Protraph Lack of good storyline.

ChicRawIdol A brilliant film that helped define a genre

pointyfilippa The movie runs out of plot and jokes well before the end of a two-hour running time, long for a light comedy.

Jemima It's a movie as timely as it is provocative and amazingly, for much of its running time, it is weirdly funny.

jai-38 The late and truly great Spalding Gray wrote and performed a number of brilliant monologues made into films by significant directors but none really better than "...Cambodia". Jonathan Demme and his cinematographer John Bailey ("Silverado"), as well as composer/"new wave" artist Laurie Anderson, perfectly complement Gray's vision of the here and there, the then and now, as well as history and movie-reality as he talks beautifully and insightfully and with deathly funny vision for over eighty minutes. It's a history lesson, a making-of-"The Killing Fields" and a perfectly bizarre philosophical treatise all at once. Roger Ebert once opined that "My Dinner With Andre" made a good counter-point double feature with "2001". I agree. Then watch Gray's "...Cambodia" after, maybe, "Star Wars"; great movies are wonderful things and come in many shapes and sizes.

mirok First let me tell you -- Spalding Gray was a man who could mesmerize, as his numerous one-man shows are evidence of. This is a "short movie" -- only about 90 minutes instead of a full 2 hours -- but it's positively compelling and makes you wonder why you didn't hear about it, why it didn't get that much publicity in your neck of the woods, etc. until you were lucky enough to stumble across it.One thing I adore finding are movies that can be paired up as a double feature. An example would be Ed Wood's last film, Plan 9 from Outer Space, together with Tim Burton's homage work, Ed Wood. Watch them together and it's just great. I would also recommend watching The Killing Fields, in which Gray plays a minor role (as the U. S. Consul in Phnom Penh) and this movie, in which he talks about the making of said movie.Remember that this is a topical movie because it was made in 1987. By that time the infamous "killing fields" were gone and Pol Pot's regime had been driven out of Cambodia by rebels supported by the Vietnamese. However, the Heng Samrin regime was far from democratic and for some strange reason the UN continued to recognize the Khmer Rouge regime -- the one led by Pol Pot -- as the legitimate government of Cambodia in one of history's craziest throws of the cosmic dice. It was not until the early 1990s that peace and democracy finally came to that troubled country.For quite some years this movie was available only on VHS. I wondered when it would ever come out on DVD. Finally it's available on DVD so I say there's no excuse not to go out and get it.

zetes One day a couple of years ago, while I was waiting for a television show, I was flipping through the channels and I caught part of Spalding Gray's monologue film -Monster in a Box- and I was so blown away by it that I missed the show that I had been waiting for. I don't know why it took me so long to rent another one of his monologue films, but this week I picked up his first one, -Swimming to Cambodia-. It was good, but nowhere near as good as -Monster in a Box-.For one thing, -Monster in a Box- was very well directed, and the "special effects" do not get in the way. But in -Swimming to Cambodia-, the sound effects are often too loud, and thecutting is too quick and artsy, when it should have been nothing but slow pans and zooms, sort of like -My Dinner With Andre-. Then there is this awful effect with the lights, basically shutting them off to cut the emotional rhythm. This was unneeded. Gray's performance itself establishes rhythm enough.My second big complaint is with the monologue itself. It is mostly very interesting, but it is not polished or cohesive. Just as he does in -Monster in a Box-, Gray alternates between very hilarious narrative (such as the descriptions of the sex acts in Thailand) and very harrowing narrative (such as the descriptions of Pol Pot's revolution). That technique works extraordinarily in -Monster in a Box-, but the two halves of the narratives don't seem to do with each other at all. The funny half concerns the work on the movie -The Killing Fields-, and the harrowing half very intensely examines the true story of the Kamir Rouge and America's dealing with these kinds of situations. Also, the monologue seems to end almost arbitrarily.This film is definitely worth a rental. It is under 90 minutes, which I always count as a plus. But if you want to be impressed, rent -Monster in a Box-. 7/10

Will-84 This movie is totally amazing, one long, mind-blowing story that is by turns riotously funny and utterly chilling. It will restore your faith in the power of a single human being to transport the audience to a whole new place, time, and mind using just WORDS.