Love Liza (2002)

What a waste of my time!!!

Brilliant and touching

The plot isn't so bad, but the pace of storytelling is too slow which makes people bored. Certain moments are so obvious and unnecessary for the main plot. I would've fast-forwarded those moments if it was an online streaming. The ending looks like implying a sequel, not sure if this movie will get one

It's a movie as timely as it is provocative and amazingly, for much of its running time, it is weirdly funny.

Excellent film beautifully made holding back on clichés and familiar themes. A classic example of a film that many people would struggle with hence some negative responses. The beauty of this film is that it challenges you and leaves you completely engrossed and wondering what would happen next. Hoffman as expected was very very convincing and so believable. He gives the viewer so much-his expressions and breathing too mean that you get an idea of his character before he even speaks. Of course the theme is horrible but overall this film isn't as depressing as it looks. I can't speak highly enough about this and deserved so much more credit and exposure than it actually got. An absolute gem.

'Love Liza' tells the story of a young man's, Wilson's (Philip Seymour Hoffman) grief and struggle to come to term with the suicide of his wife, Liza. Gordy Hoffman's screenplay is a character driven piece that is covered with layers of darkness as it frighteningly reveals the disturbing effect of suicide on loved ones. It isn't an easy film to watch but it's insightful and a courageous effort. Todd Louiso does a competent job. His direction is minimalistic so as not to distract the viewer from Wilson. As character-driven films significantly depend on the lead actor, 'Love Liza' required someone of considerable talent and what a performance by Philip Seymour Hoffman. Admittedly he has played similar roles before and that too with excellence. Thus, he's just the right candidate for the part. Hoffman's effortless and understated portrayal is devastating. Kathy Bates is equally transcendent as Wilson's mother-in-law who is dealing with her daughter's death and frantically worrying about her son-in-law. Sarah Koskoff and Jack Kehler provide excellent support. Needless to say, 'Love Liza' is dark, disturbing and difficult to watch but a commendable effort that may be harder to overlook.

CONTAINS MAJOR SPOILAGE.Philip Seymour Hoffman is great, but the first act is too damn slow and there are story problems: Firstly, the mechanics and experience of huffing gas. No one I know knows what it's like and the movie doesn't tell us. Just seems like it makes everything blurry and eases his pain. One thing I do know is that it causes brain damage, and that leads to slurred speech and a swiss cheese memory. PSH shows us some of that, but only a little. But it wasn't clear to me that he'd never huffed gas before the time-frame of the movie and I spent the first half hour certain that his wife killing herself had something to do with his addiction to inhalants.Two other plot points are problematic: it was obvious that his mother-in-law was the one who stole his stuff (because thieves wouldn't steal all your lousy clothes and silverware and plates and chairs), but we never saw any kind of confrontation between the protagonist and the closest thing this movie has to his antagonist. The actors didn't even speak to each other, it was all left unsaid -- a deliberate non-climax. And finally, the fire. Pretty obvious: if you have a main character who has a close personal relationship with gasoline, sooner or later there's going to be a fire.PSH walks away down the middle of the highway at the end, having learned nothing whatsoever. Not even about his wife's death -- the mysterious macguffin letter isn't exactly banal, but it's cryptic and impersonal and doesn't tell him anything he needs to know. Not why she did it, and not how to live with what she did. It actually tells him to "bear it". I'd walk away too.So in the end, the hero has burnt down his house, quit one job and been let go from another, alienated the few friends and family members he has left, and probably is suffering from brain damage. Wherever it is he's going, it's not going to go well for him. Redemption, if it's in the cards at all, is many year and many stories in the future.In a way this reminds me of Last Days, and of course there's the obvious comparison to Leaving Las Vegas. But unlike the latter, this movie doesn't chart a clear course of deterioration. The hero simply becomes more and more unfocused, and while he does end up worse than when he started, somehow it's not the ultimate endpoint. The story isn't finished. We're just given a little slice of (hellish) life.There are some really unlikable supporting characters -- his boss, who hits on him even knowing how inappropriate it is. And his mother-in-law is a closed book. We know she misses her daughter, but her attempts to reach out to Wilson (PSH) are tentative and unfinished. It's the unfinished nature of these emotional gestures I find so annoying. And in one grand messed-up gesture she steals ALL his things so she can read the famous letter, and it's this loss that sends him into his tailspin at the end.Sure I've got Hollywood-honed reflexes for things like this, and yes it's true that in real life, people's gestures are unfocused, weak and incomplete. But I don't watch movies for Real Life. I want something better. Clearer. I suppose I could acquire the taste for the beats of indie films like this, but as Harry Dean Stanton said in Twister: "It seems to me a person can acquire a taste for just about anything. The question is, why would you want to?" I know I'm showing my middlebrow tastes by griping about it. But I also know these incomplete gestures are what kept the movie from reaching a broader audience.With better editing this could have been a much stronger movie. Speed up the first scenes, explain to us more fully how he gets fascinated with huffing gas -- the movie was so close and yet so far on this point -- the writer and director could have made us understand that huffing gas was (perhaps) a way for Wilson to be close to his wife, the way some people will cuddle a loved one's clothing when they're not there.And finally, when the house (inevitably) bursts into flames? Leave us right there. End the movie at the point where it becomes clear he's not going to be able to put this fire out, and it's going to destroy everything. Just fade to black. Love Liza is a movie full of unanswered questions, so let's leave this one unanswered: does he live or does he die? We don't need to know.BTW why was there even a match in the envelope in the first place? I mean, aside from serving the plot. The dead woman is another cipher. Was it intentional or an accident? Did it means something personal to them? Or did she want Wilson to burn their home down? WTF?

Love Liza is a brilliant study into the mind of a man who seemingly had everything in life, a good career, a house and a wife who he loved. Hoffmans portrayal of a man driven over the edge by his wife's suicide. Hoffman struggles with addiction and pain throughout the movie, he carried this film, the writing i thought was amazing, the direction was not that great, but the effort was there.Now with that said let's move to probably the greatest soundtrack i've ever heard, Jim O Rourke who i am a huge huge fan of gave this movie more life then it had, he put songs from his four albums on there and they just captivated me even more, his lyrics are poetry, his guitar playing again is poetry, and after meeting him many times, the man is exactly like his lyrics and music, weird and beautiful and also a bit out of his mind, songs like "Movie on the way down" and "Get a room" make this such a command movie, its one of my favorites and will continue to be for a very long time.