Acensbart Excellent but underrated film

SteinMo What a freaking movie. So many twists and turns. Absolutely intense from start to finish.

Frances Chung Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

Tobias Burrows It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

HotToastyRag Noises Off. . . is the film version of Michael Frayn's play, but before you write this movie off, hear me out. I know lots of plays are boring and wordy and absolutely painful to get through, if you can get through them at all. Noises Off. . . is not that type of play.Whether you see it onstage—with a good cast and timing—or rent the film, this is an absolutely hilarious show. Use the bathroom beforehand, because it's one of the most side-splittingly funny films ever. The key to a fantastic execution of this quick, witty script is an excellent cast and a director who can create impeccable timing. Peter Bogdanavich and his all-star case have made a flawless movie.Michael Caine stars as the proverbial shouting, hair-pulling, unreachable director of a play. His assistant is the nervous, mousy Julie Hagerty, who can never get a word in. The actors in his show are Carol Burnett, Denholm Elliot, Marilu Henner, Christopher Reeve, John Ritter, and Nicollette Sheridan. They all flesh out their archetypes beautifully, with Carol as the know-it-all, Marilu as the classic diva, Chris as the well-meaning idiot, and Nicollette as the bimbo who's only been cast because she looks good in her underwear.The first part of the film is the rehearsal for the show, and while there are many stops and starts, the audience can see that the cast is nowhere near ready for their performance. Then, the tables are turned —literally—and the audience is placed backstage. The same play is run through, but this time, we see the never-ending drama that occurs backstage in every production known to man. It's hilarious for non-theater people, but even more funny and true-to-life for those who have ever dabbled in the arts.I can't recommend this comedy highly enough; even if you don't normally like plays, give it a chance. It's so adorable and flawlessly executed. I guarantee it'll change the way you think of theater—unless you're in that world yourself. In that case, it'll remind you of every show you've ever been in.

SnoopyStyle Director Lloyd Fellowes (Michael Caine) is panicking over the Broadway opening of his play "Nothing On". The movie flashes back to the final dress rehearsal in Des Moines, Iowa six months ago. Actress Dotty Otley (Carol Burnett) has put her life savings into the play and brought in senile alcoholic mentor Selsdon Mowbray (Denholm Elliott). She's sleeping with younger co-star Garry Lejeune (John Ritter). Frederic Dallas (Christopher Reeve) is questioning every move after his wife left him. Lloyd is sleeping with clueless Brooke Ashton (Nicollette Sheridan) who keeps losing her contacts but he's also sleeping with stage manager Poppy Taylor (Julie Hagerty). Belinda Blair (Marilu Henner) rounds out the cast in the play and Tim Allgood (Mark Linn-Baker) is the stagehand worked to the bone. Later, there is the famous matinée in Miami Beach where everything goes haywire as relationships blow up.The play within the movie is a rather unfunny British farce. That may be the point of the movie but it's not funny to watch. It's a lot of slamming doors, running around and people speaking in various levels of semi-British accents. In contrast, the behind the scenes with Noises Off is a frantic fun ride. It's a throwback to the silent era slapstick and it's wonderful. I may not be following everything but it's loads of fun anyways. It's a great 20 minutes but the rest is not as much fun.

T Y 'Noises Off' concerns a bad play performed from different angles, 3 times in a row. The movie was previously a stage hit and each of the 3 internal performances was clearly an act unto itself. Act 1 shows a disastrous rehearsal. Act 2 involving an axe, and lots of silent pantomime has the funniest sustained moments. Act 3 results in a few amusing metaphysical impossibilities (related to the stage world) and, say, a few sentences composed entirely of nouns. At moments, it almost reaches a level of absurdity, and lingual absurdity, found in two or three Tom Stoppard plays, except that none of the laughs deepen things, or produces any meaning.The movie retains the plays structure and that decision is fatal. Both Acts 2 & 3 depict disastrous performances. And the artificiality in the film world of waiting for act 2 (back-stage disaster) to conclude, before showing Act 3 (front-stage disaster) is artificial and trying. It becomes very irritating to watch the play again and again (and again). If you're going to liberate the stage-hit with a moving camera and editing, as it is here, there's simply no natural reason in a film to endure the play three times. The camera should have moved between the best bits of act two, the best bits of act three and spare us the third repetition, which by that point is irritating beyond belief. Condense! We don't sit through Three Act "play transfers" anymore. There also comes a point in all of this that a viewer notes that the disastrous version of the play is not much different than an accurate performance of the bad play, so the stakes are very low. There's really only a handful of gambits (some rivalries, dropped pants, keeping a drunk sober, some lovers' quarrels) that are used so frantically & interchangeably that they become dross by Act 3. There's just no arc to it; nothing but superficialities develop over it's long length. And two hours of sitcom vacuousness is too much for me.The cast of familiar, second-tier American actors produces a distraction; one waits to see if each actor can do a British accent, and then it turns out not to matter (They're all playing bad actors). Oh what I'd give to see every movie ever made, made with no-name actors. Other strange choices produce confusion: We're supposed to believe that 40-something Ritter is romantically involved with 59 yr old Burnett? Oh well, what can you do? Burnett delivers most of the funny lines.

theowinthrop I was lucky enough to catch the Broadway production of NOISES OFF in the 1980s with Dorothy Louden, Paxton Whitehead, and Linda Thornton (yes, "Tara King" from THE AVENGERS), and enjoyed the weird construction of the deconstruction of a farce in three acts. I have to say that Michael Frayne's play was wonderful at showing the difficulties of producing a farce (in this case a third rate one), and the toll of repetitive performances and back-stage relationships have on the production crew and cast. Frayne thought of everything. At revivals now I don't know if they include it, but in my copy of the PLAYBILL, Frayne inserted a fake PLAYBILL giving the idiotic careers of the stars of the show and the director and his crew. It was as funny as the show was.Farce is at once the most popular form of theater and it's most difficult. To work properly everything must be timed and in place for the sequences to fall into clockwork like movements to the conclusion. All countries produce them. France produced a master of them in Georges Feydeau (see HOTEL PARADISO). But the British love them and at their best they occupy much of the West End and the major theaters in the rest of the isles. Frayne, of course, having his background in the theater is aware of this. But he is also aware of the worse part of it - that because of the popularity of the form too many hacks put their poor wits to it, and really make it tiresome.Such is the case with this particular farce in NOISES OFF (Frayne purposely gives it the name NOTHING'S ON as a counterpoint to the title of the actual play). From the beginning (when the cast are being directed by Lloyd Fellowes (Michael Caine)) we are gradually being aware that the author of NOISES OFF demolished a key portion of the play's plot to explain an additional confusion and twist in it (it explains why one character has to be disguised as an Arab sheik in the play - but now that bit of business is meaningless). There are also split second timing problems that increasingly mangle the jokes and situations due to backstage bickering. Watch for Carol Burnett's performance as the the housekeeper. As the play goes through more and more disastrous rehearsals and productions Burnett's Mrs. Clackett is slowly having a nervous breakdown over the word "sardine".Frayne has sexual interrelationships backstage between the lead players (Burnett, Chris Reeve, Marilu Henner, John Ritter, Nicolette Sheridan) as well as the production staff (Caine, Mark Linn-Baker, Julie Haggerty) create so much confusion and poison as to threaten the very health of the audience (Caine at one point hearing call after call over the theaters intercom system that the curtain will be rising in five minutes runs backstage announcing the incipient panic among the elderly retirees watching the play). Add to all this Desmond Elliot (in one of his last roles) playing the critical role in the farce of a burglar (who is supposed to end up in bed with Burnett) is a happy alcoholic who constantly misses his cues and proper entrance points (particularly if he has another fast one before going on). At one point Caine, Linn-Baker, and Elliot end on stage in the same role at the same time, reciting the same lines to the other performers!The play is destined for Broadway in five months. Will it survive the road tryouts? Will the cast and crew survive without killing each other off? Watch this very funny film to find out.