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Critics Consensus: Narratively unwieldy and tonally jumbled, Maps to the Stars still has enough bite to satisfy David Cronenberg fans in need of a coolly acidic fix.
Critic Consensus: Narratively unwieldy and tonally jumbled, Maps to the Stars still has enough bite to satisfy David Cronenberg fans in need of a coolly acidic fix.
All Critics (153) | Top Critics (36) | Fresh (95) | Rotten (58)
This isn't a lousy film; it's a mediocre, ugly film about lousy people.
Hollywood has been disemboweling itself since... Sunset Boulevard and The Bad and the Beautiful, but those movies seem like Cream of Wheat compared to Cronenberg's wicked vision.
"Maps to the Stars" loses some steam near the end, and its resolution has the predetermined quality of Greek tragedy writ small. Still, I found it (as the Replacements song says) sadly beautiful.
According to Cronenberg, the script for "Maps to the Stars," by Bruce Wagner, began life more than twenty years ago, and it shows.
Although it's been dismissed in some quarters as minor Cronenberg-and criticized for "getting Hollywood wrong," or something-it's a sneakily powerful movie.
There are scads of scabrous inside-Hollywood psychodramas, but never a festering pyre on the order of David Cronenberg and Bruce Wagner's Maps to the Stars. What a hyperfocused duo of ghouls!
Strange as it may sound, this is one of the most enjoyable films of the year.
The feral, schizophrenic granddaughter of Sunset Boulevard, acknowledging the allure of Hollywood while revealing its darker side.
The script has just enough humor to elicit cringes, eyebrow raises and laughter in proper proportion, and while the events are plenty shocking, you might also be surprised at how much you enjoy watching them unfold.
It's a pretty tall order to pull off this mixture of lowbrow hijinks and astute ribbing, but Cronenberg and his game cast do so with tongue placed firmly in cheek and without diluting their stinging Tinseltown deconstruction one iota.
Maps to the Stars is a funny, gross movie, with more than a little sleaze.
[Screenwriter Bruce] Wagner's vision has been outdone by Matthew Stokoe's brutal novel "High Life" or even Dan Gilroy's tabloid saga "Nightcrawler."
A disenchanting look at the ugly side of Hollywood, the vanities and arrogance of the rich and famous. That's confusing at first, engaging in the middle part and down right gross in the end when it all comes down to death, murder, suicide and misery. Moore's performance is outstanding, the rest of the cast is great too, but when every character turns out to be a frikkin lunatic, it's hard to hold on to something. Of course that's exactly what Cronenberg intended.
Super Reviewer
Julianne Moore steals the scene as what seems like an older version of Lindsay Lohan with a Mommie Dearest complex (think of Christina, not Joan) in a cynical story full of horrible characters who are forced to face their ghosts in ways that would leave Freud aroused.
Interesting film about horrible people. Was it just me who kept thinking "Justin Bieber" when Benji was in full brat mode? I think I need to watch this again sometime. It's a lot - a lot of characters, a lot of situations. Pretty f'd up, honestly. I think I liked it. Not entirely sure as the people are just so awful. Lol. Original and ambitious movie.
Havana: I can't believe I just spent $18,000! Leave it to director David Cronenberg (The Fly, A History of Violence) to spend decades making studio films outside of Hollywood, only to finally shoot a film in Hollywood that looks to take it down. Of course, it would help if this acerbic, satirical take on Hollywood culture was a little more attuned to the world of today, but that does not mean it isn't fun. Maps to the Stars is an entertaining drama that follows a few privileged individuals, as they deal with the culture they have thrived in, with lots of setup for disastrous results. There is not a whole lot to take from the punches supposedly taken from the skewering of said culture, but there is enough in the way of the performances and odd touches that made it worthwhile in a weird, Cronenbergian kind of way. read the whole review at thecodeiszeek.com
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