A Beautiful Life (2008)

0% of critics liked it
(12 reviews)
35% of users liked it
(118 ratings)

Two lost souls find meaning in a world of chaos in this independent drama directed by Alejandro Chomski and adapted from the play by Wendy Hammond. Desperate teen Maggie (Angela Sarafayan) is on the run from her abusive father, and young immigrant David (Jesse Garcia) is scouring the streets of L.A.… More Two lost souls find meaning in a world of chaos in this independent drama directed by Alejandro Chomski and adapted from the play by Wendy Hammond. Desperate teen Maggie (Angela Sarafayan) is on the run from her abusive father, and young immigrant David (Jesse Garcia) is scouring the streets of L.A. for his missing mother. When David and Maggie meet, their fractured lives finally start to make sense. A Beautiful Life also features Dana Delany and Debi Mazar. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

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Rating, Runtime: Unrated, 1 hr. 21 min.
Directed By: Alejandro Chomski
Written By: Deborah Calla, Wendy Hammond
Genres: Drama

In Theaters: Oct 2, 2009 Wide
On DVD: Mar 1, 2011
Studio: New Films International

Critic Reviews

Mark Jenkins, NPR
[Lau] successfully balances satire and sentimentality in the first half, but loses his bearings in the sappier second part.
Gary Goldstein, Los Angeles Times
Whatever does work here - mainly a soulful performance by Liu Ye - ultimately gets lost in the excess.
Jeannette Catsoulis, New York Times
Set among the mean streets and meaner people of downtown Los Angeles, this laughably clichéd dive into sexual masochism and hardscrabble survival replaces story with outline and characters with place holders.
Andrew Barker, Variety
It's tough to find comedy in a dead-serious, skid-row-set film about homelessness, sexual abuse, incest and the exploitation of immigrants, but the misguided A Beautiful Life manages to provide unintentional laughs by the barrel.
V.A. Musetto, New York Post
A Beautiful Life makes little attempt to be credible or original. And the acting is poor.
Walter V. Addiego, San Francisco Chronicle
A Beautiful Life is nicely shot and features some appealing actors, and that's about it for the good news. The bad news is that the characters and situations are platitudes and the story is so heavy-handed that the film is hard to sit through.
Jeff Shannon, Seattle Times
The film strains credulity by pushing its characters wildly to and fro with a shamelessly sentimental screenplay.
Michael C. Walsh, Boston Phoenix
Unfortunately, Lau throws in one too many wrinkles, squandering our empathy by forcing us through a long-winded relationship involving betrayal and illness.
Avi Offer, NYC Movie Guru
An amateurish, contrived drama that's neither captivating, insightful nor engrossing.
Don Willmott, Filmcritic.com
There's simply not enough for Maggie and David to do to sustain an entire movie.
Nick Schager, Slant Magazine
This intertwined tale of people struggling on society's fringe plays like bad community theater.