Product Details

• Actors: Thomas Jay Ryan, James Urbaniak, Parker Posey, Maria Porter, James Saito
• Directors: Hal Hartley
• Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, NTSC
• Language: English
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Number of tapes: 1
• Studio: Sony Pictures
• VHS Release Date: August 24, 1999
• Run Time: 137 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (56 customer reviews)
• ASIN: 0767811437
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #28,953 in Video (See Bestsellers in Video)

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  Video > Comedy > Comedy Directors > Hal Hartley

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com
Simon (James Urbaniak), a shy garbage man, lives with his sister (Parker Posey of Party Girl and Waiting for Guffman, among dozens of other movies) and mother, who both treat him with minimal respect. Into Simon's life comes Henry Fool (Thomas Jay Ryan), a heavy-drinking self-proclaimed great writer who goads Simon into writing an enormous poem. The poem becomes the source of great controversy, proclaimed by some as a great work of art, denounced by others as perverse trash. As Simon's star rises, he tries to draw attention to Henry's work as well, to little avail. Though the premise seems simple, Henry Fool takes on something of an epic sweep as it follows the effects of fame on Simon's and Henry's lives. This rumination on art and inspiration was hailed by some critics as the best film yet by writer-director Hal Hartley (Trust, Simple Men, Amateur), while others felt it brought out his worst self-indulgences. All of Hartley's movies defy easy interpretation, and Henry Fool is no exception. Still, it's a rare film that even tries to tackle such subjects, let alone does so with a combination of intelligence and humor (ranging from verbal quirkiness to scatological embarrassment). Hartley's films, surprisingly enough, feel warmer and more accessible on video; perhaps watching them in one's home makes them seem more intimate and less abstract. --Bret Fetzer

From The New Yorker
Hal Hartley's latest film takes a while to get going: almost an hour passes before it develops any emotional momentum. Yet when it does, it's powerful and strangely unnerving-there's an original and ambitious voice at work here that puts most independent filmmakers to shame. The story concerns an oddball garbage man named Simon Grim (James Urbaniak) who becomes a famous poet under the tutelage of Henry Fool (Thomas Jay Ryan), an ex-convict drifter. Hartley has refined his offbeat writing style from rambling riffs to sharp, halting spurts of dialogue that are funny, with an edge of desperation. The film captures the sad world of Hartley's lost poetic lovers better than any picture he's made before. -Bruce Diones
Copyright © 2006 The New Yorker

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

20 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Film is Briiliant, DVD an Abortion, January 23, 2007

By	Eric M. Van (Watertown, MA USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Henry Fool (DVD)

Warning: this is not a widescreen presentation of the original film, which was in 1.66:1 aspect ratio. IT IS A MATTED (VERTICALLY TRIMMED) VERSION OF THE PAN-AND-SCAN VHS VERSION, WHICH MEANS IT'S 60% OF THE ORIGINAL IMAGE. (The reported 1.78:1 aspect ratio on the DVD box is correct, even the claim that it's anamorphic widescreen is correct: it's just that the image you're seeing was generated by taking the "reformatted for your TV" VHS version, which chopped off the sides of the original theatrical image, and *further chopping* it to fit the widescreen format by eliminating the top and bottom of the VHS image. This is a common practice for widescreen movie presentations on HDTV, but it's always inexcusable). It's unwatchable even if you only know the movie from the VHS pan-and-scan version (which was 80% of the film). And the transfer is poor: it looks worse on my TV than the VHS tape I rented a few years ago.

What an incredible letdown, because the film is sheer genius.

20 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Comic Epic with Heart, Soul and Bruises, August 5, 2004

By	G P Padillo "paolo" (Portland, ME United States) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Henry Fool (DVD)

Hartley's Masterpiece: An epic, dark comedy with heart and soul and bruises.

If Hal Hartley were never to make another film, he could easily go down as having created a genuine American Masterpiece with "Henry Fool." Hartley takes this material and stamps it with heart and soul and distance. It's like staring at a palette of beautiful colors - then stepping back to realize it's a bruise. Henry is never less than this astonishing.

As Henry,Thomas Jay Ryan gives what is easily the best film debut I've seen in many years. None of the wimpy whispery-voiced drivel that passes for acting these days (from even some of our best screen actors) his performance practically pops off of the screen like a fart at a funeral. The rest of the cast - James Urbaniak, Parker Posey, Maria Porter, Kevin Corrigan, et al. - are on the same inspired level, but it's obvious why the film is named after Henry. I cannot wait to see this man in more.

Obviously allegorical, "Henry Fool" fairly teems with its laundry list of symbolism both quaint and profound, easy and impossible. I found my cheeks hurting from the smile stretching across my face for much of the film. Other moments had my eyes welling with tears at the beauty - and pain - these oh, so deceptively simple lives toil through.

This is not, obviously, a film for all audiences, there is something of the fairy tale here and while suspension of disbelief is required, it is also its own reward. Actually the characters, though larger than life, are so evenly and wondrously drawn as to become recognizable to all of us as ourselves or others in our own lives. Here we weigh out the seemingly unfair advantages we perceive "others" has having, the pronouncements of self-worth and desire for acceptance and understanding.

Hartley's dialogue is equal to the visual aspects of his film: almost stagey (in the good sense), but with a direct honesty that many, unfortunately, will find offputting. His cast delivers these perfectly placed pronouncements with all the gravitas demanded of the situation - and sound natural doing so. It's a beautiful film to listen to.

Aside from the brilliant storytelling, "Henry" is also beautiful to look at. Hartley's cameramen lens a Queenscape most unusual - one never quite feels he knows where it's taking place, despite obvious "Queens" clues. Every frame - from Henry's powerfully bizarre arrival to the last triumphant (and gloriously ambiguous) cell is a pleasure, a joy to watch.

At its conclusion all I could say was "this was the best movie I've ever seen." Upon reflection, I realize it probably isn't, but at that moment (and each ensuing viewing) I recapture that same, precise feeling. That's what I want in a movie and Henry delivers every time.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An Overlooked Masterpiece, August 19, 2002

By A Customer

It's a shame that "Henry Fool" remains relatively overlooked and underrated. In large part because it's such a departure from his earlier films, Hal Hartley purists couldn't stomach the epic scale and thematic shift of the film, and audiences who would likely appreciate the movie never even saw it. In my opinion though, Henry Fool is a true masterpiece of American cinema and one of the best films of the 1990s. If you look at films like "Trust", "Simple Men" and "Amateur" as early, developmental works in Hal Hartley's maturation as a filmmaker, and then see "Flirt" as his attempt to identify himself more as a "director" than a "writer", then "Henry Fool" is the fruit of that labor - not only is it precisely, minimalistically and efficiently directed, but it's far and away his best writing yet. His favorite themes are expanded and blown up within a mythic frame, and his casting here of stage actors (especially the hefty presence of Thomas Jay Ryan) separates the film from Hartley's earlier work. However, it retains the philosophical tone, the inner musings of character, and the precision of their actions. This time, however, Hartley accomplishes this by expanding the frame with which he grapples with friendship, family, ambition, achievement and betrayal, and ends up with a shattering parable about who we choose to be in our lives. The film is about greatness, and thanks to Hartley's fearlessness in envisioning conceptions of greatness, it is, itself, great.