Lucybespro It is a performances centric movie

AshUnow This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

Sienna-Rose Mclaughlin The movie really just wants to entertain people.

Phillipa Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.

ubu507 Everybody's right. This movie is dumb, especially when it tries to be smart. It's not even that hot, which means it's unsuccessful on every level. I kept hoping Ghostface from Scream would jump into the frame with a knife and slash all these characters to bits. God thing it's not very long, which evidently this review has to be, even though I've said pretty much all there is to be said. O.K., the sound and soundtrack are bad, too. The attempt at an improvisational, French New Wave style comes off as undercooked amateurism. Neve Campbell is a lovely young lady with a lot of charisma, as evidenced by The Scream movies. It's a shame her career has never really developed, but it's probably because she chose to be in stinkers like this.

wonderdawg Watching wily old writer/director James Toback chatting up dewy-eyed Neve Campbell in WHEN WILL I BE LOVED is to witness a veteran Hollywood player at the top of his game. Casting himself in a small role as a university professor, Toback is pictured talking to a sophisticated young deb named Vera (Neve Campbell) about a job as a research assistant although he seems to be suggesting there are other positions she could fill as well. Since the dialogue is largely improvised it is not unreasonable to assume Toback is fluent in this kind of doublespeak in real life. In the film-maker's 1987 opus The Pick-Up Artist Robert Downey Jr. plays a smooth-talking womanizer rumored to be based on Toback's own experiences. It is possible to see why Toback succeeded where other directors have failed in getting the comely Ms. Campbell to take it all off for her art (which she does in this film.) Toback was nominated for a screen writing Oscar for 1991's Bugsy but it is small personal films like 1978's Fingers and 1997's Two Girls and a Guy that have earned him hipster cred among Hollywood's cool young elite. The filmmaker encourages his actors to become involved in the creative process. In Campbell's case, "I came to her with 35 pages of script and we ended up talking for 12 hours and throwing ideas around and becoming very inspired by each other," he tells us on the DVD commentary track. (We also learn on the DVD that the film was shot in 12 days followed by 8 months of editing. Toback's tips on how to shoot fast and cheap are essential viewing for any young filmmaker with big themes and a miniscule budget.) Campbell won the best reviews of her career for her performance but the entire cast sink their teeth into the meaty provocative dialogue with relish. The script has Vera, described by Campbell on the DVD as "empowered, somewhat manipulative but strong ", exacting an unexpected revenge on her fast-talking hustler boyfriend (Frederick Weller) after he attempts to negotiate a tryst with an elderly billionaire (Dominic Chianese of Sopranos fame ) who has become fixated on her and willing to pay any price to indulge his obsession.The improbable plot line serves as a vehicle for Toback to explore his "curiosity about sexuality and physicality but also human nature and what drives people to do the things they do." (Toback leaves it to his cast to improvise their own sex scenes - like a lesbian encounter between Campbell and Ashley Shelton.) The prickly auteur has a cheerful disregard for conventional rules of film-making and it shows. The conversation between the professor and Vera probably goes on too long and there is a bizarre scene with boxer Mike Tyson that defies description. Yet Toback makes no apologies. "With this film there is no right or wrong answer. The way that people respond or decide who Vera is has a lot to do with who they are, which I find interesting."

jack78902001 I agree with most of the other comments. The filming was amateurish, and I'd hope that all the actors in it lied about being in such a joke.I agree that the dialog had a 'Woody Allen' flavor. In fact, his name is mentioned in the movie. I'm wondering if he really directed it, but knew later that it would be such a horrible stinker that he took his name off of it.Neve is a beautiful woman, and they used her beauty to fill the theaters. Her character was also masochistic. Her 'Ratso Rizzo' boyfriend was a sleezebag who did nothing to help the film. In fact, the Count's character was the only redeeming part of it. I thought he was believable as an aging billionaire who usually got what he wanted. Although he could have gotten prettier and more intelligent women for far less than a million bucks.All in all, it stankEverJackI've seen few films that I would call terrible, but this is one of them.EverJack

emdoub Okay - I'm a fan of Neve Campbell, which is the primary reason I rented this flick. She shows considerable acting chops here - which is even more impressive when you consider the lack of opportunity for her character to develop.Truth be told, most of the acting was pretty well done. Great soundtrack, pretty views of NYC, wonderful cinematography - this could be a great movie. Neve gets naked during the opening credits? Oh, yeah - settle in and enjoy... enjoy.... um....Shot in 11 days, this film features the writer/director playing a Jewish Professor of Black Studies, Lori Singer playing herself with a rude boyfriend, Mike Tyson playing someone else that just looks like Mike Tyson. Fred Weller plays the sleazy hustler boyfriend (unfaithful, no less) of rich-girl Vera (Neve), Damon Dash plays nice to a guy on the sidewalk who's trying to hustle him, and about half of the cast plays characters with their own names - someone was running low on creativity at this point.Running 81 minutes, about half of the scenes went about twice as long as they should have - which comes out okay, because the other half had nothing to do with story progression or character development. That was okay, too - because the story didn't have anywhere to go to, and after the first 15 minutes, you don't want the characters to develop - you want them to either make sense or go away. (Some make sense - but annoy deeply.) Upshot of the plot - a beautiful young woman of the leisure class bounces between being approached for sex or approaching strangers on the street, asking for phone numbers. A man touted as the most important media mogul of Italy offers a hustler $100,000 for an introduction to his girlfriend - and when she says it's not sufficient, goes out and hits banks to score a million in cash for her. She tells boyfriend that there was no cash, and Bad Things Happen - after which we see that the poor little rich girl is a Bad poor little rich girl.The point? See Neve naked, I guess. Her acting is fine - her taste here, however, is a little shaky.