Review of Running with Scissors (2006) by Tom B — 06 Sep 2011

Woah! A mega weird, out there left-field dark black comedy drama film.

RWS utilises a great support cast (Cox and Bening) to prop up a wonderfully weird ball of head zapping expression. The intense film follows a single child, ?, who is a young gay man left by his splitting parents in the hands of a wacky psychiatrist and his non conventional family. The premise of the film is a idiopathic mother that brings her son into a world of psychology and disorganised abnormality.

This film was praised for its individuality, ambition and the few points that stick out as funny, but it is a gruelling tightrope walk of a watch (verging between madness and genius).

For me the film was just too wacky to be enjoyed, and whilst it has moments of amusement (I.e the mastabatorium) and clever observations into characters, it is too dramatic a drama to be credible. It was based on a complicated book and some of this was lost, but other bits captured and improved.