Comwayon A Disappointing Continuation

Nessieldwi Very interesting film. Was caught on the premise when seeing the trailer but unsure as to what the outcome would be for the showing. As it turns out, it was a very good film.

Teddie Blake The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

Aneesa Wardle The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

cinetudes A great movie in which the play on illusions is really worthy, intelligent and meaningful. I have to make a comparison which is not one of exactitude but of general feeling with the movies of Lynch and the way they use sensations as the vehicle of the movie and the "mise en abime" is its powerful engine and it is an important compliment coming from me.You have to let yourself getting swallowed by Monte Hellman's multiple versions of reality that only cinema as a medium allows and float in that in appearance quite random (only in appearance though) mix of moments that connect together on a much more profound level that you may feel initially if you try to rationalize the story, the storytelling and find a message in this movie. I am all for rationalizing things in general, critical and independent thinking in real life but this is art and there are no rules in art, or at least there should not be in my conception of it.I love rational and well structured movies but the real purely artistic ones are the ones that do the thing that only them can, they speak directly to your real self, a mix between you conscious and unconscious that in my mind they have been carefully crafted (consciously or unconsciously) by the filmmaker, not enough of conscious and you have often fascinating but very hard of access pieces of radically experimental cinema and not enough unconscious and you have some often amazing movies but which tends to work only on one level or maybe two, staying at the entrance of the dark forest that is your deep self.Monte Hellman like Lynch or Malick is one of the rare directors whom manages to find the right balance between all the above elements and for that and the very intense moments that they create for us as spectators, he has got my eternal thanks, for what its worth !!To finish as an advice for the viewer, let yourself go to your sensations and do not intellectualize the film on the first viewing as this is surely going to be the first of many if you let the film take you and that you surrender to it !!

Perry Bee Like the title of this horrible nothing of a film, it truly goes no where, sure I liked the first 5 to 10 minutes and thought hey this could be good. But again I was fooled, I really should have paid more attention to the cast of no body's, it tends to be a good indication what a film is going to be like, and yes I have been wrong before, but most times it is a pretty good way to sort out the good from the bad.Don't get me wrong this could have been an O.K film but it had no direction of any kind, and really no fault of the cast that this ended up to be a stinker of a boring film. They seemed to really try to hard doing absolutely nothing with a script that has no direction of any kind.If you are O.K with wasting about 2 hours of your life than go for it, I myself just have better things to do, hence I gave up on this film half way through.Up there with the worst stinker of the year for 2011, very solid 1 out of 10.And watch the rating of 6.4 tumble over the next few weeks!Update Update!!!! and for those who voted positive for this disaster, please note the rating of 6.4, it is coming down! What does that mean? it stinks!

monell579 ROAD TO NOWHERE is Monte Hellman's first feature film in over two decades and it proves to be worth the wait. An instant classic of the Movie-Movie genre, along with Jean-Luc Godard's CONTEMPT and Truffaut's DAY FOR NIGHT, with strong links to Hitchcock's VERTIGO, LAST YEAR AT MARIENBAD, RASHOMON and Jacques Rivette's L'AMOUR FOU, it's a feast for the mind, eyes and all movie lovers. And, make no mistake, ROAD TO NOWHERE is every bit as original and artistically courageous as those time tested classics.Hellman's on-again, off-again career, from Roger Corman produced horror projects like BEAST FROM THE HAUNTED CAVE, THE CREATURE FROM THE HAUNTED SEA and THE TERROR to the mind-bending, low budget western THE SHOOTING (the first psychedelic western and a possible template for EL TOPO) to the the celebrated 1971 TWO LANE BLACKTOP, which defined the mood of its era, and its road movie twin, COCKFIGHTER, has proved as iconoclastic as his vision and his films have not had an easy time with mainstream critics of their time. But they have lasted. ROAD TO NOWHERE is his most daring, experimental and uncompromising film yet, and it will also last. It has the twists and turns of Hellman's own career story built in but it also has a universal validity in its overriding concern with the nature of Art and the role of the Artist. The nonlinear, mind teasing structure is both a challenge and a gift for those who want to engage with a film on a creative level. It tells either multiple stories or presents multiple takes on one story: the fallout from a film being made about a shady politician, a femme fatale, murder, suicide and possible resurrection. The director becomes obsessed with his leading actress in the manner of a New Hollywood predator on a sophisticated prowl, but there's a supremely nasty surprise in store for him and for our conventional expectations as consumers of the genre. The mind can play funny tricks when sex, money and artistic ambition are in the brew.RTN starts out as a crime film, a 21st Century Film Noir in which an obsession with cinema determines the fate of the fall guy. Mitchell Haven, the director of the film within the film, appreciates THE SEVENTH SEAL and THE SPIRIT OF THE BEEHIVE (clips of both are included in key scenes) as masterpieces in the manner of the real Monte Hellman, but Haven can't see what's unfolding right there in front of him, sometimes in his own bed. It questions our assumptions about the reality of everyday experience, the realities of the creative process and the reality we assign to the images we absorb from cinema. There is no set reality in RTN, this is a metaphysical thriller, which contains elements of the meta-fictions of Borges, atmospherically shot in North Carolina's ethereal Smoky Mountains. You won't be able to predict what's coming down in the next scene and, like Edgar G. Ulmer's noir classic DETOUR, only endless movement, existential anxiety and unpleasant change are certain.If ROAD TO NOWHERE isn't a masterpiece, it's certainly the work of an American Master. It could be described as a haunted, haunting cautionary fable on what happens to people who watch too many movies. In our age of the Blogger and instant Internet searches it also evokes the irony of John Ford's THE MAN WHO SHOT LIBERTY VALANCE, in which the editor concludes, "When the legend becomes fact, print the legend." Each image in RTN has an uncanny, minatory quality, sometimes luminous, sometimes dark, which suck one into the netherworld. It's beautiful, spare, mysterious, tragic and often possessed of a jet black humor. It could be described as a Country and Western Art film, the evil twin of COCKFIGHTER, another Hellman internal/external trek. Monte Hellman dares to allow the viewer space for creative collaboration. This is, perhaps, his authorial signature.ROAD TO NOWHERE won't reveal itself on one viewing, it immediately seduces you but insists you come back for revisits. Like any memorable work of art it respects your intelligence and rewards your patience in spades.

wagesovfeare If you read the reviews and cinema fan opinions from France, from South America, Italy and Portugal, you'll find there are major critics, novelists and philosophers who've responded not only enthusiastically, but poetically and lyrically about their love for the film. And then there are major filmmakers like Atom Egoyan, who said on stage at the Whistler Film Festival, "'Road to Nowhere' is one of the most extraordinary films I have ever seen." And Olivier Assayas was recently quoted while on his way to be on the Jury in Cannes, " I was moved by the troubling poetry of 'Road to Nowhere'...it reminds one of the physical impact that great cinema can have. 'Road to Nowhere' is like a shot to the heart."And closer to home, Noel Lawrence was also enthusiastic:"A lot of cynics told me ROAD TO NOWHERE couldn't be as good as people said it was. I saw the film last night.. and let the record reflect it is THAT GOOD. While enigmatic as anything Lynch ever shot, its relaxed pacing and subdued direction liberate the film from stylized gimmickry and make its labyrinthine storyline all the more disturbing. ROAD TO NOWHERE will supply grist to the film theory mill for the next half-century." - Noel Lawrence