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North

North (1994)

July. 22,1994
|
4.5
|
PG
| Fantasy Comedy Family

Eleven-year-old North has had it with his parents. They are always busy with their careers and don't give North the attention he needs, so he files a lawsuit against them. The judge rules that North should either find new parents or return to his own parents within two months. Thus North starts off on a journey around the world to find parents that really care about him.

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Reviews

AshUnow
1994/07/22

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

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Mandeep Tyson
1994/07/23

The acting in this movie is really good.

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Rosie Searle
1994/07/24

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

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Fleur
1994/07/25

Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

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mwcanadian-99023
1994/07/26

*May Contain Spoilers* OK, first i'll give you the cast in this movie......Elijah Wood, Bruce Willis, Reba McEntire, Dan Aykroyd, Kathy Bates, Richard Belzer, John Ritter and a young Scarlett Johansson and i likely left other big names out....now with a cast like that, you would think this movie is going to be great right!? Well sadly, you would be very wrong because this movie is bad with a capital b, a and d. the plot is about a boy (played by Wood) who wants to divorce his parents because they argue and don't really seem to notice how good Wood is. so he takes them to court and gets to choose to find parents. So with the help of Bruce Willis (he's supposed to be a guardian angel, but i'll just call him Bruce Willis), North goes to every place he can to find the perfect parents/family. i won't spoil anymore than i have about this movie.if you enjoy watching a movie that is just off the wall bad and you like seeing stereotypes then you will love this movie, but if you don't like stereotypes, then you'll want to avoid this movie as you'll likely scream at your television. Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert really hated this movie and i can't say i blame them.

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ironhorse_iv
1994/07/27

This movie directed by Rob Reiner is often regarded as one of the worst films ever made, but somehow I kinda like it. Don't get me wrong, there is a lot of things, wrong and unpleasant about this movie. The movie was often panned by many critics for its humorless jokes, adult content, racial insensitivity, ethnic stereotyping, cold-hearted characters, references to pedophilia and incomprehensible plot with an awful twist ending. I do agree with them, but I find myself, defending the movie, more, because it's told in the eyes of a trouble, often neglect, young child, North (Elijah Woods) who wish to have better parents. Without spoiling too much, I believe there seem to be more, to the film, that it's stating out. Based on the novel, North: The Tale of a 9-Year-Old Boy Who Becomes a Free Agent and Travels the World in Search of the Perfect Parents by Alan Zweibel, the movie started out with North having a panic attack, and begins to lose consciousness. Call it a depressing fan theory, but I really think, the whole movie secretly is about North's final thoughts. He either about to die, or in a coma-like dream, wondering if his parents honestly love him. It wasn't his parents in a coma, it was him. This would make sense, why his secret spot looks like self-made purgatory, and why his guardian angel (Bruce Willis) comes out, as the Easter Bunny. It's a hint to the idea of resurrection. North is stuck, there, until he can come to terms, if he wants to live with his parents or not. This would explain, why the rest of the story is told in a child-like view of the world. Everywhere that he visits, is shown like a cartoon, stereotype matter. It's ironic that North is his name, because everybody that follows a compass believes North is prime direction, but it wasn't until North step out his borders, that the film shows how little, he knows of the world, and how truly directionless, he is. There is a scene that explains, that North fails in geography that somewhat, proves this theory. Still, all these fan theories, doesn't excuse the movie for how stupid the movie is. There are scenes in the movie that are so obnoxious that it was a bit unbearable. The worst for me, has to be the musical number in Texas that I found annoying, ripping hard to rip away 1959's TV show Bonanza and 1978's show, Dallas. The whole journey of racist insensitivity was a bit rough. The most offensive, has to be the whole Eskimo 'flow' scene. At least, all the characters kinda stand out. It's so weird, seeing so many big names actors playing insulting characters. I really think actors like Kathy Bates, Reba McEntire, Dan Aykroyd, and others probably fired their agents after seeing their performance in this film. Other actors seem not to care too much for the film, and just wing it, like Bruce Willis, Richard Belzer & Alan Arkin. Then, there are those actors that play it as if they were just, doing another Seinfeld episode like Jason Alexander & Julia Louis Dreyfus. Some actors really did, put some work into their characters, such as John Ritter & Elijah Woods. It's also worth noting that the movie even has young Scarlett Johansson in a minor role. The movie took friendly jabs at film and televisions references, such as the squeaky clean 1950's family suburbia, 1954's Father Knows Best, 1957's Leave it to Beaver, and 1960's Andy Griffin Show. It downright, nearly parody them in the Nelson sequence. Other good things about the film, is how the movie was shot by cinematographer, Adam Greenberg. The opening with all the snow-globes, foreshadowing North's adventure was pretty cool to see. This movie is the film that got me, hook on collecting snow globes, so thank you for that. A lot of work, also went into the exotic sets. My favorite has to be the Eskimo village, where everything looks like it's made of ice. It remind me of the Flintstone, TV show, with its fantasy juxtaposition of modern everyday objects with that of ice world setting. That was pretty cool. The movie made great use of all the locations. It was breath-taking beautiful. One thing, I have to say, was amazing is the theme song from Marc Shaiman. It was so whimsical, but charming. Despite, the all-star cast, and a good director at the helm, North will probably be, most well-known as the film that got famous film critic Roger Ebert super-ass mad about. No doubt, about it, North will continue to receive aggressively negative reviews. Is the movie, the worst thing, out there? No. I have saw worst. Overall: It's bad, but it can be 'so bad, it's good', somewhat watchable, if you turn off your brain. Check it out, if you want to, but I don't recommended, unless you want a headache.

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ryderjacob
1994/07/28

"North" is probably the most hateful movie I've seen in an extremely long time. With a god-awful script with extremely tasteless dialogue, a stupid plot and wasting the perfectly good talent of Elijah Wood, Bruce Willis and it's director Rob Reiner (A Few Good Men, The Princess Bride, Misery, When Harry Met Sally, etc.). This movie even makes me cringe when I'm sitting her writing this reviewA boy (Elijah Wood) gets fed up with his folks and decides to divorce them and go looking for a new set of parents, like Texans (Reba McEntire and Dan Aykroyd), Hawaiians, Eskimos (Kathy Bates, Abe Vigoda) Amish, etc.Everything in this film is UNBELIEVABLY bad! This is a very, very, very, very bad movie. Just like the great Roger Ebert, I hated this movie! I think Elijah Wood is a good actor, and the director Rob Reiner has made one terrific movie after another, but this is garbage. First class garbage!!! I'm sorry, but this sucked!!!

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chucknorrisrules
1994/07/29

North is a story about a kid with a strange name played by pre-Frodo Elijah Wood who thinks mommy and daddy didn't get him enough ice cream and goes to find new ones. That's it.That's the premise of the movie. North's parents are loving but busy despite him being a child prodigy, all the other parents love him, giving us more reason to despise him (and the other kids too I would guess, and rightly so). He takes the advice of Bruce Willis in a rabbit costume, and 'divorces' his parents at the behest of a judge who looks more like a hobo disguised as a judge.North then goes around to strange parodies of parents around the world, including Oklahoma-style parents, some Hawaiians who establish a disgustingly borderline paedophilic poster of him, Eskimoes, Africans, Chinese where they worship him as a God (strange in a communist country), and a Walton-esque cliché family who seem perfect, but the spoilt little snot-face is still unhappy and abandons them, visits the Amish, the French, and due to some implausible plot line with his former friend, has to return to his parents in the right time without getting killed, only to wake up to discover it was all a dream and he returns home.Not only is this film unfunny, insulting, patronising and stupid, it breaks the one rule of writing. Making the story a dream by the end without making this clear at the start is the worst thing a writer can do. Rob Reiner's career never recovered, but considering he thought pre-teen Elijah Wood's arse on a billboard was more appropriate on screen than a cigarette, I would say he deserved it.

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