seen dealt with in a movie before (I won't say what and spoil it). You see this particular situation in movies with girls all the time, but not boys. It was very well done. This was really a unique film in that it is funny and serious and sad and surreal all at the same time. I have never seen anything else like it.
Anton Yelchin is very good here, as is Kristin in a smaller role.
Definitely one to check out if you like unusual films!