Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

Discussions of specific films and franchises.
Post Reply
Message
Author
User avatar
Brian C
I hate to be That Pedantic Guy but...
Joined: Wed Sep 16, 2009 11:58 am
Location: Chicago, IL

Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#1 Post by Brian C » Sat Nov 03, 2012 12:04 pm

New trailer

Starring Rooney Mara, Jude Law, Channing Tatum, and Catherine Zeta-Jones

I believe it was previously known as Bitter Pill - it's set in the shady world of pharmaceuticals.

User avatar
domino harvey
Dot Com Dom
Joined: Wed Jan 11, 2006 2:42 pm

Re: Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#2 Post by domino harvey » Sat Nov 03, 2012 12:07 pm

I'm in as always with Soderbergh but lord what an overwrought trailer!

User avatar
mfunk9786
Under Chris' Protection
Joined: Fri May 16, 2008 4:43 pm
Location: Philadelphia, PA

Re: Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#3 Post by mfunk9786 » Sat Nov 03, 2012 12:31 pm

I know, the tag line was like a cherry on top

User avatar
Brian C
I hate to be That Pedantic Guy but...
Joined: Wed Sep 16, 2009 11:58 am
Location: Chicago, IL

Re: Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#4 Post by Brian C » Sat Nov 03, 2012 1:04 pm

It looks like something that would have starred Kim Basinger 20 years ago. Or Ashley Judd 10 years ago. Or Amanda Seyfried one year ago. Or Emma Watson -3 years ago.

User avatar
Forrest Taft
Joined: Thu Mar 15, 2007 8:34 pm
Location: Stavanger, Norway

Re: Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#5 Post by Forrest Taft » Sat Nov 03, 2012 1:22 pm

So this will our last chance to see a new Soderbergh on the big screen?

User avatar
domino harvey
Dot Com Dom
Joined: Wed Jan 11, 2006 2:42 pm

Re: Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#6 Post by domino harvey » Sat Nov 03, 2012 1:23 pm

Yep, the Liberace biopic is an HBO flick

User avatar
warren oates
Joined: Fri Mar 02, 2012 12:16 pm

Re: Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#7 Post by warren oates » Sat Nov 03, 2012 2:36 pm

Wow, this new title is even worse than the one before. It's so clearly a comedy title that Woody Allen took it years ago for one of his books. Why does everybody think that a title has to be so achingly obvious and literal? Like if there's no mention of pills or medicine then we won't be able to grasp the concept from the poster/trailer? It doesn't sound or feel like a thriller at all.

User avatar
mfunk9786
Under Chris' Protection
Joined: Fri May 16, 2008 4:43 pm
Location: Philadelphia, PA

Re: Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#8 Post by mfunk9786 » Sat Nov 03, 2012 2:44 pm

Yeah, they should call it Make Your Own Title, You Assholes!

User avatar
Brian C
I hate to be That Pedantic Guy but...
Joined: Wed Sep 16, 2009 11:58 am
Location: Chicago, IL

Re: Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#9 Post by Brian C » Sun Nov 04, 2012 3:56 am

I'd have called it Roughly the Same Size as Life.

User avatar
The Narrator Returns
Joined: Tue Nov 15, 2011 6:35 pm

Re: Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#10 Post by The Narrator Returns » Wed Jan 30, 2013 11:25 pm

So far, 100% positive with eight reviews in.

There are plenty of twists and surprises in "Side Effects" that keep you guessing. The first real movie of 2013 is finally here. Repeated viewings may be necessary. -Cole Smithey

A thriller built around an enigmatic character such as “Vertigo” and “Side Effects” is hard to pull off in a credible manner since by its very nature the movie deals in incredible story material. It’s the singular achievement of Soderbergh and Burns that they manage to pull it off in this movie. -Kirk Honeycutt

It is a bugfu*k crazy yarn, more like what you’d expect out of Brian De Palma, but with that ineffable hum – the Soderbergh snap – the cool camera, exquisite framing, shallow focus and scenes that don’t last a frame longer than they have to. -Film.com

User avatar
Murdoch
Joined: Sun Apr 20, 2008 11:59 pm
Location: Upstate NY

Re: Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#11 Post by Murdoch » Wed Jan 30, 2013 11:31 pm

Hopefully that's the only time I'll see "bugfuck" in a review.

User avatar
Kellen
Joined: Mon Jun 28, 2010 7:20 pm
Location: missouri.

Re: Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#12 Post by Kellen » Fri Feb 08, 2013 5:33 pm

Pretty much liked everything about this until the last 20 minutes or so when:
SpoilerShow
the rooney and catherine are in love angle comes into play.

sighkingu
Joined: Sun Dec 02, 2012 5:07 pm

Re: Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#13 Post by sighkingu » Fri Feb 08, 2013 6:55 pm

A shame that this is to be Soderbergh's final theatrical release. It's very much a film I would have preferred to have found flipping between channels late at night. Hoping the Liberace picture is an improvement over this.

User avatar
Jeff
Joined: Tue Nov 02, 2004 9:49 pm
Location: Denver, CO

Re: Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#14 Post by Jeff » Fri Feb 08, 2013 11:24 pm

I liked it a lot, and think it's an appropriate closing act for Soderbergh. After all, it's a chance for him to employ his expert craftsmanship in a straightforward genre picture like he has done with the Ocean's movies, Magic Mike, and Haywire. It's a "psychological thriller" potboiler like those that were so prevalent in the early 90s. It can't be taken seriously, and really works on those terms. If it feels like an HBO programmer to watch between Presumed Innocent and Malice, I think that's the point. It's just one that's done really well. The fact that it kind of turns into that sort of film organically when you're not looking makes it all the more fun. I initially had the same reaction as Kellen toward his spoilered revelation, but I think ultimately even that over-the-topness works here. Unnecessary tawdry complications are part of the game. If nothing else, the film proves Rooney Mara is the real deal. She navigates an incredibly complicated role beautifully. I can't imagine Blake Lively pulling it off.

User avatar
Professor Wagstaff
Joined: Tue Aug 24, 2010 11:27 pm

Re: Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#15 Post by Professor Wagstaff » Sun Feb 10, 2013 1:31 pm

In agreement with Jeff here. It's a fine screenplay by Scott Burns, full of clever turns and sly, understated humor that gave each reversal play like a humorous turn of the knife. It's a shame that Soderbergh and Jude Law only hooked up for two films at the end of the director's career. Law's work in Side Effects and Contagion are among his most mature and effective in a while and what a pleasure it is to see an underutilized actor like him actually get to show those strengths.

User avatar
John Cope
Joined: Thu Dec 15, 2005 5:40 pm
Location: where the simulacrum is true

Re: Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#16 Post by John Cope » Sun Feb 10, 2013 3:00 pm

Professor Wagstaff wrote:It's a shame that Soderbergh and Jude Law only hooked up for two films at the end of the director's career. Law's work in Side Effects and Contagion are among his most mature and effective in a while and what a pleasure it is to see an underutilized actor like him actually get to show those strengths.
It's also a real shame that Soderbergh never used James Spader again after sex, lies. I have never understood that for, as fine of an actor as he is, that film remains Spader's career high point (and one of SS's, too).

User avatar
warren oates
Joined: Fri Mar 02, 2012 12:16 pm

Re: Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#17 Post by warren oates » Mon Feb 11, 2013 1:25 pm

I take it John Cope has never seen James Spader in Boston Legal, which strikes me as the role he was born to play.

I'll echo Wagstaff and Jeff's endorsement of this picture. It's a very well made and satisfying genre exercise with
SpoilerShow
compelling twists that also create interesting shifts in audience identification that recall Psycho or some more contemporary high-end Korean thrillers.
This is maybe the best Scott Z. Burns script yet. So it's a shame to see Soderbergh hanging up his hat so soon now that he's gotten this good, meticulously honing both his team and his working method.

User avatar
mfunk9786
Under Chris' Protection
Joined: Fri May 16, 2008 4:43 pm
Location: Philadelphia, PA

Re: Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#18 Post by mfunk9786 » Mon Feb 11, 2013 11:43 pm

I'll just pretend that the mind-boggling threesome of Contagion, Haywire, and Magic Mike wrapped up Soderbergh's illustrious career, and forget that Side Effects ever happened. The first two acts are so very promising, but the film refuses to stick to its guns and give us either a straightforward story about a doctor trying whatever he has to in order to get his life back, or an ambiguous one about the possible dangers of prescription neurological drugs. The third act is low end DePalma by way of the worst of the Saw franchise, abandoning any reason in order to deliver the most lurid ending that can be conceived of, regardless of any pesky need for logic in its storytelling. Catherine Zeta Jones is shoehorned into a role that is never developed enough (and never performed very well), and any unsettling weight that the very nervy events of the first half of the film had is deflated without any care for what a delicate foundation has been built upon which to construct what could have been any other card in a very satisfying Rolodex of better endings to this film, better things to say and things to do and things to prod at us with. Some of the dialogue is Scott Z. Burns' worst (a frantic 9/11 comparison; a grieving Ann Dowd sobbing "But on the commercials they just show people getting better!"), though it's his plotting late in the film that caused Side Effects' easily diagnosable, easily avoidable problems. It's a shame Soderbergh didn't wait until he was through with making this one to retire - something tells me he was on hold with his 401K broker when he was needed most.

User avatar
wigwam
Joined: Mon May 07, 2012 11:30 am

Re: Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#19 Post by wigwam » Tue Feb 12, 2013 12:54 am

yeah i checked out once it went from her story to his and the last third's twist-athon was meaningless

i did love the visuals tho, what Star Trek did for lensflair this does for selective focus

User avatar
mfunk9786
Under Chris' Protection
Joined: Fri May 16, 2008 4:43 pm
Location: Philadelphia, PA

Re: Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#20 Post by mfunk9786 » Tue Feb 12, 2013 1:01 am

yeah what you said

User avatar
Finch
Joined: Mon Jul 07, 2008 5:09 pm
Location: Edinburgh, UK

Re: Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#21 Post by Finch » Sat Mar 09, 2013 3:27 pm

Feel the same as mfunk and wigwam: the film really worked for me until the last 25-30 minutes when the ludicrous twists come into play and made me question the film in retrospect. There is so much promise in the setup that what we finally get isn't anywhere near as interesting, and it deflated the whole experience for me. I think of Soderbergh as a good craftsman who never quite manages to overcome the hurdle of a mediocre screenplay, so yeah, Side Effects sums up neatly his strengths and weaknesses. Thought Law and Mara were great, but, man, I can't stand Catherine Zeta-Jones.

User avatar
Reverend Drewcifer
Joined: Sat Mar 09, 2013 5:16 pm
Location: Cincinnati

Re: Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#22 Post by Reverend Drewcifer » Sat Mar 09, 2013 5:36 pm

The Hitchcock and De Palma comparisons I read when the film was initially reviewed are off the mark. Soderbergh is too tasteful, too Helvetica to go off the rails, cackling as the plot twists, a gleeful gleam in his eye as he amps the thrills. He and Scott Burns made a skillful juggling act out of the tone of The Informant, but neither earns the "batshit" moniker here. The closest is the final shot, but there is no deliciousness in the irony, no digestion of the material. It's an atheist's kind of twist ending, with no delight or judgment, and can't fail to be anything but an airless exercise.

User avatar
mfunk9786
Under Chris' Protection
Joined: Fri May 16, 2008 4:43 pm
Location: Philadelphia, PA

Re: Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#23 Post by mfunk9786 » Sun Mar 10, 2013 4:03 am

An atheist's kind of twist ending?

User avatar
Reverend Drewcifer
Joined: Sat Mar 09, 2013 5:16 pm
Location: Cincinnati

Re: Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#24 Post by Reverend Drewcifer » Sun Mar 10, 2013 8:38 pm

Inasmuch as Hitchcock's Victorian Catholicism and De Palma's Catholic-Quaker sensibility underscores the irony with a particular relish, Soderbergh seems incapable of adding the kind of judgment necessary for the kind of ending he was attempting.

User avatar
The Narrator Returns
Joined: Tue Nov 15, 2011 6:35 pm

Re: Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013)

#25 Post by The Narrator Returns » Wed Mar 13, 2013 5:33 pm

Coming to Blu-Ray on May 21

Sadly (although it was pretty much just a pipe dream), no final commentary for Soderbergh's final theatrical release, but at the very least, the drug commercials sound like a nice touch, and not the fluff that graced Soderbergh's previous three movies.

Post Reply