What have they done?

I was *so* disappointed with this film. For starters at not much over 90 minutes, it's *far* too short. Secondly, all the characters except for Farrell's are badly drawn, and thirdly, Farrell (IMHO) is miscast as Bobby. Michael Cunningham, who wrote the screenplay, also wrote the far superior book. Even if you loved this movie, go read the book instead - it'll blow your mind.

It stars Kevin Spacey, Julianne Moore and Cate Blanchett - three of the finest actors working today - and is based on the Pulitzer Prize winning novel by Annie "Brokeback Mountain" Proulx. It couldn't possibly fail.... yet it does; this is spectacularly, embarrassingly bad.

A rich, complex, compelling and underrated book is reduced to a cheap-looking and lazily plotted horror/thriller. Disappointing.

Urgh, this is no classic - it's title is the most memorable thing. Children of the Corn is horribly derivative of better films, with its corny (sorry) music score, creepy kids and religious theme. An interesting and clever short story by Stephen King is here padded out to inordinate length. The children overact (they're children, but still...), the film seems to want to reassure rather than to horrify, and the corn imagery is just too much (corn husks pile up in abandoned homes, shops, friggin' everywhere). It's directed boringly with a simple point and shoot technique. The setup is far more interesting than the payoff, with the second half - endless scenes of walking around and screaming - more likely to piss you off than scare you, let alone entertain you. Not good. And how many sequels!?

It's A Home At the End of the World all over again - i.e., one of my most favorite books (which coincidentally also centres on, but is not limited to, a complicated love triangle) is simplified so much that not only are almost all sub-plots removed, but the main plot is so diluted that nothing much of any consequence seems to happen. Even though, in actuality, a lot does happen. Simply put, this is a mediocre adaptation of a superior novel. What elevates this slightly above A Home are some excellent performances. Peter Sarsgaard handles his ambisexual (my term) character with skill, and Jon Foster comes close to matching this, although his monotone delivery can be hard to follow. It's little wonder this failed to set the box-office on fire but it still remains a big disappointment, particularly since Michael Chabon's works lend themselves very well to adaptation (Wonder Boys is evidence of that).

Ryan Murphy has done an excellent job of taking poignant, disturbing and sometimes laugh-out-loud material and adapting it into something profoundly annoying. Augusten Burroughs' superbly written first memoir details in vignettes moments of his teenage life at the hands of massively irresponsible adults: an abusive, loveless father; a fundamentally damaged and abused mother; a paedophile; and an unhinged, unstable psychiatrist doctor. Ryan Murphy gets so much wrong it's hard to know where to begin, but for starters Augusten's father (here played by Alec Baldwin) is sympathetic when he should be feared, his mother (played with skill and dexterity by Annette Bening) is promoted to a starring role when she should be barely glimpsed, and music cues are overused to the nth degree. The manipulation Neil Bookman has over Augusten, which forms a good deal of the backbone of the memoir, is hastily got through in a few scenes and lacks any depth. Joseph Cross as Augusten does a very good job however, and his scenes with Evan Rachel Wood are amongst the most funny and successful. But too much potential is wasted and the film tries too hard to shock and be melodramatic in some areas whilst neutering the power of others. Read the book again instead.