Marvin's Room

Nonetheless, Marvin's Room is not only sharply written and well-acted, but it's also the rare sort of film that takes an honest and uncompromising look at death and dying. more

The famous faces make it difficult, at first, to sink into the story, but eventually we do; the characters become so convincing that even if we're aware of Keaton and Streep, it's as if these events are happening to them. more

Yet, even on those occasions when the screenplay falters, the actors are there to take up the slack. more

Inspirationalism wafts off the screen in little perfumed puffs. more

Marvin's Room, the 1991 Scott McPherson play, filmed by Jerry Zaks, is an old-fashioned weepie of noble mien with many bright moments and a superb cast. more

The whole film is laced with shards of humor and irony, which proves helpful, considering the basically downbeat nature of the material. more

Any movie with Meryl Streep is an occasion, but when you add Diane Keaton, Robert De Niro, Leonardo DiCaprio, Hume Cronyn and Gwen Verdon, you've got an embarrassment of riches. more

Add to that a perfect cast and one's only complaint will be that this is, at heart, another tear-jerker about how good it is to love and be alive and all of that. more

Tony Award-winning stage director Jerry Zaks' debut feature is a gentle, surprisingly funny film about dying that manages to tug a few heartstrings without the usual emotional manhandling. more

Keaton doesn't stoop to bitter-spinster blather. Instead, the luminous vulnerability that served her well in such dramas as "Shoot the Moon" lights up this depressing, gallows-humored heart-tugger.

While it is horrible story, the acting makes this movie quite entertaining. Leonardo DiCaprio, Robert De Niro and Meryl Streep gave some great performances that nearly overshadow Diane Keaton's horrible one. It was an obvious sap story that fails to produce any empathy for the character in trouble. more

An absolutely amazing cast is unable to bring this movie to greatness. Very good - often touching and moving, but the screenplay has a rough journey transitioning from the play. The movie doesn't suffer an enormous amount as a result, but it doesn't accomplish anything spectacular. The acting is phenomenal, the story is interesting... but the script just can't hold it together. more

There's some very good acting in this movie. Meryl Streep (an actress I sometimes love and sometimes hate) is the best of the cast, perfectly portraying the harsh mother. Leonardo DiCaprio is also excellent. His performance could have been over-the-top angry rebel, but he does an excellent job communicating everything we need to know about his character in a subtle manner, without overacting. However, some of the dialogue is awkward and stilted, and I never once connected to the character of Diane Keaton's character, Bessie, which meant the movie was always cold to me. Not necessarily a... more

Not an ?entertaining? movie per se, but it?s still great. A serious movie with some comic relief and a few heart-wrenching scenes (The two sisters are picking up a bunch of pills that fall all over the place and Bessie (Diane Keaton) explains the love she?s had in her life, but not conventional love; it?s so nice). Some people might find Marvin?s Room a little boring, but those people are stupid. A real character-driven movie about family. And Meryl Streep really looks like she could be Leonardo DiCaprio?s mother, don?t you think? more

I remember seeing this as a teenager and thinking what a jerk-ass DiCaprio's character was, and how friggin' big the needle was for a marrow transplant was. ick ick ick! Overall, I really didn't like the movie but this is going by a 10 year old memory. more