Steal This Movie (2000) User Reviews

Good biography of a great man

[itamarscomix · 7/10 · 24 May 2005]

'Steal This Movie' is a well-thought, well-written well-acted, well-made dramatization of the life of left-wing activist Abbie Hoffman, probably the most famous of the Chicago Seven. (The title is a play on the title of Hoffman's autobiography, 'Steal This Book', though it certainly doesn't have the poignancy of that title.) 'Steal This Movie' made some bold casting choices. The lead role was given to Vincent D'Onofrio: not an obvious choice, because Vincent looks very little like Abbie, which caused many die-hard history aficionados to bash the decision. However, Vincent fills the role wonderful, brilliantly, expressing all the conflicting sides of Hoffman's personality, his sense of humor, his dead seriousness, strict political consciousness, bi-polar disorder, having to live in hiding and away from his wife and son. He makes the character come alive much more than someone else could have by simply looking and talking like him. Abbie's wife Anita is played wonderfully by SNL's Janeane Garofalo, accomplished comedian but not so as a dramatic actress.

Though it doesn't have that much cinematic value by its own right, 'Steal This Movie' does a fantastic job of getting through both the spirit of the time and the greatness and difficulties of Hoffman's activities and his character - a great and fascinating person whose impact has long been overlooked. It's also a wonderful document of an important period that is practically ignored (relatively, of course). For those interested in the late 60s, in the hippie movements, Black Panthers and other left wing political movements of the time, and of course in Hoffman himself - it's invaluable, on top of being both touching and entertaining. A good watch.

Abbie Hoffman: American

[EmperorNortonII · 7/10 · 29 December 2001]

"Steal This Movie" is the biopic of Abbie Hoffman, the famed activist and self proclaimed "orphan of America." The movie paints a portrait of Abbie as a man who loved his country, only not the way the status quo would have wanted him to. Vincent D'Onofrio plays the lead with a real passion, and Janeane Garofalo also displays competent dramatic ability as Abbie's wife Anita. This movie shows America in the 1960s at its best and worst. What I found interesting was its use of grainy film for flashbacks, to take on the look of a '60s documentary. If you were alive in Abbie Hoffman's time, you either loved him or hated him. Seeing the story of his life may give you a new perspective on who he was.

Organizing activities can be harmful to your health.

[michaelRokeefe · 5/10 · 28 December 2001]

Robert Greenwald directs this brilliant biopic of '60s counter-culture rabble-rouser Abbie Hoffman(Vincent D'Onofrio)following his involvement with civil rights demonstrations in the south; his association with the infamous Chicago 7 and his disappearance underground in the '70s. Great mix of actual historic footage and well paced dialogue based on the books of Hoffman and his wife Anita. The perky Janeane Garofalo portrays Anita Hoffman and Jeanne Tripplehorn plays Hoffman's girlfriend Johanna Lawrence. Also in the cast are Kevin Pollak, Troy Garity and Kevin Corrigan. D'Onofrio is excellent in the lead role. This is the least heard account of events, but very thought provoking and interesting.

Good.

[chthon2 · 29 January 2003]

This film is about the activist years of Yippie Abbie Hoffman and the time after. People expecting to see a biopic about his activism, antics, or books will be dissapointed. The film is about Abbie Hoffman. Not about his efforts, but about him.

The editing is not that great, and the dialogue could have been better, but the scenes are entertaining even without good pacing. D'Onofrio also did his best to portray Hoffman, even though he's 9 inches taller and doesn't look like him. He seems to capture that charisma, that "mojo" that other people seem to like. He' also very good in the second half, when you can tell Abbie is pondering his life - if he's doomed to run forever, is he running from nothing, did he waste his life. He seemed very tortured.

A lot of people may be dissapointed, but this is still a good film. Such a shame it didn't get wide release.

good but dumbed down

[quayle-1 · 6/10 · 7 April 2006]

This was an overall good release but there were numerous flaws. The worst of which was the dumbing down of the characters, especially Abbie Hoffman. It made for good cinema and fit the mainstream's mental picture of Abbie, but was quite misleading. Abbie's last wife, Johanna Lawrenson, was grossly misrepresented as apolitical and little more than a bubble-headed groupie. Both were excellent organizers and people. Talking to both was inspiring. It's sad that a film from a better source misrepresented them. However, that said, the film has value for providing a visual picture of the times and occurrences of Abbie's life. Abbie was one of the most significant of the 60s cast of characters and this film contributes to keeping his legacy alive.

Better than you think (...than I expected)

[Win-5 · 7/10 · 28 September 2008]

I was prepared not to like this movie, to think that it did a superficial job. As I watched, I remained unconvinced - the lead-up to the Chicago riots, the demonstrations and riots themselves, the Chicago 8-or-7 Trial, these were nothing new, no great storytelling.

But when Abbie went underground, and Anita raised their son without him, and Abbie's life took the crazy course it took, that's when this film came alive, and when the characters turned into people. Was the film 100% accurate? I don't know. But I do know that there was life to be had, not just cardboard cutouts of the myths. I was engaged, and I was moved, and I was impressed.

Pro left-wing but good

[SalutToi · 7/10 · 7 August 2002]

I prefer when documentary-type of movies tell a story without taking sides. Unfortunately Steal This Movie is (like me) a pro-left-wing movie. It tells the biased but pretty faithful story of left-wing icon Abbie Hoffman. Nothing new under the sun but still pretty powerful. The hippie revolution was more than just sex-drug-and-rock'n-roll. 7/10.

steal this crap

[emptymask · 4/10 · 4 November 2003]

Let me start out by saying that I am a huge fan of Abbie Hoffman and have read Steal this Book and Steal this Urine Test. Also am a even bigger Jerry Rubin fan. But his movie was a discusting pile of rubbish that made a very PG version of Abbie Hoffman. The director took no chances into making Abbie Hoffman interesting in this movie. They despicted Stew Albert as a F***ing cartoon chjaractor devoid of intellegence, the man was a proffesor at Berkley for christsakes. Ok they did a horrid casting job for Anita Hoffman, did a Horrible job casting for the Jerry Rubin character. I just guess the movie doesnt fit the news flashes that I have seen of Abbie or the books that he wrote. The movie just didnt fit and upset me. Oh yeah and theat is the absolute worst voice over I have ever heard of Richard Nixon. This is one of the few movies that I have ever rented that I could not sit all the way through because, I have a passion for Abbie Hoffman and his discruntled band of Yippies and this movie was just plain badly done. And it hurt me that now when people see a movie about the yippies they will see a terrible adaptation, and not get a true sense of reality. Instead they get a hollywoodized palanthra of crap.

Biased but Should be

[abbe15 · 8/10 · 4 December 2005]

I feel compelled to comment about both the movie and the bias in the movie. As someone who studies Abbie Hoffman I thought that the movie stayed pretty true to what Hoffman wrote in his autobiography, the letters that he and Anita shared that were eventually published, and the transcripts of the court testimony of the Chicago Trial. I think that knowing the movie is based on documents written by Abbie himself makes any bias in the movie seem appropriate or at least more acceptable. Also, I would argue that it is helpful to have a portrait of Abbie that is mostly positive, considering all of the trouble the government went to in order to paint him in a bad light to the public. I think Hoffman was an extremely interesting, albeit troubled character, and I think that D'Onofrio portrayed him well.

Deeply Flawed But Absorbing

[jzappa · 7/10 · 12 October 2008]

Abbie Hoffman stimulated some of the most off the wall and entertaining postscripts of the Vietnam War era with extemporaneous performances mixing public defiance and radical street theater. Some of his turns in the air had a particular genius, as when he spread dollar bills onto the floor of the New York Stock Exchange and the traders plunged to the floor fighting over it without any concern for the situation, reflecting a precise metaphor for what they always do otherwise.

More than anyone else in contemporary American history, he was able to secure headlines and reap national interest just with the daring nerve and overconfidence of his imagination. From what I know of him, one of my favorite things he did is in the film, when he declared that he and fellow Yippie Party affiliates would levitate the Pentagon, he enticed a mammoth gathering. President Nixon and J. Edgar Hoover didn't find it funny, but that was the aim, that everyone have a joke at their expense.

The movie traces the trajectory of Hoffman, played by the curiously cast Vincent D'Onofrio, from the early 1960s, when he was a civil rights worker in the South, to the late 1970s, when he had gone underground and was an esteemed environmental campaign organizer. Down this wayward road of his, he married a woman played by loved actress and liberal Janeane Garofalo, started a family, then holed up.

His first family, under relentless FBI surveillance, one of the film's biggest shocks, was able to meet with him time and again, but in the meantime, he met and fell in love with another woman, played by Jeanne Tripplehorn, which I'm actually glad he does because Jeanne Tripplehorn is a good actress who doesn't seem to get enough work anymore. That the two women got along rather well and were able to split Hoffman denotes their liberality and that he truly was too much for any one person to live with.

That was emphatically true as it became obvious he was suffering from manic depression. His outrageous activities in the 1960s were equalled by profound despair in the 1970s, and his boundless oomph and imagination might have been nourished by a disorder that was a helping hand earlier in his life, a serious drain later. I can relate, as I have an anxiety disorder that I believe would likely turn into manic depression eventually if I did not find the right medication.

Steal This Movie is a clever title based upon Hoffman's famous Steal This Book , not a fashionable title with its publisher. It suggests a time when theft was hardly a crime, because the highest corporate echelons of capitalism leveled the playing field for the people. The movie, directed by Robert Greenwald, has an enormous amount of material to cover, and does it fairly clumsily. Information enters the screen from too many directions. Subtitles treat the material like a documentary. Spoken narration treats it as memory. Actual newsreel footage coexists with reconstructions. This clearly comes from Greenwald's partiality to documentary film-making, as he is the director of the vital piece Outfoxed: Rupert Murdoch's War On Journalism. As a feature narrative film, Steal This Movie takes a little more time to stabilize and finds its pulse, which in a sense is hardly a flaw in the manner in which it would be in another movie because I feel like Hoffman himself would have made similar films had he been a filmmaker.

Abbie Hoffman is seen wearing an American flag shirt and getting in trouble for desecrating it; the movie cuts to footage of Roy Rogers and Dale Evans yodeling while wearing their flag shirts. Hoffman insisted that the flag represented all Americans, including those opposed to the war; he resisted efforts of the Right to annex it as their exclusive ideological banner.

Vincent D'Onofrio has an interesting task, playing the role, since Hoffman seems on autopilot much of the time. He is charismatic and has an instinctive grasp of the dramatic gesture, but can be infuriating on a one-to-one level; the women in his life sometimes wonder whether he really sees and hears them, and can understand what he puts them through. Both Garofalo and Tripplehorn are valuable to the film because they supply the minimum necessary number of eyes through which we see a man who couldn't clearly see himself.

Flabby.

[junk-monkey · 2/10 · 30 July 2007]

The trouble with this film, like so many other films that fail, is the script.

The script is so unfocused it flounders around all over the place. What IS the story here? OK, it's a biopic but I think everyone will agree there is no way that an entire life can be condensed into 100 or so minutes. Some selection and editing is required but this script just didn't select or edit enough. It didn't render Hoffman's life down to one or two definable pivotal moments or themes that the audience could identify with and, through them, 'get' the bigger picture of the whole man.

The movie wanders from being a straight plodding 'troubled genius' biopic, to semi-docu/mocu-mentary (using new shots faked up to match archive footage), to sub True Life Sob Stories Movie of the Week (the whole "I'm bringing up a son who doesn't know I'm his Dad" shtick), to political conspiracy theory movie etc. etc. It just never makes its mind up what it wants to be, and the half-hearted Citizen Kane like narrative structure (reporter interviewing people from Hoffman's past) is soon abandoned which leaves the film even more unstructured and flabby than it starts out.

The movie is full of moments and incidents that contribute nothing to the story and could well have been cut to leave room to expand something more important. The whole scene in the psychiatrist's office after Vincent D'Onofrio pounds the window screaming "I'm Abbie Hoffman! I'm Abbie Hoffman! I'm Abbie Hoffman!" ("I'm acting! I'm acting! I'm acting!") could have easily been cut. All that happens is the psychiatrist says "You have bipolar disorder here's some lithium.", and the two women in his life say "We could see you weekends more often." and bang! That's it. No more mental health problems. It is such a laughably pointless tokenistic scene it could easily, and should, have been dumped before it was shot. The scene where they all get high and watch newsreel footage from Viet Nam and Hoffman phones GOD? Pointless. Tells us nothing about anything. Yet, when it comes to a pivotally important moment like the drugs bust, the film making is so hurried the situation just comes out of leftfield and doesn't make any sense to the audience. Suddenly he's dealing in heroin? Where did this come from? Why? What is going on here?

I, being a middle-aged leftie, would guess I am sitting well within the target audience for this movie but even I got fed up with the portrayal of 'The Man', 'The Pigs', 'The Fuzz' etc. as brutal, be-suited, unthinking, hippie-hating androids. It may have been like that in 60's America, I don't know, I wasn't there, but in film terms it was cheap clumsy polemic.

Having said all that Vincent D'Onofrio was convincingly charismatic as the younger Hoffman and I could watch Janeane Garofalo in anything, even reading a bus timetable, though she just wasn't right for this part.

A Vince D'Onofrio acting fest

[marialba · 8/10 · 16 November 2000]

"Steal This Movie" was not only an educational film in the sense that shed some light on the activist movement of the 1960s, but also a pleasant surprise regarding the quality of the performances in it. Vince D'Onofrio is amazing as Abbie Hoffman and his acting ability is in full display. Steal this video right away!

Greenwald is better at documentaries than fiction, but its fairly watchable

[Quinoa1984 · 6/10 · 24 May 2006]

Unlike some others who have commented on Steal This Movie on IMDb, I don't know that much about Abbie Hoffman, aside from the obvious that he was a fervent protester in the late 60's, and enough of a symbol of the anti-war and anti-Government movement to get a bit part in Forrest Gump (he's the "war in Viet-****ing-Nam" guy). So as part entertainment and part information this film does its job adequately, even as I recognized the film's flaws. It's not without its plus side- if you're a fan of Vincent D'Onofrio (and to me he has an impressive career as a character actor from Full Metal Jacket to The Cell), this is one of the better treats of his career as he lets his hair down (literally) and portrays a man on a downward spiral. What's interesting about the story of Hoffman is how he keeps on with the same spirit even as he's forced into hiding in the 70's. D'Onofrio plays the chaotic, but focused, counterculture icon with enough energy and conviction to make up for the fact that it IS a movie-version of the character. As well as this, actors like Janeane Garofalo and Donal Logue are really playing versions of these people that are convincing up to a point. But the problems in the film are more to do with the direction by Robert Greenwald; he's not as imaginative in treating the material as he thinks he MIGHT be, even as he uses numerous visuals and cutaways in some montage scenes, and adds a typical soundtrack to the proceedings. The script doesn't feel too false in later scenes showing Hoffman's mental breakdown, but it isn't as convincing as I imagine the book(s) on and by Hoffman must be. It's a very intriguing subject (and I'm already a fan of the period) that's given an adequate cinematic treatment. What's disappointing though for those who come across it will not be what's there but what isn't; this is the kind of story and character that needs an Oliver Stone kind of treatment (this is close to it, more like a knock-off). B-

A mediocre film about a marginally interesting character.

[=G= · 5/10 · 23 January 2001]

"Steal..." is a journeyman production which tells a skewed version of the Abbie Hoffman story and revisits the domestic turmoil of the Vietnam era. Though in and of itself not a great film, "Steal This Movie" may conjure some nostalgia for those who remember the Yippie days and wet the interest of those who don't. An okay drama not to be confused with historical documentary.

An interesting film

[dvanhouwelingen · 31 January 2001]

The film is an interesting look, at what appears to be an interesting man. The style of film is distracting at first - it's all a little too busy, but once you get get by that the film is an interesting ride. The performances are great - Janeane Garolfalo and Jeanne Tripplehorn play the women Abbie loved and do it very effectivly. And D'Onofio is great as Hoffman himself - fiery, passionate and very effective. If there's a problem with the movie, it's that it seems too in love with Hoffman to give a truly accuarate picture. It romaticizes his struggle and seems to think that Hoffman did nothing wrong when he sold what appears to be a lot of cocaine to an FBI agent. True, he was set up, but he still sold it. The film breezes past Hoffman's suicide and paints a man like a golden boy, a truly great man. I would have appreciated a more honest look.

Stolen Moments

[reel_emotion · 6/10 · 9 April 2003]

***Spoilers***

The director aimed to make a biopic that wasn't TV-movie like, but, in the end, it became boring and leaving the viewer wanting to know more about Abbie and Anita Hoffman.

Using a documentary like style, a reporter tries to find out why Abbie Hoffman is still in hiding. Why try to recreate a documentary when a real one would've been more interesting?

The technique of showing old film clips, etc. just didn't work, and, when the famous protests stopped and when Abbie went into hiding, the scenes with him, Johanna, Anita, and America went deep into Lifetime movie territory.

Personally, I did not know much about Abbie Hoffman and had not read much about him. I DID know that Nixon and Hoover kept files on '60s protesters and radicals--no real revelation there. But this movie leans so far too the left, I kept wondering if that capitalism and old mores were really that bad. Abbie seemed like such a jerk at times--cheating on Anita and doing drugs. His bad behavior didn't help his cause, which seemed to be the main problem of the '60s: we have a good message of love, peace, and freedom, but let's get stoned first!

This movie did leave me wanting to know more. I wanted to know more about Abbie's mental illness and suicide. I also wanted to know more about the other people of the movement like Jerry Rubin and Bobbie Seale and their conflicts with Hoffman.

Steal This Movie is not a total waste, though. You have good performances by Garofalo, D'Onofrio, Logue, and Corrigan. Some history lessons are in it. It was just another movie that had great potential, but lost it somehow. Sadly, it was often tiresome to watch at times. It's not a good thing to be checking the clock, waiting for the movie to be over.

Could there be a better actor than Vincent D'Onofrio today?

[LindaS · 7/10 · 18 September 2002]

Good overview of the adult life of Abby Hoffman and 60's revolution. It personalized it for me. It has a nice touch in that Tom Hayden's son with Jane Fonda plays his father. Vincent D'Onofrio is a terrific actor.

The movie contained one glaring history error.

[B1270 · 6/10 · 10 July 2005]

The movie was OK. I know there is poetic license, but it had Nixon winning in a Landslide then initiating the Chicago trial. It was 1972 when Nixon won in a landslide. The 1968 election was a squeaker. Nixon won by 500,000 votes and was not declared the winner until the following morning. Otherwise it seemed very accurate, they even had the Yippies with the Pig convention just before the Chicago Democratic convention.

I would have liked some insight about why the Yippies were so anti-Lyndon Johnson. Since Abbie blamed Nixon for the trial was there remorse for handing the election to Nixon?

The actors were very good, and there could have been more exposition of the early days in the East Village.

Terrible - never rings true to those who know anything about Abbie.

[Monk-17 · 1/10 · 26 June 2001]

There is nothing good to say about this movie. Read Revolution For the Hell of It or any of his other writings. Abbie was often dismissed as the clown-prince of the '60's, but he was a man of ideas who used his cleverness, his sense of humor and pop culture, and his flamboyant personality to get attention to his ideas. The media too often concentrated on the man, not the ideas, and that's the problem with this movie, too. Later in his life he did suffer from depression. But this flick is like a National Enquirer version of Abbie. He deserves better. If you don't know Abbie or his times, this movie won't help.

This film lies. I give it a zero.

Affecting, but doesn't catch the spirit (AND WHERE'S KUNTSLER?)

[alanjj · 10/10 · 22 August 2000]

I felt compelled to give this movie a "10" because I love the subject and thought the performances were swell. But it didn't really capture the mood of the 60s--there really was a community of people all across the country who felt a shared vibe, but this movie portrayed the movement that Abbie was involved in as merely a political movement, with political countermovements against it. It was more than that, and different from that. Jeanine Garofolo gives a flawless performance as Anita. Somehow, however, Vincent D'Onofrio didn't seem right as Abbie--he was just too handsome and athletic. Although Abbie was indeed handsome and athletic, it was in a very Jewish, ergo comfortable, way. There are many others who would have made a better Abbie: John Cusack, the guy from Northern Exposure, the guy from Rushmore, the guy from American Pie.

And where was William Kunstler??!!! He was a major participant, defending the Chicago 7. What happened there? Just because Lefcourt was a producer, they dropped Kuntsler. Was Lefcourt even in Chicago?

Abbie Hoffman...

[karpuz-2 · 7/10 · 12 March 2008]

Vincent D'Onfroi acting yeah... this movie doesn't tell us Nixon era, Vietnam war (just a documentary we see on white screen of vietnameses or Nixon posters,where is Mc Charthy?!) but I'm giving 7 for the actors and actresses and also nobody mentions about US's expansionism and exceptional-ism todays. This is a movie about Abbie Hoffman's struggle and I appreciate again D'Onfroi about his Hoffman acting. At least this movie gives us the idea why they struggled for justice, equality, liberty in 60s... as Abbie says Indians, Vietnameses...,I say 'far east' countries for 'bringing civilization' you know, you should... I bought this movie from the cheap section... in my language (I wish someday I find it original)

see this movie?!!

A Bitter Pill For The Left

[mrezyka · 2/10 · 23 June 2005]

This film plays like a demented episode of VH1's "Where Are They Now", or "Behind The Music". In the first half of the movie (that depict his "glory days") Abbie Hoffman is unintentionally portrayed as a sort of delusional rock star. You know the kind; the poseur lead singer, the pretty boy, who didn't write any of the music, doesn't have a clue, but gets all the glory for nothing and chicks for free. Consequently he takes his success for granted, abuses it, and ultimately destroys it along with himself. Indeed Hoffman's glory days ended abruptly when he was busted for dealing cocaine, skipped bail, and went into hiding.

The second part of the movie deals with that time in hiding. In it we see Hoffman as a pathetic crybaby endlessly blaming everyone, anyone, but himself for his downfall. Eventually the times pass him by completely; and he can never to come to grips with that. How sad. THE END. End credits roll and OH NO! We learn that Abbie Hoffman eventually committed suicide in 1989.

I'm sure this is not the image the filmmakers intended for Hoffman in making this movie. Given that Tom Hayden and Gerald Lefcourt were involved, I'm sure they intended this film as some kind of homage to the life of a man who was after all, an icon of the 60's and of the Left's anti-war movement. In this they have failed miserably. The film presents Abbie Hoffman as a mindless caricature. We are never told about what drives him. How did he arrive at his views? How did he manage to capture the imagination of a whole generation? How did he organize such a vast movement? Why at the height of his fame did he get involved in dealing cocaine? Why? Who knows, and since the filmmakers don't seem to, ultimately who cares?

Amazing movie

[TrustNo121000 · 10/10 · 9 August 2005]

I loved this movie. I thought it was a good account of part of Abbie Hoffman's life, and was historically accurate.

I would recommend that everyone see it. Abbie Hoffman is an important figure in history, and I'm glad that this movie is there to inform people of this.

The acting is done well also, even though I had a bit of trouble separating Vincent D'Onofrio's Law & Order: CI role with this one. (I sometimes have a lot of trouble with that when there are actors the I watch all the time on regular television shows) I think this is a great film that really makes you think about things, and makes you want to learn more about Abbie Hoffman.

An Abomination

[arfdawg-1 · 1/10 · 22 December 2014]

The Plot

Five years after Yippie founder Abbie Hoffman goes underground to avoid a drug-related prison sentence, he contacts a reporter to get out the story of the FBI's covert spying, harassment and inciting of violence they then blame on the Left.

The skeptical reporter interviews Anita, Hoffman's wife, a single mom on welfare in New York City; Hoffman's attorney, Gerry Lefcourt; and others.

As they talk, we see Hoffman's career in flashbacks, from early civil rights organizing through the trial of the Chicago Eight. While underground, as mental illness takes its toll, he meets Johanna Lawrenson, and an odd family develops: Abbie, Anita, their son, and Johanna.

I like Abbie. He was an interesting guy who ultimately killed himself. But he was a very compelling person to listen to.

This movie doesn't capture any of this. It's a borefest. And an atrocity to Hoffman.

Abbie was smart, articulate, funny and a great story teller. This movie is the exact opposite. Poorly directed, poorly written and the acting is horrible.

Avoid at all costs.

... No put it back!!!

[kmac1313 · 12 July 2003]

First I have to ask, Vincent, what were you going for with that accent, New Yawk, Bahston, Joisey? Sounded like a combination of all but it distracted me from your dialogue. Should have just played Vincent playing Abby.

Second, there was a review here that should be removed as the guy that wrote it is so off base I think he saw a different movie. Dude, FYI. it's Jerry Lefcourt. Look into it.

Third, Abby was kicked (really he was kicked) off the stage at Woodstock by Townsend during the Who performance. Abby was the type of guy you wanted to kick. He was all about Abby.

This film is a romanticism of the truth. Don't steal it; steal Medium Cool instead.