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Fierce People
Lions Gate Films


8.3

based on 15 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

based on 3 votes
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FILM:

MPAA RATING: R for language, drug use, sexuality/nudity and some violence

Starring Diane Lane, Anton Yelchin, Donald Sutherland, Chris Evans, Kristen Stewart, Paz de la Huerta, and Blu Mankuma

When 16-year-old Finn is caught buying cocaine for his junkie but well intentioned mother Liz, his plans of spending the summer away from NYC with his anthropologist father studying the Ishkanani in the jungle are abruptly changed. In an attempt to get both of their lives back on track, Liz moves the two of them out to a cottage on the country estate of her sugar daddy, Mr. Osborne. Finn immediately makes his way into the 'tribe' of wealthy country clubbers that inhabit his new home. Soon Finn is dating Mr. Osborne’s granddaughter Maya and has found a best friend in her brother Bryce. Finn adjusts quickly to their life of fancy clothes, cars, horses, sex and drugs. Liz begins attending AA meetings and begins to establish herself as a loving mother working to correct her mistakes and win back Finn's love and trust. Unfortunately things begin to spiral out of control, and he begins to see that the wealth and friendships bestowed upon him come at a price. (Lions Gate)

GENRE(S):	Drama
WRITTEN BY:	Dirk Wittenborn
DIRECTED BY:	Griffin Dunne
RELEASE DATE:	DVD: February 5, 2008 Theatrical: September 7, 2007
RUNNING TIME:	135 minutes, Color
ORIGIN:	USA / Canada
LANGUAGE(S):	Tagalog / English

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

ReelViews James Berardinelli

The film is worthwhile primarily for the fun, breezy first hour. After that, it's a case of watching to find out how things turn out.

New York Post Kyle Smith

Director Griffin Dunne's adaptation of Dirk Wittenborn's fiercely personal novel ambles pleasantly through coming-of-age movie territory, then takes a jarring Agatha Christie detour.

Variety Ronnie Scheib

Whenever Sutherland comes on scene, any inadequacies in the film's depiction of the well-to-do become irrelevant.

Village Voice Scott Foundas

Whereas most of the injustices suffered by "Nanny's" nanny are of the skin-deep variety, the hopelessly reductive Fierce People ups the ante.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Staff (Not credited)

Fierce People's first hour is dominated by brittle social satire, but in its third act, the film takes a jarring turn toward tremblingly sincere melodrama it can't pull off.

The New York Times Stephen Holden

When F. Scott Fitzgerald remarked that the rich “are different from you and me,” he might have been thinking of someone like the moody billionaire from Fierce People.

TV Guide Ken Fox

Not even the always reliable Diane Lane can save this one.

New York Daily News Jack Mathews

What might have read as a dense allegory comparing the rituals of the super-rich with the tribal customs of the violent Ishkanani tribe in the Amazon becomes a tedious, over-ripe soap opera on screen.

Los Angeles Times Robert Abele

Dunne and Wittenborn, who adapted his book, work too hard at stressing just how ruthless the unspoken standards of the stinking rich can be, leading to a story-pivoting act of brutality toward Finn that careens the movie into a tonal wilderness that it never recovers from.

Chicago Tribune Tasha Robinson

The idea that rich people are an alien tribe is just one of many that get lost in Wittenborn’s distracted script. Instead of exploring the concept, he throws out random incidents until he hits one that sends the film into a dark, grotesque spiral.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer Bill White

Fierce People is no ordinary dud. This seedy soap opera is the most outlandish, campy romp through the mud since "Showgirls."

Washington Post Ann Hornaday

When the tone goes from daffy to dour in the course of a harrowing plot point, the story becomes more forced than fierce.

Boston Globe Wesley Morris

The platitudes in this gratuitously sentimental movie are taken a lot more seriously than the people.

Chicago Reader Joshua Katzman

Never recovers from a jarring and improbable act of ritualized violence that occurs halfway through the film.

San Francisco Chronicle Steve Winn

Plays like a movie that some teenage boy cooked up in his chemistry lab. There are lots of potent things floating around in it - sexual initiation, drugs, fantasy-land wealth, brute violence, primitive rituals, Diane Lane and Donald Sutherland - but the mix just sits there without producing any notable reactions.

The average user rating for this movie is 8.3 (out of 10) based on 3 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Chad S. gave it a7:
In the absence of a father, Liz Earl(Diane Lane) finds a father figure for her son Finn(Anton Yelchin); a man with no balls, literally; the masseuse's benefactor has no balls. While dad studies the Ishkanani tribe in South America, Finn conducts his own field study of a different sort of "Fierce People", upper-crust people, who kill and f*** in the deepest recesses of New Jersey. Ogden C. Osbourne(Donald Sutherland) has no testicles, but if you're the seventh richest man in the United States, you don't need balls in your sac to f*** over a tandem of interlopers whose summer-long hobnobbing with the rich almost gets them killed. Unlike "The Nanny Diaries", "Fierce People" uses anthropology as a visual and thematic motif throughout the film's entire running time, and its surprisingly effective, especially when the story grows unexpectedly dark in tone. If you're familiar with non-westernized cultures, Ogden's dumbstick and scrotum that signifies nothing is a matriarchal reversal of the female genitalia mutilation practice that primitive males force upon their women in the bush(Ogden's ex-wife had given the okay to snip-snip). Interestingly, Ogden's sexual agency is transferred to his granddaughter Maya(Kristen Stewart), who seduces Finn in a rites-of-passage ceremony that involves candles and warpaint. A secondary male puts a stop to their formalized consummation, because had Finn impregnated Maya, it would've been harder for the tribe to eject this low woman and her unworthy son from their midst.

Kevin J. gave it an8:
Donald Sutherland is so perfect for this role...he embodies every fantasy of wealth gone wild. he makes the movie, with Diane Lane.

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Fierce People Lions Gate Films

Fierce People
Lions Gate Films