Customer Reviews

Permanent Midnight [VHS]

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(14)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

People that compare movies to the original books are always going to be disappointed. That's no big mystery to anyone who's both read a single book or seen a single movie. Nuff said on that.

The movie is definitly a good one because it is very dark, and very real. Reviewers that bashed this movie are obviously clueless regarding drug use, drug users, and addiction. This movie is definitely disgusting and depressing because of its plausibility, and that's what makes it good. To have the perfect wife (Elizabeth Hurly), the perfect job, and still do anything and everything to get high demonstrates how the need overpowers someone's life. Permanent Midnight is "A Good Horrible Movie".

Movies rarely hold the same allure as the books from which they arise and that's the case here. "Permanent Midnight" portrays the harrowing experinece of a television script writer that was also a heroin addict.

Ben Stiller stars as Jerry Stahl, whose autobiography is the basis for the film. Stahl appears in a brief role as a physician treating his own (through Stiller) addiction. This is an interesting insofar as the physician -- the real life drug addict -- is very downbeat about Stiller's chance of kicking heroin for its substitute.

Elsewhere, a lot of today's A-list actors -- Owen Wilson (who had a middle initial in the credits), Maria Bello (who got great reviews in "A History of Violence"), Elizabeth Hurley, Sandra Oh, Cheryl Ladd and Jeanene Garofolo -- lend a lot of credibility to this episodic treatment. Probably most riveting, and most revolting, are Stiller's regular scenes of drug use...during breaks in meetings at work, in the bathroom during parties, while taking care of his child. In another scene, he interviews for a job with a TV producer while high. The flick concludes with sound bytes from interviews Stahl did with TV talking heads (Morey and Tom Snyder) with Stiller digitally added to the scene.

I thought Stiller transformed himself into a serious actor for the role and the good supporting cast clearly helps; still the film is too episodic to score higher than average. This biopic is mature fare and sometimes very difficult to watch, especially a scene where Stiller, in the car with an infant, mainlines heroin through a vein in his neck. It also loses points since none of the actors show any signs of age as its chronology progresses.

Still, there's often something interesting going on or something you probably haven't seen before by such name actors. There was a lot more drug use here than in "Trainspotting" where the cast was compprised 100 percent of heroin addicts. So check this out if you're up to it; you might find it rewarding.

Hello, My Name is ..., and I have never shot Heroin. I fear the needle (ignore the tattoo) and fail to relish in the sadistic reactions to the drug. However, were I to awaken to a new day of increased favor towards needles and IV drug use, the viewing of this film, and the performance handed to us by Ben Stiller, has already assured me that I shan't dive into the abyss of said narcotic. You hate to use words live "riveting" and "brilliant", although clearly at ease with his psychotic side, Stiller makes me believe that a man would attempt to crash through a window post "drug-induced-euphoria". One wishes Janeane Garofalo had a few more moments on-screen, but what she added was probably enough. I haven't read the book (an oddity for me, actually), but I fear that I shall quite soon. I was drawn into the story from the get-go, though I wonder if that was due to the shooting by Veloz, or by Stiller. Either way, this "dark comedy (from whence that title came, I am still unsure)" darkened my day, and caused a bit of thought to occur - never a bad thing.

I picked this one up recently in the "Indie-Pack" alongside "Pi". I was suprised I hadn't heard anything about it since I usually take interest in Ben Stiller. Talk about the best kept secret! He made my friends and I believe he was actually doing the drugs he was doing. If for some strange reason you can't appreciate Stiller, then here is your cure. He'll take you on a journey in this portrayal of the true events in which writer Jerry Stahl loses his job as a successful television writer, and his beautiful wife and daughter to an obscene habit of heroin. Other notable stars include, Elizabeth Hurley, Owen Wilson, Janeane Garofalo and Cheryl Ladd. Based on the autobiography of Jerry Stahl also titled, "Permanent Midnight"

I feel bad about not liking this movie... Primarily because the book is without a doubt my favourite... My problem with the movie isn't the acting... Its the lack of what was in the book.. I can understand when a book goes to movies there are liberties taken but I feel that to many liberties were taken when David Volez wrote the screenplay... It's just something seemed to be missing. Although Ben Stiller's performance was class A I don't think it was enough to save this movie... Word to the wise... next time to make it accurate especially if it''s fact based...

This little movie, "Permanent Midnight," almost makes it. I had a four-star review going for it right until the final scene where what could have been a capstone moment, simply misses the mark. When Brad Delp, God rest his soul, former lead singer of Boston belts out in "Peace of Mind","Now everybody's got advice they just keep on givin' / Doesn't mean too much to me / Lot's of people out to make believe their livin' / Can't decide who they should be," I think he must have had a movie like "Permanent Midnight" in mind. The movie really has an identity crisis going...is it a redemptive tale, is it a cautionary tale that screams drugs just aren't all that great, or is it a love story? The last scene where Jerry Stahl, aptly played by Ben Stiller, leaves one lost wishing that the movie had at least been one of those stories...not vainly attempting, and failing, to be all of them.

The movie is cool enough. The soundtrack is steady, not stellar. Does it glamorize the LA drug scene? Not really. When Stiller's character shoots up heroin again and again in bathroom stalls or wherever he can score a hit, and then sprays the bloody backwash from the needle over the bathroom ceiling the message is pretty clear...no one you know, love, care about should be coming any where near the drug scene. Heroin and any other addictive illegal substances (and some legal ones too) has this innate potential to completely and utterly destroy lives. As a drug movie, "Permanent Midnight," falls just short of telling the tale of complete and other woe. Movies that come to mind that really hit home the cautionary aspect of powerful anti-drug messaging are, "Requiem for a Dream," which has several scenes that want to make you look away from the screen; Steven Soderbergh's excellent social and political commentary on America's drug war and drug culture, "Traffic," and lastly but not leastly the movie with Nicolas Cage and Elizabeth Shue in Las Vegas where Cage ends up drinking himself right to death. Those films work. Those films are clear in their message, powerful in their story. "Permanent Midnight," starts to work on several levels but ultimately falls short in them all.

Ben Stiller turns in a very engaging performance as the Jewish writer, brilliant in his writing, but with a habit the size of "Utah." When I first read that on the jacket descriptor..."the size of Utah," I thought it might be one of those Mormon-themed flicks that seem to be so popular of the last 2-3 years...but alas, "Permanent Midnight," has really nothing to do with Mormons and everything to do with drugs and love. Elizabeth Hurley is well Elizabeth Hurley. Maria Bello is one of the finest actresses out there continuing to score in powerful roles in minor films so her career flies under the radar but she seems to pick and choose roles that work for her. If the movie were a redemptive love story where Bello's ex-junky character creates some true catharsis for Stahl I would have been right there. But as it is...I say look somewhere else film buffs for your love story, drug story, and ultra cool hip story. "Permanent Midnight," tries to be all these things in doses but in the end leaves you searching for blue veins...not with needles mind you but to find a pulse. ...mmw

Admittedly I'm guessing here, but it would seem that the lurid fascination of drug-themed films has diminished considerably in recent years. Or if I can only speak for myself, I guess I can say that their fascination for me has dwindled. When PERMANENT MIDNIGHT came out (to mixed reviews) in 1998, I made a mental note that, while I probably wouldn't want to pay theater prices to see the movie, I'd make a point to catch it when it came out on video.

Well, it's taken me over five years to get around to finally seeing it. Whether it was those mixed reviews or the fact that films about substance abuse have lost their ability to shock--or for that matter, to illuminate--I can't say. But this is one case where the (majority of the) critics had pretty much gotten it right. The movie IS worth seeing--mainly for the acting and for a few startlingly effective scenes--but it's probably not a must-see and certainly not a "must own" for most viewers.

As a supposed "breakthrough" role for Ben Stiller, the results are also kind of mixed. Yes, he did pull off this demanding role, impressively so; and no, he hasn't done all that much dramatically since. He's been in some very good films (ROYAL TENENBAUMS,especially) but hasn't had the chance to stretch significantly since PERMANENT MIDNIGHT. That's a shame, but that's also show biz. He keeps working, at least.

The rest of the cast is also impressive. Elizabeth Hurley also gets a chance to prove her acting ability for once, and Maria Bello who perhaps is still best known for her years on ER, is pretty impressive in an underwritten role. (She's essentially a framing device with a heart of gold.) Owen Wilson is always worth watching. (Am I the only one who thinks he looks like a young, blond Dennis Hopper? If anyone ever wanted to do a father-son junkie movie, they'd make for perfect casting.) Janeane Garofalo and Cheryl Ladd make effective cameo appearances. And there's even a pre-GLADIATOR Connie Nielsen on board here as a rich German junkie who seems to revel in "making love" to a Jew.

It's all a little disjointed, which given the story's source is a recovering junkie, makes a certain dramatic sense. Subplots--some kind of intriguing--are introduced, only to remain undeveloped. (I was curious, for instance, as to just how and when that marriage of convenience to Liz Hurley's character developed into a love match.) That kind of sketchiness also makes a certain kind of druggy sense.

I guess if you want the details, you need to check out the Jerry Stahl memoir on which the film is based. That is of course one measure by which we can evaluate any film from an unfamiliar literary source (and I must confess that I had never heard of the book before--leastwise not that I recall). If the film makes the viewer want to read the book, then it's more than done its job.

PERMANENT MIDNIGHT isn't a bad film. On the other hand, it did not make me want to read the book.

In PERMANENT MMIDNIGHT, director David Veloz smooths out the hard edges from Jerry Stahl's riveting autobiography of the same name. Obviously he was going to try for some casting surprises, so a gang of comedians are brought in and asked to play serious parts, and if they're note funny comics, they're supermodels trying to act. The spectacle of all these people trying to "act seriously" pushes the movie over the edge into spectacle; but that's better than your average movie which doesn't offer any spectacle at all.

Maria Bello tries to prove there's more to her than drop-dead gorgeousness on the Cybill Shepherd line. Verdict? Not in just yet. In subsequent movies Ms. Bello has shown that she's competent, and in one or two something more, but here she doesn't especially impress. Elizabeth Hurley looks beautiful, and actually manages to achieve a state of peevishness that looks convincing; maybe the director told her that her L'Oreal ration was being suspended. And even Cheryl Ladd, top model of another era, is somehow squeezed into the movie I guess to remind us that in Hollywood, even tiny parts are filled by the good-looking. The trouble is, this is something we found out years from Burt Bacharach songs: "And all the stars/ that never were/ are parking cars or pumping gas." Such as Janeane Garofalo who made quite a few movies and then disappeared from the screen after Dennis Kucinich's candidacy sank like a stone.

The other point of PERMANENT MIDNIGHT is that heroin is bad for you and hurts the family structure. However the hegemony of the US cinema by twin Pleaides Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson will never be destroyed, and their friendship here is a thing of intense contemplation. Long ago they decided that each one was the psychic twin of the other, and ten movies later, they have outlasted Hepburn and Tracy as the screen's great love team. It's a permanent thing with the tensile strength of steel.

Based on the autobiography of Jerry Stahl who is playhed by a very subdued Ben Stiller(no humour here). The cast is rounded off by owen Wilson and Genine Gerafalo as well as Elizabeth Hurley. It is essentially a movie about a writer who goes from small town nobody to big stardom writing for Alf and other 1980s comedy shows, but his downfall comes through heroin addiction. This is mostly a chronicle of this downfall, his shakes and endless search for another hit. It is tragic but eventually the viewer stops caring, his life is not so interesting and it is not that compelling a story. It is mostly just depressing, wathcing Stahl be arrested while driving high with his child in the seat next to him.

Not that great a film, but a true breakthrough role for Stiller.

Seth J. Frantzman

Ben Stiller branches out into dramatic territory as Jerry Stahl, a writer who wrote for Alf and Moonlighting, fell into drug addiction. This is no comedy, as it shows Stahl shooting heroin at every oppertunity; at parties, show meetings, in the hospital bathroom during the birth of his baby, etc. Stahl pulls no punches as he shows how his need for drugs came before anything else and how he lost everything before he finally got help. Stiller does a good job of portraying perpetually-sweating, hyper Stahl and shows that he has range beyond doing just comedy.