Vashirdfel Simply A Masterpiece

Phonearl Good start, but then it gets ruined

CrawlerChunky In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

Zlatica One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

Lukas Quinn The title notwithstanding, this drug-laden laugh trip is more Reality Bites than Up in Smoke. David (a sweetly earnest Wilson) is a pot dealer with half-baked ambitions of becoming an artist; Serena (Witt)is his nuttily domineering love interest. Though the pair's lack of real chemistry makes the cuddly ending feel tacked on, the hysterical drug-buddy performances of Brittany Murphy, Andy Dick, and Jack Black really make this joint roll. This isn't a fast-paced broad comedy, it requires some patience. You gotta sit back, and let it envelop you. Let life slow down and enjoy the quirkiness and absurdity of the plot and characters.

Kame2000 Bongwater, although its title misleads many people to think of it as a stoner film, is a solid drama/comedy title in the vein of films like Drugstore Cowboy, an 80's film featuring Matt Dillon, or Trainspotting, except with less drug use and more sexual promiscuity - Bongwater, in short, is not a drug-centric movie. However, it is interesting because of its cast. Its obviously bare-bones script requires careful acting from its stars to give it a little extra life. Overall, maybe not enough of that extra energy is awarded to the by-the-rules directing style, but ultimately, what comes out is a solid, engaging flick, worth watching all the way through.

tedg One of the saddest experiences is encountering a movie that has almost all the right things to be successful. It has all the ingredients, perhaps all the right perspectives, but not the requisite skills to bring it to a coherence that pierces. This is one of those movies, and its apt that is about characters whose lives are in the same uncooked limbo.About the actors. The men in this all went on to greater careers, essentially doing the characters they do here. The women. Well, their careers have all been stuck, and yet they do at least as well here.One of these is Alica Witt. She was sort a special icon for a while after her remarkable one line in Lynch's otherwise disastrous "Dune." Lynch was so smitten that when Sting did Figgis' first movie, he clued him in. Figgus subsequently used her as an icon in "Liebstraum," and she appeared similarly in "Vanilla Sky," as a cinematic marker.Here she is early in her career, playing a woman on the edge. Its a typical role for an ingénue, a free spirit constrained by society and her own foibles that revolve around men. Natalie Porman made this role work in "Closer." Mia Kirshner did so in the much more complex "Exotica." Witt almost does here, and somehow the failure touches more.Here she is before unadvisedly removing that bump in her nose, trying her guts out. She is raped late in the story, and the few moments after — so far as I know — are the high point of her adult career.There's one sequence in the film that does work. It doesn't involve Witt. Luke Wilson's character is a pot dealer. He takes his new girlfriend on a collection trip to a camping commune, led by Jack Black. She has replaced Witt, though Witt found her to sponsor a show of Wilson's sophomoric art.Once they arrive everyone takes acid. The girl and Black (who is terrific) hit it off. Wilson hallucinates his mother into existence, where she serves an iridescent lemonade. This whole sequence works, and I imagine it was the first one created. There's nuance, and I prefer to believe that all that follows — even the existence of the Witt character — is part of the trip.Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 3: Has some interesting elements.

oiwiein Well I may have just indicated my past with this summary. Oh well. If you live in the NW of USA than you either know a stoner, are a stoner or are soon to be one. This movie is just as the title Bongwater says for stoners. It has some big name actors and they play the paranoid stoner role very well. This film is not an Oscar winner by any means but instead has a somewhat sad and mellow. It is a movie about lots of people that live in this part of the country. Just people that are lost and have no real future to look forward to. There only real joy is getting stoned or high on LSD in the woods. Not really a comedy more like a statement about a certain lifestyle. Problems abound and psycho women galore. Poor Luke Wilson the head stoner does a great job as your likable, lonely stoner. Jack Black plays a decent waster that would have been at all the Grateful Dead concerts. Brittany Murphy plays a rather horny psycho girl which is probably not far from the truth. Andy Dick and his gay partner have some pretty funny parts to add to the plot. It just is not a very happy movie though. Kinda like a stoners life it's just there and goes on until the cops or fire department shake things up. Crazy women and stoner dudes what a mellow life.