Living the Dream (2006) User Reviews

To close to home (spoiler ahead)

[dmacias666 · 3/10 · 25 November 2006]

This movie is a real low budget production, yet I will not say anything more on that as it already has been covered. I give this movie a low rating for the story alone, but I met the director the night I saw the film and he gave me an additional reason to dislike the movie. He asked me how I enjoyed it and I told him that it was not easy to like. My main objection was the lack of foundation for the relationship between the two main characters, I was never convinced that they were close. I also told him that the scene where the main characters were presented as children becoming friends was too late in the film.

He told me that the flashback scenes were not in the original script. That they were added because he felt like I did that the two main characters did not appear close. He went on to explain that these scenes were not filmed to his satisfaction as they were out of money. I agree that they did not do much for the film.

Another fact about the movie, that I was not aware of, is the actor who had the lead wrote the script based on his own personal experience. This is usually a bad move as some writers do not take into consideration the emotional reaction the viewer. The story is so close to home that the writer make too many assumption as to the audience's reaction to his own tragedy. And the story is tragic. However, it did not work for me as I never cared for any of the characters, least of all the lead. What was presented were two evil people out to make a buck by any means, regardless who gets hurt. When Ms. Young's character decides to give up he evil ways, it appears that she does so because she is ineffective, not because she knows she is doing wrong. If the movie has a message then I suspect that only the writer is aware of it.

Could have been worse?

[Filmnerd1984 · 3/10 · 3 January 2008]

jeez, this was immensely boring. the leading man (Christian Schoyen) has got to be the worst actor i have ever seen. and another thing, if the character in the movie moved to America when he was ten or something and had been living here for over 20 years, he would speak a lot better English than what he pulls of here. or to say it in my own Language "Skikkelig gebrokkent". But it is cool to see Norwegian dudes in a movie made in Hollywood. it was just a damn shame they were talentless hacks. The storyline itself is below mediocre. I have a suspicion that Christian Schoyen did this movie just to live the dream, as he clearly does in the film by humping one beautiful babe after another.

Wow, this is a REALLY bad movie. Ouch.

[joidevie · 1/10 · 6 December 2006]

If I could give this movie less than a 1, I would certainly do that. I had read a review of this film in the LA Times and I found myself walking by the theater and remembered the review. My wife and I were game and we thought it can't be as bad as the critic said - you know critics. Sure enough... Give me a break with the awful acting, horrible camera work, poor use of the budget (that has been mentioned over and over again as an excuse). I've worked on films with smaller budgets that are 100 times better. It's the Director and the Producer that makes films work - they choose the teams. That's it. If they don't put it together and make it work...it simply won't. So, they didn't - and it doesn't. I don't think they can... I just had to take the time to write this review...though I'm sure the film crew doesn't appreciate this review - I hope I'm doing you all a favor with my wish for you to do well, but - in another career. Good luck.

Great movie!!!

[Jim_H · 27 September 2006]

I have to say that I was impressed by this small but very well done independent movie, which I saw at test screening in Los Angeles. The story is original and different and keeps you wondering and intrigued all the way to the end. It makes a strong point on focusing on a social message of how some people who get bullied as kids always have to carry their insecurities with them throughout life. But,this movie is for sure not for everyone. To relate to the story it's important to both have a good knowledge of the mentality in big cities such as Los Angeles and a good understanding of irony.

The actors do a great job with their characters. The best performances are by Sean Young (Brenda) and Christian Schoyen (Jonathan) who plays the immigrant. Both of these two main characters come across as believable and likable. Larry Drake as the insurance man and Danny Trejo also pull it off. Jeff Conaway's and Marilia Pera's performances are funny and adds flavor to the movie.

The technical quality of this low budget movie, which according to IMDb only had a production budget of $350,000.- is superior to many other much bigger budget movies out there. The director of photography has done an excellent job and I could not find one technical flaw when watching it. The same was with the sound, which is crystal clear throughout. The music by Daniel Tanzig and Felipe Grytz is settled and only plays when needed in the background. It never collides with the dialogue and makes you focus on the story and the characters.

The directors; Allan Fiterman and Christian Schoyen bring to the big screen a refreshing and interesting story. It's good to see that they have been successful in staying true to one style (drama) throughout the movie. Being a fan of unique and original independent movies I will give Living the Dream 9 out of 10 points.

this is a wannabee movie, I'm sorry to say

[michaelhill · 1/10 · 15 May 2006]

There have been many movies, on living the American dream. And this is one of them.

First of all, on the technical side, there is a lot wrong. The audio is bad, i had trouble understanding the dialogs here and there, and the camera positions could have been better.

They really tried to come up with a good movie, but for example the part where they show, how Jonathan is loosing himself in the dream,with girls, drugs and alcohol, is done very badly. The acting is very poor as well from all the characters in the movie.

I had a hard time watching it from the beginning till end, and couldn't wait for the movie to be over.

If your expectations are low, and you're bored on a Sunday with bad weather, watch it. If you in for a deep story with action, then this is not your movie.

Normally i would not have give a score of 1, but of 4.5 for this movie. But the reason i gave it a 1 is because of the bad audio, and camera uses, not to mention the bad cut scenes with cheesy effects.

LIVING THE DREAM: A "B" Film gone bad....very, very bad....

[screenwriter-14 · 1/10 · 26 November 2006]

How LIVING THE DREAM managed to get into the Laemmle 5 in West Hollywood is beyond me, as it is the worst film I have ever seen in my life. I should have known when the first scene opened in-gasp, Eugene, Oregon-,that this dud of a film with characters that you want to like and feel sorry for from their exclusion days from high school,but can't, as they are such losers, is so wooden and atrocious with dialog that is beyond bad.

Then, cliché, the three high school losers end up in LA, and here is where the film could have been realistic if it had shown them trying to find a career in acting. But no, one works as a used car salesman, the other is a true loser in a garage call center selling magazines. Even the bastard that runs the place has more audience appeal than that dreadful actor with the horrible foreign accent. And, they fraudulently get money from an insurance scam to set up an Executive Recruitment firm with no experience, just showing "the supposed good life" in LA night spots with a cast of actors that are so wooden and bad, they better not have SAG cards...

I could go on and on about this bad film, but I ended up walking out of the theater, which had at the start six people, and when I left four men were the only ones in the audience. I wanted to like this film, but I couldn't find one merit in the story, characters, writing, dialog, nor the actors. Whoever cast this film should retire. Amen...enough...

on a scale 1 to 10 its a 81/2

[bluscreenmedia · 8/10 · 6 May 2009]

Loved this movie seen it at NY film festival last summer it a real look at LA and how the end justifies the means SEAN YOUNG is Great AND THAT KID MATT Dallas from Kyle is in it. the story is about a couple of friends who gets dogged out in there life BUT come up with a plan a Porche a nice office and new wardrobe that changes there luck . It also makes you wonder if the end really justifies the means ,here comes the gold diggers more cash more parties and a whole lot of sex, they are living the dream. But what goes up must come down and these guys are so busy trying to ball that they forgot to spend time running their business and to top it off they used Danny Trejos money to party with . Rule number one never mess with Danny's money. Even I know that!!! Cool and relevant film great performances.

Danny Trejo is actually very cool I highly recommend this film when it comes out Very COO0000000000000L

Good written, not so good done, but certainly watchable

[Stibbert · 6/10 · 1 June 2006]

After seeing the rating here at IMDb and hearing the stupid accents on the trailer I didn't really have high hopes for this movie. Luckily it turned out to be much better than expected.

Meet Jonathan and Brenda. After given a hard time growing up they move to L.A. to pursue the American dream, only to find out all they who gave them a hard time in their childhood is still giving them a hard time and have found the dream they so desperately seek.

This is one of those films with a rather strong, original and out of the ordinary story. First off it's a story that many can relate to in one way or another. The film is well written with good characters and nice development. You may see where it's headed, but you don't mind cause there's so much to see on the way.

I would like to say that good characters are given life by good actors, but I'm afraid I can not. The acting is far from 100%. Worst is probably Christian Schoyen as Jonathan. His English is far from good and it's really annoying. Sean Young is OK, Danny Trejo rather good and Jeff Conaway simply good. A big surprise to me was Kristian Valen who did a much better performance then I'd expected and was among the better ones.

Alan Filterman does a nice job with the cinematography. Doesn't exactly qualify for an Oscar, but it's good enough. Nothing stands out as really good, but nothing stands out as really bad either. I didn't really like the editing. Some cheap and easy-way-out-solutions there and it could've been better. It's easy to see this is not the most experienced editor.

As for music it's simple, yet strong. I really liked the score as it brought out the feel and mood of the film very well. Bryan Galvez has done a good job there. They also use a lot of non-original music, but they do so wisely. They don't put too much focus on this music and mainly just let it run in the background and so they make the music fit the scene not trying to fit the scene to the music.

All in all Living the Dream is not gonna be one of the best film this year. If so something would be very wrong. Technically it's no wonder. It's below average. However, where this movie succeeds is telling an interesting and good story. That's why you watch this movie and this proves that it's the quality of the story not the size of the budget that decides if the will turn out good or not. I can't quite decide what rating to give it. However, my first response was 6 or 7, but ended on a 6 simply to say, this is as low as it goes.

Impressive and original

[AndrewH678 · 8/10 · 18 December 2006]

After reading the review in LA Times, which was actually pretty good I was tempted to see this "little" movie at Sunset 5. Especially after LA Times called it "misantrophic", with the "most hostile cinematic view of Los Angeles since the Oscar winner Crash". After also hearing that this movie was made by people with no background in film, shot during a summer holiday on a tiny budget I got even more curious.

The film itself was completely far out and made with such a hateful view of people that I could not stop laughing. To me the film was so dark and twisted that it was funny. But, I can easily also see why some people would strongly dislike it. The film basically mocks everybody and this was one of the few times I have ever seen a movie where every character is bad. Technically it was beautifully shot on film, the acting was good and the film had a clear message that people who get bullied as kids sometimes gets messed up for life. What impressed me the most though was to see how these filmmakers had decided to go their own way, instead of trying to please the audience with a hero and happy ending.

For the film itself I would normally have given it a score of 5. But, when hearing about the fact that it was made by people with no background in film, getting such great review in LA Times with a score of 2/5, which is better than many big movies I added another 3 points to the score. Bottom line; this was both impressive and original.