Lovelace

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source: Lovelace

Lovelace (2013) *** (out of 4) Amanda Seyfried gives a wonderful performance as Linda Lovelace who for a brief moment found herself a star due to her performance in DEEP THROAT. The film would make an unknown amount of money for everyone but Linda who found herself trapped in an abusive relationship with her husband (Peter Sarsgaard) who pretty much pimped her out. LOVELACE is a lot better than some people are giving it credit for but once again it's important to note that this here is a film and not a documentary. Lovelace has been a rather controversial figure when she decided to speak out about being abused and saying that she was forced to do *. If, like myself, you never fully bought this then you might be upset that this film does portrayal her as a victim. There are some faults to be found in this film but I think the performances are so great that you can't help but be entertained from start to finish. Sarsgaard once again turns in an excellent performance as the creepy husband. Sharon Stone turns in one of the best performances of her career as Linda's mother and the always dependable Robert Patrick plays her father. The real star is of course Seyfriend who is simply remarkable in the role. The actress does a remarkable job at showing off the various sides of Lovelace including the charming and shy girl but also the more problematic sides including the scenes dealing with the abuse and her life after *. Seyfriend is completely believable in the part as there's never a second that you don't feel as if you're watching the real Lovelace going through these moments. Another remarkable film is the visual look of the picture because it's pretty much flawless in regards to it looking like it was shot in the 1970s. A lot of films try to recapture the look of the films from that era but I've never seen one look as magnificent as this one. Again, there are some flaws throughout the picture including it never really taking any sort of stand on any issue that was in Lovelace's life. I think the film could have been better without some of the more melodramatic moments and especially several between Lovelace and her mother. Still, the movie contains some excellent performances that make it worth checking out.

...though honestly, due to it's jumping around in time, it was a bit difficult to follow. Overall, a stunning movie, a real wake-up call to * of the 70s, taking such bright eyed youth into the seamy underbelly of the entertainment industry, but a more linear narrative might have worked a bit better. I loved Amanda as Linda, she did an amazing job. I just have am easier time watching movies that are less disjointed. Honestly though, I do hope Lovelace wins some awards. It is certainly worthy. Debi Mazar was stellar as always. :) Seriously, ten lines of text? I seriously said all I wanted to in seven. But what the hell, I will keep typing until it accepts my review. Live and learn, right? So they say...

This bio film of Deep Throat star Linda Lovelace is more interesting than most user comments admit, though in the end as bad as they say. Linda's lifestory is a chain of confabulation and reinvention, all lives are, a matter of how we view our selves after the fact and deciding on the value. She wrote apparently no less than three autobiographies, with the third one being the 'real' dark story of what happened to her. So the 'rise' part of the film sees a wholly innocent, fresh young girl being enticed - so pure and shy she won't even take her top off as she sunbathes with a friend in her own backyard! Silly. But that is how she chooses to frame herself reminiscing in the bathtub. The 'fall' shows those gaps of horrible abuse that were omitted in that first narration. But that is what she chooses to recall as years later she takes a polygraph test on the behest of the publisher of her memoirs. And that is how Linda has chosen to present her story in her own book, herself pure and corrupted by a crazed husband. This is not to say that she's making everything up, just as we know she isn't completely honest. Truth is usually somewhere in the middle. We see the alleged rape at gunpoint, yet there's no mention of her seedier films which she had denied doing until proof showed up. So a film worthy of the subject would show two Lindas at odds, a softer understanding of the effort of trying to decide just who you are: the one who (re)writes her story, and the one who is genuinely caught up in it. Here we simply get Linda the victim. In the end, a cleansed Linda goes on TV to warn against abuse and to promote 'finding yourself'. The film tries to show this reinvention of self and memory by being itself reinvented halfway through, yet in the end plies the same manipulation. The film 'settles' on her story being real, and presents it to us as the life of Linda Lovelace, why, because it comes with positive value we'd rather remember.

For years I'd been wondering what was all that fuss about Deep Throat and finally when I got to watch it guess what I felt? Nothing! I still didn't get the fuss. It was a cheesy 70s * movie and nothing else. It was until I read into what went behind the movie and its lead Linda Lovelace that I became more intrigued with it. For the newbies, Deep Throat was a phenomenal and controversial * movie of the 70′s which told the wafer-thin story of Linda who had her clitoris in her throat rather than you-know-where. It was just a mere * movie, which grossed over 600 million dollars, on the surface but what mattered happened behind the screen. I wanted to watch the original 2005 documentary Inside Deep Throat which delved behind the * sensation but unfortunately I couldn't find it anywhere. I was glad when I heard about a biopic on Linda Lovelace played by one of my fav, Amanda Seyfried. I was not familiar with the Rob Epstein & Jeffrey Friedman director duo, so I didn't know whether to get my hopes high or not. An ensemble cast of James Franco, Sharon Stone, Robert Patrick, Juno Temple, Chloe Sevigny, Wes Bentley upped the ante intriguing me. More than a biopic, Lovelace felt more like a commercial movie made to cash in on less drama and more on the concept of Deep Throat with some nudity thrown in. And no don't be excited when you read 'nudity', just because Lovelace was based on * doesn't mean the movie needed to be pornographic in nature. Yes Amanda Seyfried does go topless in a couple of scenes which I thought was gratuitous. At its heart it was still supposed to be a drama but clumsy edits and a weak script made it less so. Lovelace does handle marital abuse issues well, you do get to see how Linda was abused, verbally, beaten and f**cked to do her husbands bidding ending in * and even prostitution and how Sasgard's initially charming Chuck turned into monster in the second act. Amanda Seyfried seemed to me like the wrong choice and was less like her real life counterpart but nonetheless gorgeous. She fit the role of the naive, girl-next-door perfectly but I don't think that was how the real Linda was. She portrayed the best of helplessness and being mistreated by her husband. It was more of how she was in the 3rd act that I desperately wanted to see, how she rebelled against her abusive husband but there was hardly 10 minutes of it. Despite Amanda's talents she was overshadowed by all the heavyweight 'stars' that was on screen and especially by Peter Sasgard. This guy just can't play a nice guy, can he? And bloody hell can he play an antagonist well I am sure he'd do well even when he's sleepwalking. Apart from Amanda's Linda and Sasgard's Chuck every other character felt like props. I do understand the core focus is on Linda but despite other characters' screen time they was absolutely felt like cameos. To see Sharon Stone's performance as Linda's mom, was to a degree, relieving. The fact that the movie was shot cheaply didn't add to it either. I don't know if it was deliberate so as to give it a VHS feel but it felt drab most of the time, almost like those TV movies. In the end Lovelace felt just as cheesy as Deep Throat and was adrift in genre-confusion, was it a drama or comedy? was it commercial or artsy? I don't know and I suppose neither does the directors as well. Lovelace could have been a compelling drama about how Linda fought back and an eye-opener for women all around the world, now, facing the same issues but sadly it comes nowhere near as I expected. For what its worth watch it for Amanda Seyfried and Peter Sasgard's chemistry and un-chemistry.

Andy Bellin wrote the screenplay for this biopic-type film directed by both Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman which relates the life of Linda Lovelace, known as the queen of adult * for her controversial role in the 1972 film DEEP THROAT and the writer of the confessional book ORDEAL which gave the public the 'real story' behind the girl who was Lovelace before she died in 2002 - the girl who is used and abused by the * industry at the behest of her coercive husband, before taking control of her life. The film is basically divided into two parts - the fantastical story of a freckled face 'innocent' girl of strict upbringing who rises to fame by being the first * star to perform fellatio on the screen and gained fame and stardom, and the second part of how this naïve girl was the victim of the abusive husband and * industry until she gained the courage to marry and have a family and step out of the spotlight of her fame in Deep Throat. And the manner in which the two views on the same girl are interconnected in the film is the strong point of the movie: the technique of show 'reality' while simultaneously depicting 'fiction' works well. The cast is strong: Amanda Seyfried does a star turn as Linda Lovelace (aka Linda Susan Boreman aka Mrs. Larry Marchiano) though much of Lovelace's life is omitted (her liver transplant, her messy divorces, her other films, etc); Peter Sarsgaard is excellent as the smarmy drug-addled Chuck Traynor, the man who convinced Lovelace to enter *; Sharon Stone and Robert Patrick as her rigid parents; Juno Temple in the thankless role as Lovelace's only friend Patsy; and the * guys - Chris Noth, Bobby Cannavale, Hank Azaria, Adam Brody as the well-endowed Harry Reems (though that of course is never filmed), Chloë Sevigny as a Feminist Journalist, James Franco as Hugh Hefner, fellow * star Dolly as portrayed well by Debi Mazar, Wes Bentley, Eric Roberts, and Ron Pritchard as Sammy Davis Jr.! There are real taped interviews and comments by Johnny Carson, Bob Hope and Walter Cronkite which enhance the credibility. The film closes with an interview after Lovelace has revealed her past in her best selling book ORDEAL - and at that point the film slides down the hill of Hallmark type feel good. An entertaining film about a name from the 20th century that deserves visiting despite the fact that it simply goes on too long. Grady Harp

sorry for the obvious joke but it really does. The life of Linda Lovelace is a story with SO much potential but all we have here is an extra smutty Lifetime movie. The device of showing the glossy side of the story first then backtracking to fill in the grim gaps is intriguing but in the inept hands of the film makers it's just an obvious "hey wouldn't it be neato to tell the story THIS way" gimmick. With the exception of a convincing Hank Asaria as director Gerard Damiano, all of the performances seem phoned in including the leads. For a more in depth & interesting take on this material check out the documentary "Inside Deep Throat" & "Boogie Nights".