Map to The Stars

Map to The Stars

What f' movie? This is one messed up movie. We get incest, murder, suicide, domestic violence and other crazy things in this movie.

From IMDB, ((The Weiss family is the archetypical Hollywood dynasty: father Stafford is an analyst and coach, who has made a fortune with his self-help manuals; mother Cristina mostly looks after the career of their son Benjie, 13, a child star. One of Stafford's clients, Havana, is an actress who dreams of shooting a remake of the movie that made her mother, Clarice, a star in the 60s. Clarice is dead now and visions of her come to haunt Havana at night... Adding to the toxic mix, Benjie has just come off a rehab program he joined when he was 9 and his sister, Agatha, has recently been released from a sanatorium where she was treated for criminal pyromania and befriended a limo driver Jerome who is also an aspiring actor. ))

You get a bit of pretentiousness throughout the movie that rears its ugly head when it really shouldn't, but doesn't come across as being preachy. Yes, Hollywood is shallow, but there is something gravely ill about this entire family outside of the Hollywood sphere of influence.

Since this is a film, a lot of messed up things happen. Some of it happens organically from the strange story, while other things string from shock fo shock value. One example of needless shock and dark humor is one character shoots a dog and I think it was put in there to shock and disgust us more than being a part of the story.

As the film progresses, the movie focuses more on the screwed up family more than the shitty nature of Hollywood.

Well, this is a David Cronenberg film and a lot of f'ed up things happen in his movies.

The movie is flawed, but I actually liked it in the end though, despite its bleakness.

~Julianne Moore is great as this crazy actress that's about to pass her prime. She does some crazy shit in this movie that takes some guts. Yes, there's even a poop fart joke with her.

~Evan Bird : He's a child actor that has a major bug up his ass. He's the actor version of Justin Bieber. He supposed to be a typical asshole kid with too much money and attitude. There are some messed up things happened to him, but you can't feel sorry for him.

~Mia Wasikowska : She plays his creepy and dangerous sister: She really is outstanding in her part. She, like her brother, does some seriously f'ed up things. She is really good here.

~John Cusack : He's playing a guru version of himself and he's just as much of a jerk as he is in real life.

Grade: C+