Act Naturally

There is the set up for the joke: the father of two sisters (one adopted, one natural born) has died and left a nudist colony to his two daughters who don't realize it is a nudist colony till they show up at the front gate. The next hour and a-half is the punchline that gets anticlimactic and predictable after the first five minutes. Why does the adopted child call the natural born child about the death of their father? The one daughter is adopted with barely discernable discussion of what adoption means to her and that fact to the relationship of the natural born child. And the father hardly seemed the type to adopt anyone. Body image is barely touched on though it is hinted at; one of the employees has a noticeable burn scar on her shoulder, barely touched on as a topic for body image, except for how it happened. The scar seems to mysteriously disappear by the end of the movie. One person (male) was morbidly obese, most would be described as the va-va-voom category, or at least not repulsive naked. No elderly nudists. Little family nudity, till the end and a family with infant show up showering together. Personally, I would maintain that everyone looks good naked; nudity seems to de-emphasize weight where clothing seems to emphasize weight. There was an awful lot of drinking alcohol; alcohol is a depressant and a vasal dilator and hardly recommended in a hot-tub. There was some discussion of what motivated people to attend nudist resort. But somehow, by the end of the movie, there was a feeling of an inability of the scriptwriters to grasp something essential to the movie: the adopted child and the birth child. They were simply not able to grasp that importance and signification to the movie. In the end one sister ops into the nudist lifestyle, the other rejects it. The film didn't quite descend to titillations, but it didn't ascend very far from that. We can see people being shot to death on TV (even the standard crime drama on the four stations--ABC, CBS, NBC, FOX--but heaven forfend if we see the naked male or female. (I'm aware there is something wrong with that logic, but I can never put my finger on what is wrong. ) Like I say, the film didn't quite descend to titillation, but it didn't ascend very far from that. It seems like there were any number of serious directions the film could have traversed, creating a more substantial film about nudity, and instead they went for the trite and obvious.

The center of attention towards the film seems to be the amount of nudity. There is a large amount but the film's reasoning behind it stems from the people being "nudist" at a nudist resort. The story is relatively better than expect and only given a small plot description, it does showcase what it it about. The film isn't as provocative as initially thought, where this is a real film with a plot, convincing acting, characters, well dialogue and so on. Although the end results are very predictable and we see sort of how they would unfold as the film progresses. With an obvious happy ending. The ending is given a very clear sequel bait, and apparently there is a sequel but not yet out? They really should have made the sequel right away. This film seems like it would actually made a decent tv series, given that there are several different characters and many subplots could ensure from it.

As a nudist who was raised that way, I found the substance of this film to be fairly close but with license. The writing is a little stilted but on topic. Characters and character flaws, plot are all somewhat predictable. But the heart and sole of the film is genuine. It's like every other coming of age, finding meaning in life drama, but with graceful nudity. Puzzling though are the clumsy cover ups as if it was a pg 13 film. I supposed that has to do with the ratings system. I would love to have seen this played as a full unapologetic * film. Total props to those who bared all to make this movie!

The is so close to being one of those sweet indie comedies, but it just misses to mark in a few places. It's extremely trope-y with by the book characters and plot, BUT everyone seems to be acting their hearts out and there's nothing truly awful about it. It's just kind of there. A few laughs, but nothing you'll remember later. It doesn't even exploit the nudity! Comes across as more gentle and loving than trashy, which makes one wonder who this was for? Nudists? I've definitely seen worse and would still say this was an okay watch if you've got nothing else on the plate.

Pro nudest colony and pro the Act Naturally story. A great side to showing how life can still be enjoyable and about the only place where people still treat eachother well.

I guess the film makers did one thing right in putting their best effort into the first half of the film, so then at least some would watch the ending for the resolution despite it's decline in script, editing, pacing and sense. To be fair, we did laugh at many scenes at the beginning, though some from the cringe element. The two sisters are oddly prudish even for two non-nudists. The cast appears to be a mix of actors and extras given speaking parts. Perhaps some agreed to frontal nudity and others didn't, because we get a mix of straightforward nudity and fan-dances with comically, strategically placed props. However, that's not what really let's it down. The sound is choppy throughout, and the camera needlessly handheld at times. In the last act the script, not strong to begin with, falls apart, and actors seem to be ab libbing with the most banal non-communication. The editing goes to pot, especially with the multiple fade-to-black cuts during the not-sad-at-all funeral. The final insult is that the resolution of the story is not revealed to us - the argument and subsequent agreement between the sisters is without audio, with just...airplane noises over the top? WHY? Was the audio not useable? Why not reshoot? Was the script so lame that it was deemed unworthy of inclusion? Again, reshoot, please! It couldn't have been expensive to shoot - two girls and a car on the side of a country road. I don't know. Hopefully it was a learning experience for everyone involved.

Bad script Very bad acting Clichés, predictable All the residents seem to be « employees » It is supposed to be about the good feelings of being naked but everybody is putting effort to cover their bodies... 16+ movies show more nudity. So why the « shame » then?

Like several other reviewers I found it refreshingly pleasant to see a film which has people * for none sexual reasons and generally a reasonably enjoyable film to watch. However despite several favourable comments on the extras portion of the DVD from people who are reputedly real nudists I didn't really feel that it portrayed nudism very accurately. Firstly nudism is usually promoted as a family activity, in this film all the nudists appeared to be single, an almost complete lack of any families, only in the final few seconds were a couple briefly seen with kids in there arms, maybe they were real members of the club used in the film. My other reason for deleting points out of ten is the the foul language frequently used by the two women who were the central characters, this was totally unnecessary, if it wasn't for that I would have said it was a movie the whole family young and old alike could have enjoyed. In some ways the movie parodied the nudies from the 50's and 60's where there always seemed to be some object which just happened to be in the right place to obscure the view, which seemed to be done more for comedy than anything.

Act Naturally is about two sisters, one biological and one adopted, that first meet upon the death of their father. Leah Collins (played by Katie L. Hall, who also co-produced and co-wrote the movie) is the adopted daughter while Charlie Tillerman (Liz Lytle) plays the biological daughter. At the beginning of the movie Leah gets a call from Charlie. During their introductory call, Charlie tells Leah that her father has died, and that they have to take a road trip together from Florida to Arizona to claim their father's remains. When the two sisters arrive at their destination, they are both surprised to find themselves at a nudist resort. The women then discover that not only was their father secretly a nudist, but he also owned the resort! If that was not enough of a surprise, they soon find out that the nudist resort is their inheritance, which they now own. It seems like the only thing they can agree on is that neither one of the wants to take their clothes off, and that they both want to be done with this experience as soon as possible to get on with their lives. The resort staff recognize this discomfort, and try to get them feel as comfortable as possible in their new environment basically to keep sisters from selling or closing down the resort. Most of what I have described is the introduction and setup, while the remainder of the movie deals with a fish out of water style comedy as the two sisters deal with their new environment. The movie has both funny and serious moments. Some of the serious moments explore the characters who work at the resort, and their individual reasons for choosing to live in a nudist environment. As such I think it pretty much succeeds in one of its main goals to honestly depict a non exploitational story of who nudists really are, and how two non-nudist women adjust to an unexpected and forced immersion into a * environment.

I watched "Act Naturally" last night. It is now well and truly one of my all time favorite movies - I can imagine myself in forty years pulling out the DVD to watch it yet again. It was funny, heart warming and the characters were real and honest. I could imagine being friends with them. The nudity was not gratuitous in any way - it was for a point - to explore how people perceive and judge their own bodies - it even had me thinking about my own self image and what example I am setting to the children in my life (I need to change what I think, do and say!). It is not an action packed movie, I know it doesn't appeal to everyone, but for me it was refreshing and I loved it. Give it a look - what have you got to lose? Other than your clothes perhaps...:-)