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Movies / On DVD / The People Vs. Larry Flynt
The People Vs. Larry Flynt

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The People Vs. Larry Flynt (1996)

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Reviews Counted:15

Fresh:13

Rotten:2

Average Rating:7.7/10

Runtime: 2 hrs 10 mins

Genre: Dramas

Synopsis: In THE PEOPLE VS. LARRY FLYNT, Milos Forman expertly directs the viewer's sympathy toward Larry Flynt (Woody Harrelson in a superb performance): smut peddler, misogynist, and Editor in Chief of the... In THE PEOPLE VS. LARRY FLYNT, Milos Forman expertly directs the viewer's sympathy toward Larry Flynt (Woody Harrelson in a superb performance): smut peddler, misogynist, and Editor in Chief of the infamous Hustler magazine. Born in the back woods of Appalachia, the young Flynt--in an opening scene that immediately grabs and amuses--is seen selling moonshine as a child to alcoholic hermits. Flash forward to the 1960s, and he's running a go-go club where he meets the wild (and strangely loveable) Althea Leasure (Courtney Love) who becomes his soul mate and wife. Life is not as sweet as it first seems for the porn king who finds a massive readership for his magazine (the first to show crotch shots). He soon finds himself in the middle of several Supreme Court law suits, and also as an assassin's target. While Flynt's various outrageous meetings with self-righteous Reverend Jerry Falwell (Richard Paul) and devout Christian Ruth Carter Stapleton (President Jimmy Carter's sister, played by Rudolph Giuliani's ex-wife Donna Hanover) are hilarious and smartly pointed, it is perhaps the touching, and ultimately tragic, love story between him and Althea that make him very human, and very interesting to watch. [More]

Starring: Woody Harrelson, Courtney Love, Edward Norton, Miles Chapin

Starring: Woody Harrelson, Courtney Love, Edward Norton, Miles Chapin, Vincent Schiavelli, Donna Hanover, Crispin Glover, James Cromwell, Richard Paul, Brett Harrelson, James Carville

Director: Milos Forman

Director: Milos Forman
Screenwriter: Larry Karaszewski, Scott Alexander
Producer: Oliver Stone, Janet Yang, Michael Hausman
Composer: Thomas Newman

[See More Credits]

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Release:

May 6, 2003

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Reviews for The People Vs. Larry Flynt

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1 - 16 (sorted by date)
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Click to read the article

Full Review Source: Washington Post | comment Comment
10/18/08
Washington Post
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

An exultant comedy of American repression and revolt.

Full Review Source: Entertainment Weekly | comment Comment
06/30/08
Owen Gleiberman
Owen Gleiberman
Entertainment Weekly
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A brave, spectacularly entertaining -- and unexpectedly stirring -- account of Flynt's life that asks us to regard the publisher of Hustler magazine as an invaluable champion of our First Amendment freedoms.

Full Review Source: Newsweek | comment Comment
06/30/08
David Ansen
David Ansen
Newsweek
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One of the truly bizarre careers in recent American cultural life provides the source of tart and tasty amusement in The People vs. Larry Flynt.

Full Review Source: Variety | comment Comment
06/30/08
Todd McCarthy
Todd McCarthy
Variety
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Woody Harrelson plays Flynt with energy, and Courtney Love does at least as well as his wife.

Full Review Source: Chicago Reader | comment Comment
06/30/08
Jonathan Rosenbaum
Jonathan Rosenbaum
Chicago Reader
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We're really celebrating Hollywood's freedom to create biographies of anyone, no matter how high or low on the social ladder, and still come up with the same banal characteristics, messages and conclusions.

Full Review Source: Washington Post | comment Comment
06/30/08
Desson Thomson
Desson Thomson
Washington Post
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It's a modern-day Capra film, about an unorthodox businessman who's persecuted for his originality but eventually is recognized for the lovable, rugged American individualist he truly is.

Full Review Source: San Francisco Chronicle | comment Comment
06/18/02
Mick LaSalle
Mick LaSalle
San Francisco Chronicle
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Thanks to the light humour, it's consistently engaging; yet minus that darker shading, it's never fully convincing.

Full Review Source: Globe and Mail | comment Comment
04/12/02
Rick Groen
Rick Groen
Globe and Mail
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In its excesses and extravagances, its fascination with sex, religion, celebrity, bad taste and making a whole lot of money, there is no more American story than that of combative pornographer and Hustler magazine publisher Larry Flynt.

Full Review Source: Los Angeles Times | comment Comment
02/14/01
Kenneth Turan
Kenneth Turan
Los Angeles Times
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

The People vs. Larry Flynt is ultimately a worse disappointment than an out-and-out stinker would be, because of its lively, entertaining first half.

Full Review Source: Salon.com | comment Comment
01/01/00
Charles Taylor
Charles Taylor
Salon.com
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You don't have to like the man to support his struggles and enjoy this dramatization of them.

Full Review Source: ReelViews | comment Comment
01/01/00
James Berardinelli
James Berardinelli
ReelViews
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Smart, funny, shamelessly entertaining and perfectly serious too.

Full Review Source: New York Times | comment Comment
01/01/00
Janet Maslin
Janet Maslin
New York Times
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Like 12 Angry Men, it's a civics lesson that will still be regaling film enthusiasts four decades hence.

comment Comment
01/01/00
Mike Clark
Mike Clark
USA Today
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An enormously entertaining and surprisingly touching bio-pic.

Full Review Source: Washington Post | comment Comment
01/01/00
Rita Kempley
Rita Kempley
Washington Post
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Love proves she is not a rock star pretending to act, but a true actress, and Harrelson matches her with his portrait of a man who has one thing on his mind, and never changes it.

Full Review Source: Chicago Sun-Times | comment Comment
01/01/00
Roger Ebert
Roger Ebert
Chicago Sun-Times
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Click to read the article

Full Review Source: Detroit News | comment Comment
01/01/00
Susan Stark
Susan Stark
Detroit News
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