Teringer
An Exercise In Nonsense
FuzzyTagz
If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.
Francene Odetta
It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.
GregForstner
I've seen many a weird movie in my life but this one has to be the weirdest yet. I've also seen other movies by Cronenberg such as the "The Fly" or "Crash". They deal with controversial subject matter too, and confront the viewers with disturbing images but what distinguishes these flics from "Naked Lunch" is that they have a coherent narrative.As much as I can appreciate the extraordinary effects (typewriters turning into cockroaches with a speaking pink anus), this lack of narrative makes "Naked Lunch" a decidedly tough watch that drags on for long 115 minutes. What can be gathered plot-wise: The unsuccessful writer Bill Lee works in NYC as an exterminator. His wife gets addicted to the bug powder he uses in his job and when he tries it too, his writer- libido awakens: typewriters transform into living organisms that guide the creative process. After Bill Lee accidentally kills his wife on a drug trip, he is made to flee to North Africa, to a place called the Interzone that defies reality and rationality…. Everything beyond that should not be included in the summary – it is as confusing and mind-boggling as it gets, supposedly based on the thoughts of a drug-addled brain.Some may call "Naked Lunch" the apex of creativity as the movie seems to mirror the process of writing a novel. A few elements can be discerned: the drug abuse as a starting point to get some ideas, the ideas gain authenticity and the writer plunges into an alternative reality where typewriters dictate him what to do and he becomes entangled in intrigues and homoerotic passions….The imagery is highly evocative of events and themes that coined the life of famous US author William S. Burroughs whose novel "Naked Lunch" inspired David Cronenberg to do this. Burroughs actually killed his wife in Mexico-City in a Wilhelm Tell-inspired act of madness and intoxication. Burroughs, who for a huge chunk of his lifetime was fleeing prosecution in several countries, in fact settled down in Tangier, Morocco for a couple of years to enjoy drugs and young men under the blazing African sun. He went on to live in Paris and London until he settled down in Kansas, while being most of his life busy getting on and off heroin.Now if there is a biography worth making into a movie, it's his. There are numerous facets that are utterly intriguing about this artist such as his differing sexual preferences, his lifelong battle with the law, his massive drug addiction and his attempts to become clean, his friendships with other glaring Beat Generation authors such as Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg etc… Personally, I found this movie largely unapproachable and boring. If you have a working narrative, then you can include almost as many drug bouts as you want. But this is clearly not the case here….
funeralfortheliving
Naked lunch is a visual and metaphoric masterpiece about creativity art and poetry and the depths of insanity that have given us the most astonishing and creative leaps towards human evolution. David Cronenberg unfortunately is a true auteur in a business ran like a production line assembly due to the audiences inability to enjoy anything that doesn't relate to what they have been brain washed into identifying with. William Burroughs actually stated that this film was the closest adaptation to anything ever attempted out of his writings and is the only time I have ever heard a writer say a film adaption didn't make them cringe at its gross misrepresentation. So why would the lemmings who pay 13 dollars to view Transformers 3 have a problem with this imaginative astounding work of art? It is simple, if you don't like films like this your an idiot there is no way around it. People are going to try and use excuses like free will and some things are not for everybody. But lets be real those are nice ways of saying you have chosen to be stupid. Do people in the Olympics say you can't compete because it's just not for everybody, no they understand you can't compete because your not talented or skilled enough to even stand on the side lines. But since we live in the land of the symbolically deformed and challenged it's OK to pretend being a sucker is great seeing as the kindergarten level propaganda employed is the only means of selling garbage and lies to pee brains just to keep our economy above total depression. How could a cgi crap fest with no story or character development like Dred get higher ratings than a master piece of the symbolic like Naked Lunch? Once again proving stupid people only like movies that spoon feed them all the answers in one sitting like 6th sense and Memento. Movies that have only one message and one goal knowing the morons who flood cinemas have to be slapped in the face for 1 1/2 hours to go oh I get it after the final reveal that leaves nothing to be imagined rams right down their butter lubricated throats. This is why I left film school just like in ancient rome Americans have been turned to brainless sheeple who think true art is to be demonized as the devil and replaced by product ruled by bottom line and would rather watch Happy Feet than be philosophically challenged. Congratulations you are all new age christians who burn art, feign experience, and take your queue's from a square that promises a safe distance from perception and knowing. True roman solders defending the status quo as being a mass of mindless idiots who cling to the lowest human functions of domestic drama and talking point arguments founded in identifying your self as a soulless sellout with no sense of individuality; instituted by a culture industry that promises minimum wage for your suspension of the constitutional rights given to you by people who valued truth and knowledge. So if you are incapable of relating to anything artistic or meaningful and like to get caught up in societal ignorance's and your idea of philosophizing is am I a good Ma Ma and Da Da, or think fundamental life choice is what should I wear to the prom or which homoerotic child's game is playing tonight on the idiot box, you might not even want watch this and you surly should not be leaving a review. You don't see dyslexic people leaving reviews to grammar text books or blind people reviewing books not available in braille do you? And you surly don't see moron's reviewing Einstein and Tesla claiming their works to be worthless drivel because they can't understand it so why in the world of cinema is it OK? You don't see me going to web sites that sell foreign books in other languages and saying this is just a bunch of gibberish because I don't know how to decipher it do you? Yet IMDb is flooded with reviews of piaxar-latent inhibitionists who think talking animals are visceral genius and farting cartoons are comedic bravado. Stick to your lame human dramas please and stay out of grown ups business. Have some kids or go play at the local playground you'll find subjects more in line with your intelligence level. Schopenhauer was right.
Liam Blackburn
I recommend watching this in the early morning hours when your mind is glazed with the sheen of your early morning donuts. The surreal scenes work with the jazz music. It's about communication. The typewriters keep turning into fleshy organisms that talk themselves. They look like insects and the one hybrid typewriter is like a huge insectoid alien. The same one that gives him one mission thats sitting in the bar. Plus he gets his first mission which is to kill his wife. So he kills his wife, but I totally forgot that that was his mission. It is really cool how the movie maker accomplished this because I didn't clue into that he carried out his mission until later. He didn't even know it at the time and then it gets revealed to him by another insect machine that he was programmed to not even know he was carrying out a mission. The most effective agent is a unconscious agent. The most effective agent is an unconscious agent. Think about that. Then there's the story of the guy who teaches his rear how to talk. It just becomes this unconscious agent without a brain. Just a talking machine like the typewriter who keeps giving him the missions. The only difference between an operative and non- operative is they write reports. Then they mention the new world order near the end. It's like the whole New york media is in internal operation focused on these grotesque cockroach type machines that keep spewing intoxicating stories like drugs for the mind.
braddugg
This is a film that jolted me in my sleep and made me awake, days after I saw this. Some scenes are terribly brilliant in this surreal drama.Thanks to Criterion, because of which I got to know of this film, and picked it up from their collection. David Cronenberg is one of the outrageous directors existing today. He does not seem to compromise with his vision and tries to be so true to the material that it frightens the viewers very much. I wonder if I can ever see this on a big screen, in theater somewhere. Will they dare to put it up, will there be audience in the first place? I really doubt. yet, this is one of the finest surreal dramas that was made in 1990's.A week after I watched it, I just woke up as I got a scene from this film in a dream. Damn, even today (which is a month after I watched it) as I type the review, the hairs strands are standing on forearms. Creepy it is and totally insane too. I wonder how such a subject was chosen to be presented.This is an adaptation of the novel by the same name, written by William S. Burroughs. I wonder whether those who have read it imaging the details presented in the book, also have been through nightmares as I did watching this film.Nevertheless, this is a very important aspect of art and film making and indeed it is needed. I appreciate the courage of the director and more so the producers. Obviously, this is not a film for everyone, even for the generally weird people, but it's for those who have a liking for aesthetics of weird, nightmarish, disgusting things.I cannot reveal characters or the plot points coz that would make any reader of this review miss the fun, given that he chooses to see the film. It's definitely worth a one time watch and that perhaps is enough for a lifetime as it would not be easy to erase from memory either. It has tremendous impact undoubtedly. A 4/5 for one of the terrific and even terrible surreal movies
