SnoopyStyle It's 1951. Marcus Messner (Logan Lerman) works at his father's butcher shop. They're observant Jews in Newark, New Jersey. He is left off the Korean draft by going to college in Ohio to study law. It's a small conservative school where Jews are a small minority. He rejects the Jewish fraternity. His atheism attracts troubled Olivia Hutton (Sarah Gadon).Based on a novel by Philip Roth, this is James Schamus' theatrical directing debut. He's worked on many great movies over the years mostly under Ang Lee. I love Marcus' awkward confusion about getting a blow job. It's definitely different from anything I've seen before and it's weirdly funny. There is a strange awkwardness in the writing which I mostly attribute to the characters. There is real discomfort with the dean. There's also some disconnections. Olivia is the first to claim that Marcus is an atheist which is weird. There has to be a missing scene where they discuss religion and he comes out to her. She didn't say it as a guess and I don't think he gave it away earlier. I'm really taken with both Logan Lerman and Sarah Gadon. They are really good actors. This is an interesting first stab by Schamus but directing may not be his best skill.

ford-41419 Great movie very suspenseful and entertaining, Logan's performance was amazing to watch he captured the character so well

morebeautifulquitters After seeing this movie I am astounded that I myself survived at all, however marginally, after finishing my college education. Probably I shouldn't have. This film taught me way more about myself, and the diabolical twists and turns of a self-created life...than about what I was supposed to understand about what kids think about the wars raging all around them, about why Roth picked the material he wrote about, or about why some themes in life get recognized and why some don't. It's still an OK film and of course I will be reading the novel next. I assume there will be far more fine-tuned nuance there, and I also suspect I will personally feel maybe more invisible as well. Still plan to publish this reader- review and still plan to writhe through many more twists and turns in my own astoundingly improbable and invisible life. And while I'm doing that I'll probably read "A Separate Peace" one more time and then maybe get smug about how the movie for that book likewise failed to hold up. Or maybe I'm just obsessed on who can "pass that inspection" and who can't.

jonathanastickneypublic (no spoilers in the following section) While the movie and characters are well constructed and an interesting story is told, it ultimately falls apart in a way the writers, directors and everyone involved should have known. Mistakes like these continue to be made and when the movies fail, those involved are somehow surprised. This movie barely broke 3 million dollars world wide. They failed to ask themselves "Who in this world goes to a movie saying 'i want to leave the theater depressed as heck'". The answer is 'Nobody'. News got around and nobody want to see this film.(spoilers follow from here, though not super specific) This movie had a path to greatness and the writers ignored it. They opted for a depressing movie, once they change gears from happy to sad, The mother blackmails the son into leaving his G/f, She gets committed and gets shock therapy and no longer seems to be... 'alive', (she lost her spark), he gets kicked out of school because the principal is a horrible person who hates atheists(violating the law in doing so) and then he dies in the Korean war because hes not in school. Its like they thought "hay how could we make this as sad as possible? how could we ruin a great movie and loving relationships?"