williamdeanauthor My title says it all. No spoilers here: Something would actually have to happen in the movie for me to spoil it. I'm pretty sure there are less than 30 seconds of dialogue (not counting the shouting of names). You could, literally, watch this movie on fast forward without missing a thing. This may be art but it is not entertainment.

expe67 this movie is bad.it's boring and it's stupid.these guys walk around a mile, or so it seems from the direction,and then they decide to turn back and walk around a week to nowhere,they have no hiking and camping gear,no water,no compass,not even a packbag.they just decide to walk without knowing the area.why does matt decide to kill casey?to spare him of what?they don't seem to have come at the end of their rope yet.they are a little sunburned but nothing spectacular.OK they are tired and hungry and thirsty.but they are kids who still have strength.i don't buy this dramatic kill scene AT ALL.and then just as he kills him there is a highway about a mile ahead.and matt seems calm inside the car.the whole thing is ridiculous.it's a REALLY BAD AND BORING MOVIE.with a little push it could have been a satire movie called THE TWO IDIOTS.maybe that way it would work somehow.

ramoajulia This is one of the slowest movies I've seen in a while.One way to describe the majority of the long and still takes is to say that they are basically photographs but with slights signs of movement - which makes it beautiful to look at for such a long while.At the end of the movie, I came to the conclusion that its purpose was to make the viewer an merely observer of the landscape but not in a submissive way, since we are the ones responsible to add some meanings to this reticent plot.(I also thought that the scenes were so lethargic that it was almost like playing backwards... Which gave me the idea of watching it again fast-rewinding the hole movie. Haven't done it yet, but probably will see some interesting results, who knows.)

Steve Pulaski Gus Van Sant's Gerry is a mesmerizing movie-experience that won't likely be liked, or even experienced, by traditional moviegoers. We don't really know or realize it, but seeing so many dominate Hollywood films and movies that boast bigger budgets and bigger agendas have made us more accepting towards the films that show/do more. Think about it; would the public rather see a story that is character/plot heavy or a one-hundred minute long film about two characters listlessly roaming a desert terrain? That is the plot of Gerry in the biggest sense; the two men are both named Gerry (played by Casey Affleck and Matt Damon), and decide to venture out to explore the mountains, get lost, and continue to wander without hydration or a means of food in an effort to find their car. This is a story that begs further explanation and a viewer-made meaning. It is part of a genre of film, I label, impressionism, meaning the film gives you a vague story, thinly-developed characters, and an ambiguous plot and almost forces you to find a meaning in its content. The ultimate goal, if there is one, is to find a meaning that works, or even try to distinguish the meaning from the director's point-of-view. Gerry was Gus Van Sant's venture into independent cinema after years of making studio features, and began his self-named "Death Trilogy." What followed was the spectacular Elephant, centering around a seemingly typical day in the life of kids at a high school that ended tragically, and Last Days, about a rocker suffering blowbacks from society and the weight of fame.One thing all of these films have in common is they appear to be loosely predicated off of a true-life event. Elephant seems to mirror the events of the Columbine High School massacre in the late nineties, Last Days is a loose adaptation of the final days of Kurt Cobain, the lead singer of Nirvana, and Gerry has been said to bear similarities to David Coughlin, a far less famous man who was killed by a friend when they were lost in the desert in 1999.The way I see it, when it comes to the "Death Trilogy," is that Van Sant is trying to provide some sort of interpretation to the largely unknown stories of the events that lead up to those three tragedies. To this day, all of those events remain largely black and white, and perhaps Gerry, Elephant, and Last Days serve as some sort of account of what Van Sant believes happened that day.As for Gerry, this can be a film that tests your patience in every possible way. Scenes are photographed with stunning clarity, the conversations are not consistent, often touching on random topics such as video games and personal frustrations, long patches of silence are not atypical, and the film's one-hundred minutes feels every bit like it. There is enough scenes of constant walking here to equate to a real-life hike; one scene reaches an upwards of five minutes, focusing in on the two's expressions as they walk the vacant desert. As time goes on, their walk becomes brisker, faster in pace before finally they stop. The scene's tension is played out nicely due to the fact that we can't see what they're walking towards, if anything, and we begin to feel their frustration explicitly through tone and focus.The film is not the easiest sit I've had in my time of watching films. At times maddeningly uneventful, and at others, tense and jolting, it's safe to label Gerry an eclectic mixed-bag of impressionistic style. Casey Affleck and Matt Damon are efficient in their open roles, and the film's beautiful landscapes are photographed through the piercingly clear vision of the cameras, making this for a delightful scenic film, especially when the hypnotic tendencies and mirages begin to set in. With Gerry, Van Sant has effectively made his most damning work.Starring: Casey Affleck and Matt Damon. Directed by: Gus Van Sant.