Steven Soderbergh is a talented director, and I respect his decision to do a low-budget picture, but this movie didn't do it for me. I am a firm believer that visuals take a back seat to script, when it comes to making a good movie. You can shoot a feature-length movie on a home video camera with bad lighting, and it can still be good as long as the script is well-written and the characters are engaging. In this case, the characters aren't engaging. First off, it's harder to make an interesting film about wealthy Hollywood types. It's better to make movies about ordinary people, with whom the audience can relate. I just felt distant from these characters, and I found it hard to get wrapped up in their lives. The director throws the audience a couple of curve balls, but they come off as more pretentious than nifty.
The film's strong points lie in its concepts, but the execution is poor. I like the idea of an ensemble of A-list actors working for little money, and not having the luxury of trailers or craft service. The ensemble cast of popular film and TV actors is definitely talented, but good acting can't save bad material. One of the reasons why I was interested in seeing the movie is because I heard that all the dialogue is improvised by the actors. Well, either I heard wrong or I was lied to, because in the DVD commentary (which is very good, by the way) Soderbergh explains that only the scenes between Nicky Katt and Enrico Colantoni are heavily improvised.
If you want to see a better film that uses a similar style of filmmaking in a more successful way, watch Mike Figgis's "Timecode." That film is all improvised and shot on video in real time. In that case, the experiment was a success. I'm not a big fan of experimental films in general, because in most cases the directors are simply being self-indulgent and pass their work off as high art, simply because they're being different (or "revolutionary," as the more pretentious directors phrase it). Hell, making a whole movie that centers on an hour and 30 minutes of a fat slob watching TV is something different, but who would watch it? There's nothing wrong with being artistic in the process of making a film, but you must make the material at least somewhat interesting to the audience or it's simply cinematic masturbation. There are more self-indulgent films out there than "Full Frontal," but this just wasn't my cup of tea. If the script were good, I wouldn't even notice the poor visual quality, but since it wasn't, I was able to notice it and as a result it hampered the film.
My score: 4 (out of 10)
The film's strong points lie in its concepts, but the execution is poor. I like the idea of an ensemble of A-list actors working for little money, and not having the luxury of trailers or craft service. The ensemble cast of popular film and TV actors is definitely talented, but good acting can't save bad material. One of the reasons why I was interested in seeing the movie is because I heard that all the dialogue is improvised by the actors. Well, either I heard wrong or I was lied to, because in the DVD commentary (which is very good, by the way) Soderbergh explains that only the scenes between Nicky Katt and Enrico Colantoni are heavily improvised.
If you want to see a better film that uses a similar style of filmmaking in a more successful way, watch Mike Figgis's "Timecode." That film is all improvised and shot on video in real time. In that case, the experiment was a success. I'm not a big fan of experimental films in general, because in most cases the directors are simply being self-indulgent and pass their work off as high art, simply because they're being different (or "revolutionary," as the more pretentious directors phrase it). Hell, making a whole movie that centers on an hour and 30 minutes of a fat slob watching TV is something different, but who would watch it? There's nothing wrong with being artistic in the process of making a film, but you must make the material at least somewhat interesting to the audience or it's simply cinematic masturbation. There are more self-indulgent films out there than "Full Frontal," but this just wasn't my cup of tea. If the script were good, I wouldn't even notice the poor visual quality, but since it wasn't, I was able to notice it and as a result it hampered the film.
My score: 4 (out of 10)