Customer Reviews

Eight Millimeter

5 star:		(74)
4 star:		(59)
3 star:		(32)
2 star:		(28)
1 star:		(37)

 

 

Okay, hold on to your hats, this is a wild one. Nicholas Cage plays as a private detective, Tom Welles. Welles is hired by an elderly woman of wealth, to determine the validity of a reel of film she has found in her late husbands safe. Welles, travels from coast to coast to find the subjects on the film.

This is a disturbing film, and delves into the sleazier side of film making. There is scenes of nudity, sado/masochism, and other sick stuff. The critics didn't like this and many other movie reviewers also tore it up. It is a sick work, but a well done one.

If you want to see a happy film buy "You've Got Mail", or some other all the world is good and kind film. Sadly, this film touches close to the mores of our society, and nobody wants to deal with that. Thousands of Children and young adults, are abducted, or run away from home, and end up on the street and into the society shown by this film. This is a brutal honest look, at something we would rather not admit to. REVIEWED 9/5/99 BY JOHN

I decided to watch 8MM on HBO late one night with an open mind. I actually glad that I did. It does have its faults. Nicholas Cage's performance as Tom Welles goes from one extreme to the other: he is both over-emotive at times and wooden at others. The pace is a little slow at times. And without knocking the actual quality of the film, it is not always easy to watch. Well neither is A Clockwork Orange, and that movie is a complete masterpiece. Then again, how can you make a film using the underworld snuff film trade as a backdrop easy to watch?

For those of you that want to write 8MM off as another Death Wish/Dirty Harry vigilante action romp, you're missing the point. If anything, 8MM is the antithesis to what those films are about. You see the possibly irreparable moral and psychological damage that Welles undergoes when he takes the life of homicidal underworld figure who has no qualms with doing away with Welles. Do you ever see a Clint Eastwood or Charles Bronson character racked with regret - even when you take into consideration the death of a truly despicable and worthless person? True enough, Welles never stoops so low as to murder an innocent law-abiding citizen, yet you see a dramatic change in his character as the film progresses - and not for the better.

Another thing that I liked about 8MM was Joaquin Phoenix's portrayal of Max California. On the surface, he is a tattooed punk rocker who works in an adult book store. But underneath, he is the moral compass of the film. You'll learn to like Max much in the same way that Welles learns to. While Max lives as a single man without much responsiblity, he respects Welles for his dedication to family life. I especially liked the scene in which Max and Welles meet for the first time - I shouldn't have to tell anyone what kind of magazine Max was hiding his Truman Capote paperback under. And let's not forget the memorable line about trying to "change the devil".

Before I sign off, I must caution you not to expect an easy lighthearted movie. Don't even expect an action flick. But if you want to check out something dark that will make you think and challenge you, you may want to check out 8MM.

Overall rating: 4.25 stars.

8mm is a breakthrough move in many aspects. The cinematography is excellent, and the tone of the entire movie remains dark and grim. The plot is very original, and although it won't appeal to many people, it must be respected that filmmakers would actually venture out this far and make a movie which aims to disturb everyone.

I am a fan of Nicolas Cage, but I was rather dissapointed with his performance. He had some good one liners and displayed his anger well, but overall he came out more like a 2 dimensional character. The real star of the film was Joaqiun Phoenix, the porn shop owner hired by Cage, who delivered a realistic and exceptional performance.

I do reccoment watching the film. It's something that needs to be experienced by everyone. Some people won't be able to sleep at night, other's will watch it without any problems, and some might even be fascinated by the idea of watching someone's death on film. All in all, this is a movie that made a huge impact on the way I define the word "disturbing", and it will too for everyone else that chooses to watch it. Reccomended.

From the man who ruined the Batman series comes another waste of time. Nicholas Cage contributes heavily to the awful stench that permeates from 8MM with his dramatic over acting and stiffness. 8MM tires its hardest to be dark, edgy, and surprising, but fails at all three. Luckily, Joel Schumacher decides to explain the entire movie to you at the end with his character "Machine" giving you the entire synopsis behind his mischief, much like a James Bond villain. If you enjoy abusing yourself with obnoxious and tiresome movies, then 8MM is definitely for you. However, if you like movies that are entertaining and have a redeeming quality, stay away from 8MM.

Granted this is certainly not a feel good kind of movie. Nor is its subject matter, which sad to say, does exist in our pristine world, but for some reason, audiences tend to find it repulsive and tend not to look at the film as an artistic endeavor. I think Joel Schumacher's direction is excellent; the one scene where Cage has broken into Machine's house and the record is stuck at the end is as frightening as anything I've seen in recent movies. He also draws excellent performances, not only in his leading cast, but in the supporting roles. Nicolas Cage, not one of my favorite actors, does an outstanding job in a role that is complex and multi-dimensional. His persistence to find who killed Maryanne Mathews is relentless and at times heart-shattering. James Gandolfini is superb and despicable in the role of the smut producer who helmed the snuff film. Peter Stomare as the heartless director Dino Velvet is likewise disgustingly realistic. Joaquin Phoenix provides a complex comic portrait who wants to join up with Cage in his quest. Anthony Heald as the Christian's lawyer is typical bar bull, and Catherine Keener, though stuffy and reserved, makes a good wife to the volatile Cage. However, to me, the most impact comes from the carefully controlled and subtly nuanced performance of Amy Morton as Maryanne's mother. Her desire to hold on to her daughter's reappearance; her loneliness in eating alone ("I'd like to eat once without the TV) and the lustful longing in her scenes with Cage are awesome. Her performance gives the movie its heart, and enables us to see why Cage acts like Charles Bronson at the end.
This could be called a "sick" movie, but we are a "sick" society. Old Mr. Christian did the snuff film because "he could", and Machine killed because he enjoyed it.
Ultimately, a disturbing but unusually good movie. Should have done better at the box office, but don't let its subject matter keep you from watching Amy Morton in an unheralded bit of brilliance.

8MM is great in that it holds your attention with suspence for the whole film, and has great emotional impact. It becomes a matter of good vs. evil, and Nicolas Cage realizes that fighting evil is the only way to stop it, while ignoring it lets it proliferate. There is much evil is our society, and the only flaw in this film is that it's example is too blatant. There are many far sutler forms of evil. Anyway the ending is an emotional climax that shouldn't be missed.

John Christian, billionaire, industrial czar, pillar of the community, respectable family man with three children, seven grandchildren, and a wife who loves him deeply, dies suddenly at the age of eighty-one. When the private safe in his study is opened, besides the expected cash, stock certificates, etc., a reel of 8 mm film is found, a film which depicts what seems to be the brutal murder of a teenage girl. Private Detective Tom Welles is hired by a disturbed Mrs Christian to find out if the film is a simulated killing, since she is a kind and caring woman who cannot bear the thought that it might be real.

So begins Joel Schumacher's 8MM, a movie which has all the ingredients of a succesful thriller: extreme brutality, multiple murders, torture, mutilation, blood, greed, sexual perversion, pornography, ****speak, and, to top it all off, the 'snuff' movie around which this film turns. But there is more. Not only are the acting, photography, settings, costumes, dialogue, pacing, and the haunting background music all superbly managed, but the movie is also that rarity among the torrent of mindless trash which Hollywood, in its extreme contempt for the modern audience, inflicts on us today: it is a movie with a deep, even profound, meaning, a meaning with cosmic implications. This meaning is one which will probably escape many viewers. It will not escape those who have carefully read Sade, a writer who has replaced Kafka as the key figure of the modern sensibility. Only Sade prepares us both to witness and understand the sort of horror that we find at the center of Schumachers brilliant metaphysical thriller, a thriller in which figures who seem to have stepped right out of Sade's 'Juliette' or '120 Days of Sodom' have been transplanted into the modern world.

Do not miss this movie.

Tom Welles, private eye, is hired by a wealthy widow, whose well-known husband passed away recently. She has found a reel of S8-film in a safe. On the film is a cruel slaughtering of a young girl, who obviously does not pretend or act: A snuff-movie. Welles takes up investigation, which leads him to the girl's mother and from there to Hollywood, into the office of a porn flick producer. Welles' rising obsession to solve the case also carries him away from his wife and new-born daughter. But when finally names are at hand, Welles suddenly finds himself on ice much thinner than he planned. The last 20 minutes of the movie are heart pounding and breathtaking. Director Joel Schumacher delivers one of the most mind haunting dramas you will ever see and gives us a story that won't be easy to forget. It's dark, moody, creepy, brilliant, and disturbing. When all the pieces finally come together, you'll be glad you went along for the ride.

All things considered, very well done film. But due to the subject matter can also be disturbing and very hard to take in. Saying its not for the squeamish would be an understatement.

Those who panned the film should ask themselves whether they are capable of reading the info on the cover of the DVD. It definetly doesn't read "nice little film for a romantic evening with your loved ones at home" 8mm shows how a P.I. gets deeper and deeper involved in a case of so called "snuff" pornography. The whole thing becomes a 'tour de force' for his own conscience, a process which is excellently developed throughout the film. It is not some "Death Wish" like avenger flick for people with extremely low IQ's. The only thing one could criticize here is the way the whole Porn industry is portrayed in the film. Black latex, leather masks, punks and freaks.Talk about the worst cliches ever here as well as Hollywood puritanism. Besides that, extremely disturbing film you will end up watching again and again.