Acting made this work.

Rating: Null/10 (20 May 2000)

I enjoyed this flick for the most part. A couple of things bothered me about the writing. Keep in mind, I *liked* this movie.
***WARNING***
Don't read the rest of this if you don't like "spoilers".
First of all, the gratuitous and unnecessary climax and denouement. I was satisfied after Spacey had his epiphany when he discovered the fact that Suvari was a virgin. A very nice touch. Perfect. But NOOOOOOOO! Given the fact that this is a studio flick, we can't have subtlety. Let's blow his brains out and give the viewer a 5 minute "whodunit," despite the fact that the culprit was as obvious as to who started world war II (Hitler for the uninitiated). As well, the conversation in Spacey's garage with Cooper couldn't have been any more unrealistic. *Every* word out of Spacey's mouth confirmed that he was gay. This whole line of reasoning... did I say reasoning? Sorry. Was so contrived and obvious that it killed the momentum that was flowing up to that point. Suddenly *CLUNK*. The whole thing ground to a halt for me. The gay subtext was interesting, but superfluous. It could have been handled better. Despite this, I really enjoyed this movie. The performances were awesome! The art direction and cinematography were unparalleled. I thought the scene where Spacey was fantasizing about Suvari, with her on the ceiling (so to speak) and the rose petals dropping on him were amazing! Did it deserve to win over the other offerings at the academy awards this year? Dunno. But it certainly deserved to be nominated. Basically, I thought the perfromances were incredible, the actors really pulled this one off. The writing left something to be desired, but was okay overall.