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List Price: $14.99 | | Label: Image Entertainment
Salesrank: 37495
Released: September 5, 2006 |
| Our Price: $9.40 |
| Used Price: $8.61 |
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MPAA Rating: R (Restricted)
Media: DVD |
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Editorial Review:
Cigarette smoke and laughter... The hollow clink of martini glasses and biting one-liners... This was the famed lunch scene at the Algonquin Hotel's Round Table of the 1920's, home to a circle of mutually supportive young artists that defined the heyday of New York sophistication and a literate era of wit and intellect. At the heart of the round table sat Mrs. Dorothy Parker (Jennifer Jason Leigh), one of the sharpest, most biting wits of the past century. But beneath the raucous laughter is a darker and richer tale filled with passionate affairs, friendship and tragedy, all captured in this striking masterpiece of unrequited love and self-destructive impulses from acclaimed director Alan Rudolph (The Secret Life of Dentists, Choose Me).
All-Star Cast! Featuring Jennifer Jason Leigh (Single White Female, Fast Times at Ridgemont High), Campbell Scott (The Exorcism of Emily Rose), Matthew Broderick (The Producers, Ferris Bueller's Day Off), Peter Gallagher (TV's The O.C., American Beauty), Academy Award winner Gwyneth Paltrow (The Royal Tenenbaums, Shakespeare in Love), Heather Graham (Boogie Nights, Lost in Space), Jennifer Beals (TV's The L Word, Devil in a Blue Dress), Andrew McCarthy (Weekend at Bernie's, TV's Kingdom Hospital), Wallace Shawn (Clueless, The Princess Bride), Martha Plimpton (Parenthood, 200 Cigarettes), Lili Taylor (High Fidelity, Short Cuts), James LeGros (Living in Oblivion, The Rapture), Nick Cassavetes (Face/Off, director of The Notebook), Stephen Baldwin (Posse, Threesome), Stanley Tucci (Big Night, The Devil Wears Prada), Keith Carradine (Nashville, The Long Riders) and Jon Favreau (Elf, Swingers).
Description of Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle:
The press kit's historical notes should be standard issue for anyone who sees Alan Rudolph's (The Moderns, Choose Me) look at the famous intellectuals who dotted New York's finest hour in the 1920s. If you only know the names of Dorothy Parker, Robert Benchley, et al. in passing, this movie will hardly generate more study. These writers and thinkers, most famous for having lunch daily at the Algonquin Hotel, seem as weightless and thin as the fictional ones in The Moderns. Most luminous is Mrs. Parker (Jennifer Jason Leigh), whose passion for unhappiness is rarely interrupted. Leigh, in a performance that viewers seem to love or loathe, swirls "witty" dialogue with pure force and must be praised for keeping your interest in a life that was so dreary. The chief problem is not the performances (Campbell Scott is quite fun in a change-of-pace role); it's that the movie comes off as a taped show on stage: the characters are not real and it's all dress-up. Rudolph illustrates his main character's writing (done far too seldom in writers' bios) by having Leigh speak Parker's poetry directly into the camera. --Doug Thomas
Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle Reviews:
Virtually Unintelligible Leigh 
2009-04-06 - I truly wanted to love this movie after a long lifetime spent reading about the Round Table. I've also read the works of all the writers portrayed, plus James Thurber's wonderful "The Years with Ross" about the early years of the New Yorker magazine and it's founder and editor, Harold Ross. There's much that is tragic about Parker's life, and some of those around her, but the tragedy here is that Parker's brilliant words are so swallowed and garbled by Leigh that after about five minutes, I went back to the main menu, hoping to find my way to a selection of subtitles that would include English, so I could actually understand Leigh - no such luck. Those of you who can understand anything said by Bob Dylan may have better luck. It's a shame because everything else about this film is
worth watching, though Crawford seems a poor choice for MacArthur.
Only if You Already Love Dorothy Parker Will You Enjoy This Film 
2009-01-31 - You have to be a real Dorothy Parker addict to enjoy this film. Although this biographical film seems quite accurate and not glossed over, the film has many problems, i.e., direction and editing. As another reviewer mentioned, it is sometimes hard to understand what she is saying. Of course, I understand that it must be very difficult to deliver clear, understandable lines while also trying to convey that you are falling-down drunk, as she is during about one-third of the film. I've watched the film several times, and I still haven't been able to understand all her magnificent witty lines. The most famous of which are included in the film. The film tried to encompass the entirety of her life in two-hours. It would have been better just to make a film on a section of her life: i.e. "Mrs. Parker Does Hollywood," "Mrs. Parker Does the Roaring Twenties," or perhaps "Mrs. Parker Does Charles MacArthur." However, I liked the film enough that I'll probably even watch it again, but next time with a glass of scotch in my hand so that I'll feel a part of the times and be able to identify with her better. Maybe if I'm drunk, too, I will understand what she is saying when she's drunk. I was disappointed that the film didn't include Lillian Hellman, who was a friend of hers, and who tried to help Parker in her last years. There's a scene near the end of the film where Dorothy Parker is in a bar and an obscure actor (played by Stanley Tucci) comes over to talk to her. They could have substituted a scene with Lillian Hellman, who also liked bars, for that scene, and it would have been more interesting and literary. See: http://gaylealstrom.com/Dorothy_Parker_Page.html.
Terrible Acting
2008-11-30 - In the past few months I have read several biography's on the interesting men and women that made up the Vicious Circle of the round table. I was excited to find a movie that would paint a picture of that era. The movie did take you back to the time and place but I was disappointed with the acting and the story line was just plain weak. I hated the way Dorothy Parker's character came across. Did she really speak the way Ms.Leigh portrayed her? From all I read, she was a tough no nonsense broad and I had a hard time believing any of the characters in this movie. Disappointed, to say the least but I only paid a few dollars for a used copy so no big deal.
IT'S ONLY ME., BUT:
2008-05-31 - GOOD MOVIE SHOWING A WOMEN BEFORE HER TIME. A WOMEN TRYING TO MAKE IT IN THE FILM INDUSTRY AGAINST ALL THE MEN. HAD TO BE TWICE AS GOOD AND WORK TWICE AS HARD. A TIME PEICE. YOUNGE QWENETH PAL JM
Hard core fans only 
2007-11-24 - I liked this movie. But only people who really love Mrs. Parker should see it
Also, English teachers should not show this in class due to SOME naked people running around.
