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Critics Consensus: Naomi Watts and Robin Wright give it their all, but they can't quite make Adore's trashy, absurd plot believable.
Critic Consensus: Naomi Watts and Robin Wright give it their all, but they can't quite make Adore's trashy, absurd plot believable.
All Critics (74) | Top Critics (30) | Fresh (24) | Rotten (50)
With its soap-operatic performances, bonkbuster plotline and sparkling seafront setting, all 'Adore' really lacks is a cameo from Alf Stewart
Would Fontaine have made this film if the mothers looked like and were as old as Barbra Streisand and Kathy Bates and the sons weren't built like surfers? Of course not.
This isn't an Oedipus complex. This is a Preposterous complex.
Cast actresses with the skills that Naomi Watts and Robin Wright bring, give their obliviously icky story some arthouse visual lyricism, and you've got "Adore."
Adore is, as my late mother would say in describing Sidney Sheldon novels, good trash.
An exceedingly silly, sun-baked sex movie, the kind of import that adds just enough brains to its genitals to get into U.S. arthouses. (In the '70s, the mothers would have been played by Laura Antonelli and Sylvia Kristel.)
As crazy as it may seem, it's a pretty compelling journey to watch.
While Adore is based on some fairly salacious material, it tries to be an earnest drama examining the nature of friendship and lust and leaving convention behind. Unfortunately, Adore is a snore.
Christopher Hampton's pared-back screenplay and Christophe Beaucarne's ravishing lensmanship locate the action in a reality that is only a blink away from the simmering landscape of the unconscious.
This film needed serious judgment: someone to rewrite the underwritten draft of the script and to have a firmer opinion on these terribly unappealing characters
There's more depth and feeling to the admittedly provocative premise of this twisted sexual drama than you might expect...It's the excoriating payoff to the story that makes Adoration a cautionary tale with a major sting.
The worst part of Adoration was when I returned to my car and had to pay for my parking, realising that the awfulness of the movie actually took a quantifiable toll on my life: 111 minutes, and $8.50.
An insufferably dull film that is so moralistic it is embarrassing, and it lacks any sense of direction or real conflict beyond an awkward, preposterous premise, proving to be so completely clueless about its purpose that it doesn't even care to offer a proper end to the story.
Super Reviewer
Very hard movie to review, this one. Reading that it is a French production does go part of the way to explain it - definitely this style of movie and storyline is something I would expect from a French movie. Coming from Australia, it was a bit of a surprise! First of all, have to say the movie looks great with the seaside setting. Cast were also all good. While I wouldn't say I liked the story exactly, it certainly did keep me watching to see how much worse it could get. These four people really did live in their own little world. I'm not sure it could happen exactly like this in real life - I could imagine one of the boys going for an older woman, but both?! And the women being like second mums to each boy made it that step harder to believe. Some random who looks good for her age, sure - someone who probably changed your nappy at one stage? Not so much.... And then to actually BE one of these boys mums and know what your son was up to with your best friend. Sure, they struggle with that, for about 10 minutes before shrugging it off as " well, I'm doing it too". Would that seriously happen? I felt really sorry for the wives at the end and the kids, but I think it ended how it should. Beautifully filmed and paced and well worth a watch, but I don't think it will be for everyone.
A Story About Common Interests. Decent Film! ADORE could have turned out really cheesy, but the very real characters, along with a nice blend of funny and sad moods, fitting soundtrack, and pretty Australian beach scenery keep it from becoming so. Fine performances by all the major players. Though more character and conflict development may seem needed at first, we get to know everyone and everything gradually, and the fact that they are all just fairly "normal" people is pivotal. Not the greatest script, but it's nothing if not realistic. But the tone of the film, as it unfolds, seems to almost turn it into a morality tale, suggesting these women brought difficulties and grief on themselves through their indulgent behavior. They experience joy for a time, but it comes at a great cost. Most women don't take up with their best friend's son for very good reasons. Yes it's predictable and fairly generic, but honestly I'd say it's quite hard to exactly hit generic these days, and this film does it. In short, you'll like it if you like softcore romance novels. Lil (Naomi Watts) and Roz (Robin Wright) are two lifelong friends, having grown up together as neighbors in an idyllic beach town. As adults, their sons have developed a friendship as strong as that which binds their mothers. One summer, all four are confronted by simmering emotions that have been mounting between them, and each find unexpected happiness in relationships that cross the bounds of convention.
A soap opera movie!
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