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04/23/09
Finding Amanda (2008)
43
%
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:40
Fresh:17
Rotten:23
Average Rating:5.2/10
Consensus: Despite a charming turn by Matthew Broderick, Finding Amanda is too flimsily executed to succeed as a dark comedy.
Theatrical Release:Jun 27, 2008 Limited
Box Office: $31,340
Synopsis: From director Peter Tolan, creator of the hit television series Rescue Me, comes Finding Amanda, a hilarious and heartbreaking autobiographical comedy about the compulsions we can’t shake, and the... [More]
Starring: Matthew Broderick, Brittany Snow, Maura Tierney, Peter Facinelli
Director: Peter Tolan
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Reviews for Finding Amanda
Amanda can never find a tone. It opens with a scene-reading (Taylor is a writer on a hacky TV show) that produces yawns, where our lead character is the only one that laughs. It's prophetic.
06/27/08
The film's tone shifts jarringly from superficial broad comedy to something far darker. And the hooker-with-a-heart-of-gold scenario is as old as the profession itself.
06/26/08
Too much of Peter Tolan's movie takes up Taylor's self-absorption as if it's actually interesting.
06/27/08
Offers up some zinger lines in the trenches of Sin City but fails to live up to its ingenious concept.
10/18/08
False, forced, familiar and often vulgar, especially in its language and depiction of certain characters.
06/18/08
Tolan writes regularly for smart shows like Rescue Me, but his best instincts deserted him when he set his sights on the big screen for the first time.
06/27/08
... they should've renamed this one Finding the Right Tone.
05/15/08
Offers a steady supply of clever lines but suffers from the patina of self-loathing common to industry lifers and the unfortunate miscasting of straight-arrow Broderick as a depressed, cynical hack.
12/09/08
Opening with a scene from a bad sitcom that turns out to be indistinguishable from the rest of the movie, Finding Amanda limps before it’s even out of the gate.
06/26/08
This unromantic comedy is something less than a sure bet. For some reason, you get the impression that it doesn't live up to the promise of its premise.
07/04/08
Though Finding Amanda's story reaches a reasonably satisfying conclusion, the empty characters at its center make the whole thing feel like a waste.
06/29/08
Written with more bite, the premise might hold up, but as executed here by Tolan, it is a soft-hearted, haphazard mess.
06/27/08
An uncle watching his niece pick up a john should sting, not feel like we're meant to snicker at the uncomfortable look on Broderick's face.
06/26/08
Finding Amanda, the alternate title of which might well have been "I Oughta Be in Rehab," is an uneasy chronicle of addiction and denial wrapped in the rhythms of Neil Simon.
06/26/08
Top CriticFinding Amanda has some of the good and a lot of the bad aspects of a first film written and directed by the same person.
06/27/08
Top CriticA clumsy mash of Leaving Las Vegas and Hardcore.
06/22/08
This cloying comedy is barely enlivened by its talented stars who both deserve much better.
06/27/08
"Finding Amanda" is little more than what "Hardcore" might have been like if it had been rewritten by the author of a dirty joke book--an idea that, come to think of it, is actually more amusing than anything on display here.
06/26/08
Whether talking about being hooked on pot or just plain hooking, the movie despite, well, its potpourri of addictions, sticks to surfaces. Not to mention that a darker tone for this rehab redemption fare, might have been just the cure.
06/17/08
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