Please don't spend money on this.

A Surprisingly Unforgettable Movie!

It's complicated... I really like the directing, acting and writing but, there are issues with the way it's shot that I just can't deny. As much as I love the storytelling and the fantastic performance but, there are also certain scenes that didn't need to exist.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

Jeff Stanzler's second feature-length film is a lacerating gem of such unhinged chaotic force that it's hard to believe it got made in the first place. It's one of those movies that, especially if you know nothing going into it, consistently shocks and amazes you. It has a plot that makes a sick sort of cosmic sense but that couldn't possibly come from the mind of anyone but an independent film geek --- it's anti-derivative, if anything, and all the better for it.Robin Wright Penn gives what is probably the spookiest, most immediate portrait of a woman unhinged since Alex Forrest in Fatal Attraction. No...strike that. At least Alex seemed to have moments of genuine emotional regret. Penn's character is a hate-o-tronic machine, seething with disgust for the MTV-like cable station she slaves away at during the day, biding her time until she can trash luxury status symbols on off-hours, many of which belong to her former best friend, (Sandra Oh in another of her effortlessly breezy portrayals) whom she blames for wrecking her life.But Penn's character isn't just some random sociopath, she's a woman with a plan, and at the center of that plan is an innocent Muslim cab driver. After shanghai'ing him for a late evening-early morning cab ride out to Jersey from NYC, she lures him in with promises of legal help for his unjustly detained brother. It is gradually revealed that her motives are far more sinister and twisted, however, than just procuring an admirer for her over-active imagination.What's really incendiary about this film is the writing and Penn's performance. The script lets us know in a million little twists and slips-of-the-tongue just how bonko Penn's character is. She's like a human grenade on screen...her psychosis is ingrained so deep we never know just when the pin will fall out. It's a riveting performance.Much has been made of the finale, which, while shocking, is just about perfect in its style and execution. It's a great finish for a film that eloquently turns the tables on the myth that all hate, in America, comes from the outside. "Why? Why?" the cabbie beseeches Penn, after she has done much more damage than good for his brother's case. This is a question we often seem to be asking the terrorists...and the answer is no more comforting here than in real life. Sometimes hate isn't a grandiose statement...many times it's just cheap and ugly.

It is ironical that Sean Penn portrayed a violent psychopath so brilliantly in THE ASSASSINATION OF RICHARD NIXON only the year before (2004, see my review), and that his ex-wife Robert Wright Penn has here portrayed a female equivalent character equally brilliantly. Surely they should have stayed married if they can both psychose so well. Why not do it together rather than in separate films? Oh well, more people would probably get blown up that way. This film has an unfortunate title which is bound to have put everyone off and diminished the audience. After all, how is the public supposed to know that 'Sorry, Haters' is the title of a TV series about rich celebrities made by the company Robin Penn's character works for? OK, so it relates ultimately to this film as well, but that is really carrying subtlety too far, and was certainly counterproductive. This film was written and directed by Jeff Stanzler. Unlike many script writers, he can direct his own work very well indeed. And as for the script and the plot, they are so fantastically ingenious that this ranks as one of the most unexpected thrillers I have ever seen. It is a truly innovative film noir. It is very rare for any one to be clever enough to get such new angles and come up with a story this original in such a well-ploughed genre. There is nothing listed for Stanzler professionally in the five years since he did this. Is he getting his strength back after this harrowing and utterly brilliant shocker? The film twists our preconceptions about current events concerning terrorist atrocities into unrecognisable and novel shapes. The setup of a stooge in this film is just as ingenious as the one portrayed in ARLINGTON ROAD. Robin Penn begins the film as a highly strung and neurotic independent TV producer who takes a taxi. The driver is a devout Muslim who wears a little white hat but speaks fluent English and French. He is a refugee from Syria, and as he takes Penn on an extremely long drive costing about $200, he and she become acquainted. He stops off to see his sister-in-law (played by French actress Elodie Bouchez, see my review of her in PACT OF SILENCE, i.e. LE PACTE DU SILENCE, 2003) and baby niece. He is trying to get his brother released from confinement as a terrorist suspect and Penn offers to get a lawyer to draft an official letter for him about this to the authorities. But countless bizarre events happen, one after another, in bewildering succession, and it turns out that Penn is not a TV producer after all, but merely a lower-level employee of the company, and the office she had appeared to use was that of her old friend Phyllis, brilliantly played by Sandra Oh (who is of Korean extraction). Phyllis's husband and child turn out to be the ones which Penn had told the taxi driver were her own ex-husband and her own child, and this is revealed to be untrue. But that's only the beginning of the surprises. Things get stranger and stranger. It turns out that Penn, who is treated by Phyllis as her best friend, is really a sociopath and psychotic who secretly hates her and wants to harm her (she scratches the paint off her car covertly, for instance). But her moment of truth is when she revels in the fact that the only time Phyllis ever called her and 'was weak' and needed comforting was on the day of 9/11. She says: 'That was the only time I felt I was not just a nobody. I want that day back.' However, I do not want to ruin the surprises by telling any more. Suffice it to say that if you want to stage a terror attack in New York, and you are clever enough to blame it on an innocent Muslim whom you pick up in a taxi, well you might appear in this film. Abdel Kechiche, a Tunisian actor, does a superb job of playing the difficult and complex role of Ashade, the taxi driver. He fully matches the intensity of Robin Penn's performance with his own.

Interesting title, it turns out that "Sorry, Haters" is the title of a TV program that Robin Wright Penn's character Phoebe is associated with producing. The fictional program has wealthy flaunting the products of their wealth.As the movie begins we see her needing a cab ride, and she happens upon Abdel Kechiche as Ashade, a Muslim in NYC. Innocently enough Phoebe has him take her to New Jersey where we see her watching a family from afar, then going up to the new Lexus in the driveway and putting large scratches in it. Then, getting back in the cab and going home.It doesn't stop there, she ends up insinuating herself into his life, going to where he lives, and where he visits the French Canadian wife of his brother who was arrested and deported for the wrong reasons. Phoebe gains Ashade's confidence when she tells him she has connections that will help get his brother free.The movie is one of those where you can't take your eyes away, because you simply never know what is coming next, and most developments are not what you would expect. It helped overall to view the 14 minute DVD extra with Tim Robbins and several others discussing the movie and what they thought it meant.SPOILERS. Another character was Sandra Oh, as the big boss where Phoebe works. In fact, Phoebe misrepresented herself, told Ashade a series of lies, on a rooftop pretended to call a lawyer to get the brother freed. Phoebe has problems, and the one time she felt really useful was on 9:11 when her boss was frightened and asked for comfort. Her whole life now has become to try to recreate that feeling, all the while not caring about anyone else. In the last scene, she and Ashade are going somewhere, they pause at the top of subway stairs, puts something in his pocket saying "my parents gave me this, I want you to have it." Then she pushes him down the stairs, a few seconds later an explosion as she walks away. In a final act of terrorism she tosses her dog into an oncoming truck and walks away. She no longer needed the one thing that was comforting her.

This film focuses on a few people in New York City whose lives have been altered indirectly by the events of 9/11...viewers will be thinking about it for a long time afterward. It forced me to look at my own thoughts and actions regarding prejudice, stereotypes and assumptions about other people. How many times have you unfairly formed an opinion of someone based upon initial appearances or pre-conceived notions? I know that I'm guilty of it (and too often). The movie's examination of this topic is especially timely - given the current level of intolerance in the United States, and the lack of accountability within a government system supposedly based upon liberty and justice for all.Although Phoebe (the blond, fair-skinned American) appears to be "normal" to the rest of the world...she is actually a very disturbed, dangerous person who has been poisoned by her own loneliness, paranoia and hatred. Meanwhile, the Muslim characters (who find themselves in a very unfortunate situation through no fault of their own) are deeply spiritual, well- educated and harmless. Phoebe's distorted perception is that she is the victim, and she empowers herself through acts of vandalism, self-mutilation (cutting) and violence.I won't give away the ending, but be prepared to say "Wow!" I was emotionally exhausted after watching the film, and discussion of the scenes and characters continued at our house for several days. Realism and great cinematography are the icing on the cake of this powerful film. I recommend it highly.