Filth and Wisdom (2008)

A Disappointing Continuation

Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.

It is encouraging that the film ends so strongly.Otherwise, it wouldn't have been a particularly memorable film

Blistering performances.

If you're a Madonna fan, you'll probably be disappointed with this one. And i guess there are a lot of non-fans out there who can hardly wait to disparage the movie. Nevertheless, Ms Ciccone did a good job in her directorial debut.Filth and Wisdom is clearly not a masterpiece, yet there is nothing wrong with this movie. It is the matter of personal preferences whether you like it or not. Besides, it features Eugene Hutz, whose role confirms everything you thought about him while listening to his band Gogol Bordello.I assume the story is partially based on Madonna's experience as a struggling artist after her arrival to New York. More than that, i see it as a subtle competition with her then-husband Guy Richie, since some aesthetic similarities with RocknRolla (2008) are visible, apart from the setting. She proved him she can direct a movie, divorced him and moved on with her life...

Jesus wept. I wish that was all I could say about this blundering, self-indulgent idiot of a movie. I am still reeling from the public humiliation meted out to Eugene Hutz and Richard E Grant in this, as another commenter so aptly described it, car-crash of a movie.The script they were handed and the movie they ended up embroiled in was the equivalent of them being packed into a bright pink Lada, tweaked up to the gills on meth and viagra, naked, before being forcibly driven at top speed into an oncoming bus-load of school children, with a haul of child porn sitting conspicuously on the back seat.Madonna's unmistakable, drooling brand of pretentiousness is smeared all over this particular steaming pile of waste. Although pretentiousness might be a bit generous, as that would suggest at least an entry level modicum of intellect with which she had to work with; this is unadulterated idiocy.Watching this movie I was constantly reminded of that scene from A Fish Called Wanda where Klein, after being accused of being stupid, responds indignantly 'Do stupid people read Russian philosophy?'. Curtis' answer kept running laps around my attention span: 'Yes, they do, they just don't understand it.' This sums up the driving force behind the pretentious, empty-headed fumbles this movie attempts to make in an effort to inject it with some kind of profundity, the like of which will no doubt appeal to people who have never experimented with thinking before, but alas will leave anybody who can spell the word 'wheelbarrow' without spell check smacking their heads off the nearest hard surface with contempt for the foolishness being hurled in steaming handfuls at their functioning brains.They spray-painted Richard E Grant's hair gray for crying out loud. Not content with humiliating the man through the woeful string of drivel that was disingenuously entitled a script, they physically marked the man's person to make him look as foolish as the movie itself. There should be some kind of association for prevention of cruelty to actors set up if you ask me, Madonna would surely get the chair for what she did to Hutz and Grant. For shame...I've given this movie 1 point because I like Hutz and Grant, 1 point because I like Gogol Bordello who provide much of the music and style evident in the movie, and I would give it another point for the car-crash quality that kept me glued to it in disbelief, reveling perversely in how progressively terrible it kept getting by the second.It's that kind of morbid fascination you get if you smell a really bad fart, disgusting, repulsive, but morbidly fascinating that it can actually be that bad and actually be getting more repellent. But since there are clearly people commenting here who insist on over-rating this nonsense, waste-of-time testament to Madonna's failed education, I will withhold that third point.If you like Grant or Hutz, avoid this movie at all costs; it's like watching them ritually humiliated by an idiot in the crudest and most unfortunate of fashions for a length of time that could qualify for a human rights violation. You will weep for them. I wouldn't be surprised if Guy Richie decided to distance himself from his missus on the strength of having seen this movie alone.

Much reviled film from Madonna is playing on IFC in Theaters. Having seen the film its clear that the hatred of the film is because of who the director is rather than what the film is. Basically the story of AK and his two roommates who are trying to simply get a leg up in the world. AK, played by Eugene Hutz in what I hope is a break through performance is a deeply philosophical Russian in a rock band who gets people to pay him to abuse them. The film is narrated by him as we see what he and his friends are going through. A small scale nothing of a film, this is the sort of film that probably wouldn't have been noticed much without Madonna in the directors chair. then again there is something very much alive in the film with great characters , odd relationships and very good music that raises it up a couple of notches. Clearly Madonna knows what she's doing behind the camera. I really do like the film. Its not the be all and end all, but there is something nicely alive about the film that makes it more than the by the numbers independent films it resembles. (And yes Richard E Grant is Wonderful)

At least you could be forgiven thinking exactly that, if you look at the main player (also some sort of narrator) in Madonnas movie. Strangely (or maybe not) the movie seems to appeal more to women. I can't really explain this, but it did work better for woman. If it's only a Madonna star factor or a genuine nerve she hit with this one, is something I can't tell you ...I can tell you though, that the performances are good, in a strange kind of way. Let's say, that the movie has Madonna written all over itself. You will most likely, either hate or love the film. Off beat and although it looks like a mess, it can be a lot of fun. That is, if you let yourself into the mood of the movie. So leave the prejudices at the door or don't enter at all!