A fatally fractured, disconnected mosaic of unappealing, marginal Hollywood types haphazardly interconnecting.
1 Comment
07/09/08
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Garden Party (2008)
11
%
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:19
Fresh:2
Rotten:17
Average Rating:3.6/10
Rated: Not Rated
Genre: Dramas
Theatrical Release:Jul 11, 2008 Limited
Starring: Tierra Abbott, Christopher Allport, Lisa Arturo, Erik Bragg
Director: Jason Freeland
Reviews for Garden Party
1 - 19 (sorted by comments)
If we're meant to take these threads as a tapestry of L.A., then Freeland clearly needs to stop watching Robert Altman DVDs and go outside to see what the real world is actually like.
07/10/08
Oddly, halfway through when Freeland strains our credulity even further, the film finally feels fresh
07/11/08
There’s neither brilliance nor bite to this look at innocence lost. Next time, go Nathanael West, young man.
07/09/08
A tapestry of intersecting Hollywood lives that illuminates nothing except for writer-director Jason Freeland's obvious fondness for Short Cuts.
07/07/08
The characters aren't interesting, and the stories toggle between tawdry and ridiculous.
07/10/08
A dreary drama about a group of selfish and amoral characters whose lives intersect in Los Angeles.
07/10/08
A blandly pointless roundelay of bad acting, forgettable characters and flat drama.
07/10/08
This ensemble piece works if you know Los Angeles. After all, it's very possible for a homeless kid, pot-smoking Realtor, young model and a number of perverts to cross paths in that town.
07/15/08
A bit like Robert Altman's Short Cuts (1993), taking a look at a cross-section of Los Angeles characters, though it runs less than half the length and, conversely, half the depth.
07/10/08
Sophomore writer/director Freeland doesn't quite feel like the host of this particular "garden party," but rather like the party's Sabrina, secretly spying from the sidelines.
07/11/08
Not exactly a feelgood drama, but nonetheless an eye-opening peek at the ugly underbelly of a merciless metropolis that could care less about the fate of the least of its brethren.
07/06/08
Slow ride to nowhere.
07/13/08
Top CriticWilla Holland is the one good thing about Garden Party -- not because of her performance (which is neither good or bad) but for that nostalgia she evoked in me for young Fairuza [Balk].
07/10/08
Their lives eventually intersect, but in more or less arbitrary ways.
07/22/08
It's a production in search of a movie.
07/10/08
They're not a likeable bunch, to be sure, but the bigger problem is that there's little resonance to their stories.
07/10/08
A low-rent answer to Robert Altman’s Short Cuts.
07/11/08
Top CriticFreeland's film offers a poor man's Los Angeles opus.
08/08/08
1 - 19 (sorted by comments)
Latest News for Garden Party
July 06, 2008:
Ensemble drama dissects a day in the life of 21st rebels without a clue. 
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June 15, 2008:
Trailer & Poster review
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