Plantiana Yawn. Poorly Filmed Snooze Fest.

Incannerax What a waste of my time!!!

Sharkflei Your blood may run cold, but you now find yourself pinioned to the story.

Myron Clemons A film of deceptively outspoken contemporary relevance, this is cinema at its most alert, alarming and alive.

bardlover Kenneth Branagh is excellent in this film. He plays a character a bit like Mike Church in Dead Again, a bit of a jerk who believing becomes a good guy. I found the comedy amazing, and the relationship with the little girl was heart wrenching. The scene where she falls when dancing and embarrasses her mother... The other "Peter" could easily be a two dimensional character, but through his conversations with Pete we see into his psyche. Even I was shocked by his behavior in the end. David Krumholz who is known for playing math genius Charlie in Numbers is hilarious as a flaming gay stage director. Robin Wright Penn is also good, although I think the hair color choice lacking. A fantastic movie.

qlangiul If this should have been a comedy, it has been the worst one I've ever seen. I tried to think what genre it was, I couldn't even do that. I tried to look at it as a comedy, I tried it as a drama, but nothing. The entire movie I tried to figure out what does the title have to do with the actual movie. The neighbor's dog appears late in the movie and the worst part about it is that the main character isn't even trying to kill the dog, the movie's plot has absolutely nothing to do with the killing of that dog. The movie is about the way some guy feels about how he's life would be if he had a child. It was a total waist of my time.

bazandjen The script gives Branagh a full range of comedy styles to work with - scathing comments, witty repartee, crude slapstick - it all works together well because the thread is coherent and always looks beyond the humor to the realistically portrayed underlying moral issues. These issues include disability and how it is experienced not only by those living with a disability but, more importantly, by those close to them. Another issue is the McGowan's differences of opinion on having children and how their growth in their relationship and themselves affects this. Laugh-lovers, however, should not despair, as the script does not degenerate into maudlin or overblown consideration of these issues - rather it deals with them as they come up, realistically, but with good doses of humor along the way, rather like in 'real life'.

rosscinema This film starts out as a dark comedy but about halfway through it turns on the sentimentality. Story is about a Los Angeles playwright that is in production with his new play and is having a terrible time with re-writes. Kenneth Branagh plays Peter McGowan and along with his play he and his wife Melanie (Robin Wright Penn) are trying to conceive a child and he is having difficulty with that also. Peter chain smokes and is not to crazy about kids but he is introduced to his new neighbors daughter Amy (Suzi Hofrichter) who has cerebral palsy. Melanie's mother Edna (Lynn Redgrave) is suffering from advanced senility and lives with them and Peter is having a difficult time concentrating on his play. And he also has a difficult time sleeping at night because his neighbors dog keeps barking so Peter goes for midnight walks and meets a man from England (Jared Harris) that has been telling everyone that he is Peter McGowan when in fact he's just an obsessed fan. This film is directed by Michael Kalesniko who wrote the screenplay for "Private Parts" and he displays a knack for showing the struggles of a writer but aside from that this is a film that meanders until it eventually wears itself out. Redgrave seems completely wasted as the senile mother of Penn. She has one effective scene with Branagh as she lies in bed but other than that her role is relegated to wandering about their home in a trance. Penn plays her role rather straight forward but she displays real charm that I think she's never really shown before on screen. Not a complicated part but she gives it her all. The film starts out with showing all of Peters quirks and difficulties but once that is done the film wanders and meanders until its reduced to Peter getting very sentimental over his neighbor Amy. Branagh is believable as a writer but all the events that go on around him are not.