good back-story, and good acting

Bad Acting and worse Bad Screenplay

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

Watching it is like watching the spectacle of a class clown at their best: you laugh at their jokes, instigate their defiance, and "ooooh" when they get in trouble.

the name of Diann Fossey is a symbol. for profound dedication to her work, for the hard war for study and protect the gorillas population. this film is a homage. and, more important, a honest exercise to reflect about a life pillars. the seed of its success - extraordinary performance of Sigourney Weaver. because she has science, courage and force to do not only a credible character but a delicate, precise web from shadow and light. the empathy and the tension, the dedication and the veil of madness, the compassion and the admiration, each of them is used for create not an explanation for a death but to feel the entire pressure of story levels. it is a superb portrait and if, at beginning, it seems be a role for Colleen Dewhurst ( for physical resemblance ) or for chameleon Meryl Streep, Sigourney Weaver demonstrates, scene by scene, not only an impressive artistic potential but a beautiful measure of detail and exploration of subtle nuance.

Human learned a new technique called "Gorilla attack" and applied it against Human race in wars.Cunning poachers applied the technique against Gorillas from whom they learned it. When we go to the Zoo ,we simply enjoy them in captivity & never mind to know how the species were brought in & what kind suffering it had undergone during the operation. This is the class example ,how these animals are treated & brought to the ZOOs.The movie is based on the real story of an American lady- Dion Fossy -who dedicated her life for saving the Gorillas from extinction.Happened to see this movie 2nd time after 2 decades & wondered how the single Lady had flown from America & fought against local poachers & corrupted government, to save the life of Gorillas of Africa.Her murder is still a mystery.

With all due respect to the late Dian Fossey and to the legacy of her groundbreaking work among the mountain gorillas of central Africa, it should be noted that her big screen biography is little more than a glossy star package with postcard scenery and sentiments, presenting the anthropologist as just another white woman who goes into the jungle to 'find herself'. Sigourney Weaver gives the role plenty of energy (mostly by over-acting shamelessly), but the film suffers from too many tactical errors, beginning with a childishly simple script that reduces complex issues into one-dimensional conflicts between corrupt humankind and the unspoiled splendor of animal life in the wild. Critical moments are further undermined by gratuitous voice-over letters home and by Maurice Jarre's overwrought (and therefore not entirely inappropriate) music score. Even the expected romantic interest between Fossey and a handsome National geographic photographer is given the regulation Hollywood screen treatment, proving yet again that sincere intentions are never enough to salvage a trite and superficial film.

It is a shame how a movie treatment can be made of a world-renowned character, like Ms Fossey, that bears very little relationship to the person she was, as portrayed both by her own book and the books written about her.Her character remains unknown in this movie. And I've watched it for a second time now, to see if the first frustration with which I viewed it, when it was first released, had left me. No, it hadn't. It starts off poorly, with a fictionalized account of how Fossey met Louis Leakey, the famed anthropologist and how she begs him for a job. Simply not true. Fossey had already been to Africa at the time she met Leakey and he was the one who asked her to go there and work with the endangered gorillas, then numbering well under a 100. I don't even see the benefit of making this autobiographical change to the story. Fossey's motivation for going on this hazardous mission, leaving a fiancé in the U.S. is never explored. Was she is in love, as some speculate, with Leakey? Her love and interest in the gorillas is never in doubt and in real-life her obsession consumed her such that her eccentricity became sociopathic to the degree that her distrust of humans encompassed anyone who crossed her path from her students to the government of Rwanda.Her relationship with the National Geographic photographer is unfortunately Hollywoodized here and does not reach the intellectual level of harmony that they had in real life, they knew from the beginning , because of their individual interests and pursuits, that it was doomed to short-term, but celebrated the "in the moment" aspect of it. This could have been portrayed on screen a lot better.The shift to sociopathic personality, about halfway through the movie is too sudden to ring true and the ending feels rushed and "let's get it over with already". Her murder was appalling and undeserved but she had made many enemies, not the least of whom were her students from whom she demanded servility and unquestioning obedience.Sadly, I think she was ill-served in this bio-pic, perhaps a deeper psychological exploration of her character will be made at some point.However, the gorilla filming was breathtaking.6 out of 10.