Surprisingly incoherent and boring

For all the hype it got I was expecting a lot more!

Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

Edmond is a film maker's experiment that focuses on dialogue and character at the expense of plot and logic. The themes of societal conformity as well as sex and happiness are explored with varied success and this makes for an overall poor film with some redeeming qualities. This is based off a play of David Mamets', best known for dialogue centered films such as Glengarry Glen Ross, and directed by Stuart Gordon best known for the mediocre Pit and the Pendulum. If a film that is effectively small dialogue filled rants by David Mamet sounds appealing, then this may be your film, but for any casual film watcher this film is a disappointment. William H. Macy plays Edmond a regular 'Joe' who hits a breaking point and journeys on a descent into darkness as he becomes increasingly more sex crazed and violent. Each step is a separate vignette featuring an array of big name actors from Denise Richards to Bai Ling and Bokeem Woodbine, and many lesser known, industry talents such as Jeffery Combs. These actors are sometimes brilliant, but often bad, and rarely are their characters any more than a back drop for William H. Macy. At first I thought the always good Macy was doing a particularly poor job in this film. The character is one of the least likable movie heroes (or anti-heroes) in my memory. He is rude, thoughtless, crass, sexist and racist, and particularly cheap. Some great acting has allowed these characteristics to be likable, but not in Macy's case – Edmond is not endearing or redeemable. However, soon I realized he is actually doing a great job of making Edmond so unlikeable. It is hard to be so despicable. A good comparison would be Michael Douglas in Falling Down. However where we sympathize with Douglas as the world is slowly corrupted around him, Macy is simply a jerk who does not deserve our empathy. We as an audience find it hard to be engaged with Edmond and his fall from sanity is sudden and unrequired. This I am sure is somewhat intentional, but is hard to watch as an audience. The directing is poor, and maybe that is partly the source material, but the loose 'plot' of the movie is severely limited. There are clues and symbols that are left unexplored, and the themes are left unbalanced and unexplored. This movie may be some 3rd year film maker's dream, and may speak to some people who applaud Macy for his acting or Mamet for his brave dialogue, or an array of other actors for their brave performances, but as a film it fails.

This is a brief review of "Edmond" and "Glengarry Glen Ross", two films written by David Mamet.The lesser of the two, "Edmond" revolves around a businessman (William H. Macy) who has grown tired of the stresses and pressures of modern life. Trapped in an existential rut, and finding no love, purpose or satisfaction at work or at home, he breaks up with his wife and sets off for a night on the town. Here he hopes to hire a prostitute, but things don't go as planned, and pretty soon he's being arrested for a violent murder. The film is remarkably brisk (79 minutes), Mamet obsessed with modern emasculation and violent resentment, but weak direction by Stuart Gordon undermines his screenplay's better qualities.Capitalism as a slow train to hell, "Glangarry Glen Ross" is merely an ensemble version of "Edmond". Here the businessmen are a group of real estate agents who struggle to cope with deadlines and targets. They're fired by their company and given a ruthless ultimatum: sell or you won't be rehired. Eventually the pressure of meeting targets proves too much and one salesman commits a shocking crime.Filled with meaty dialogue and lengthy monologues, "Glengarry" is elevated by several bombastic moments by actors Al Pacino, Ed Harris, Alec Baldwin and Jack Lemmon. It's a joy to watch these actors chew scenery, even if the film ultimately amounts to a group of middle class, middle aged men, moaning about the drudgery of their 9 to 5 lives.7.5/10 - Worth one viewing.

William H. Macy gives a credible performance here as a frustrated middle-aged businessman who goes on an Odyssey in New York's night life and seems the seedy, steamy end of it all.Macy is almost like a Howard Beale (I'm mad and I'm not going to take it anymore character.) Angry with life and looking for a purpose and direction, Macy, as Edmond, really and quickly descends into insanity. With violence, immorality and mayhem around him, Edmond may be perceived as the victim here. Remember Ronald Colman's twisted Othello, when he kills waitress Desdemona? A similar fate is waiting for our hero as well.The hell of prison life is well depicted here with Macy being sodomized and hence drawn into a homosexual relationship.This is one mad descent into a hell-like atmosphere. It's just too upsetting to watch deviance at its worst.

Edmond Burke (William H. Macy) has grown frustrated with his life, and after a visit to a tarot reader, he has decided to start a new life. And that new life is going to start with some sexual fantasy and a bit of violence... where will it go? While I have no interest in talking poorly about writer David Mamet, this film is much like "Falling Down" with Michael Douglas, another white-collar man who goes through a mental break. Sadly, the difference is in style: this film is more artistic, and "Falling Down" is more gripping. Where Douglas can be fierce and menacing, Macy can only come off as nervous... even his most violent moments do not have the emotional sincerity that Douglas exudes.Anyone who wants to rent this should be warned in advance, the back cover of the DVD is riddled with lies. It claims to "star" Mena Suvari, Denise Richards and Julia Stiles. That is a lie, as only Stiles has a scene of more than three minutes. You could just as easily say George Wendt or Jeffrey Combs star. The box also claims this is "a first rate mystery", but there is no mystery to be found in this film. None.Likewise, the film is a bit hard to categorize... it's something of a violent drama. Hollywood Video called it horror, and the box calls it a thriller. The thrills are minimal (this is a slow-paced film) and it is not horror in any traditional sense. Stuart Gordon is a great director and a very nice man, but fans should be aware that this falls more in line with "King of the Ants" or "Stuck" than it does with any of his more well-known horror masterpieces.I will not discuss the philosophical aspects. Edmond believes that "every fear hides a wish", and he has constructed an interesting racial theory. The viewer can take these however they like, I do not know if there is an overarching meaning behind any of it... I found they fleshed out Edmond's character but had little value beyond the film itself. The deleted scenes, a mere six minutes, add a bit of intrigue and should probably have remained, especially with the film running only 82 minutes.Stuart Gordon or David Mamet fans should see this one. It's not going to blow you away, and beyond little thrills like a Jeffrey Combs cameo and some semi-nudity from Julia Stiles, it is not the most memorable. But Gordon's career is best understood in its complete vision, and this is outside the scope of his better-known work.