X
- 2008
- R
- Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM)
- 1 h 50 m
- 2008
- R
- Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM)
- 1 h 50 m
Summary In this hilariously funny fish-out-of-water tale, How to Lose Friends & Alienate People tracks the outrageous escapades of Sidney Young, a smalltime, bumbling, British celebrity journalist who is hired by an upscale magazine in New York City. In spectacular fashion Sidney enters high society and burns bridges with bosses, peers and super...
Directed By: Robert B. Weide
Written By: Peter Straughan, Toby Young
- 2008
- R
- Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM)
- 1 h 50 m
- 2008
- R
- Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM)
- 1 h 50 m
How to Lose Friends & Alienate People
35
6.5
Where to Watch
Summary In this hilariously funny fish-out-of-water tale, How to Lose Friends & Alienate People tracks the outrageous escapades of Sidney Young, a smalltime, bumbling, British celebrity journalist who is hired by an upscale magazine in New York City. In spectacular fashion Sidney enters high society and burns bridges with bosses, peers and super...
Directed By: Robert B. Weide
Written By: Peter Straughan, Toby Young
Where to Watch
Top Cast
Metascore
Generally Unfavorable
Based on 25 Critic Reviews
35
16% Positive
4 Reviews
4 Reviews
44% Mixed
11 Reviews
11 Reviews
40% Negative
10 Reviews
10 Reviews
Metascore
Generally Unfavorable
Based on 25 Critic Reviews
35
16% Positive
4 Reviews
4 Reviews
44% Mixed
11 Reviews
11 Reviews
40% Negative
10 Reviews
10 Reviews
Possibly the best movie that could be made about Toby Young that isn't rated NC-17.
Pegg has some good obnoxious moments, but he's only a few movies away from becoming Dudley Moore.
User Score
Generally Favorable
Based on 37 User Ratings
6.5
59% Positive
22 Ratings
22 Ratings
35% Mixed
13 Ratings
13 Ratings
5% Negative
2 Ratings
2 Ratings
User Score
Generally Favorable
Based on 37 User Ratings
6.5
59% Positive
22 Ratings
22 Ratings
35% Mixed
13 Ratings
13 Ratings
5% Negative
2 Ratings
2 Ratings
Totally underrated. Saying that my rating is a protest vote. Megan Fox phwooar!
Report
Granted it's predictable, mainstream, unoriginal and simple, horribly contrived at times with the rom-com element, cringefully acted with a dodgy script and I can fully appreciate why it received such terrible reviews. But even it's harshest critics will at least find themselves **** at it's querky and nostalgic references. Pegg has undoubtedly stuck to his strong suit in terms of his easily identifiable loser-character, but that's exactly what you go and see the film for. On the other hand, Megan Fox and Kirsten Dunst are the ultimate down-side to any film.
Report
Best in show is the divine Gillian Anderson as a powerful celebrity publicist, editing the image of her clients in much the same way this adaptation tames Young's much pricklier book.
An embarassingly unfunny, stumblebum adaptation of Toby Young's memoir.
Someone describes his writing as "snarky, bitter, witless." The last part pretty well sums up this movie.
The crushingly unfunny and slopped-together How to Lose Friends & Alienate People has neither the ambition nor the intelligence to do justice to its source material.
For the most part, How to Lose Friends & Alienate People is a decent enough British comedy film. Based on journalist Toby Young's memoirs, we follow Sideny Young (Simon Pegg) attempting to make it as a big-name journalist for the massively popular Sharps magazine based in New York. The casting is pretty inconsistent - Pegg makes for a thoroughly unlikeable protagonist (perhaps due to the man Sidney is not-so-loosely based on), but you do warm to him eventually, once you've had time to take some pleasure in some of Sidney's failures. Kirsten Dunst makes for a bit of a comedy revelation as Alison Olsen, Sidney's fellow Sharps journalist and love interest, and Gillian Anderson and Miriam Margolyes seem to be relishing their roles as powerful, media-savvy publicist Eleanor Johnson and Mrs Kowalski, Sidney's landlady respectively. Meagan Fox, surprisingly enough, also impresses, at least if, like me, you take her performance as Sophie Maes, a ditsy actress looking to be taken seriously as an aware jab at her own media image. Elsewhere the casting is rather less impressive. Jeff Bridges, playing Sharps editor Clayton Harding, does a rather fine impression of Jeff Bridges. Also, I am yet to see a film where Danny Huston, here playing Sidney's nemesis and immediate superior Lawrence Maddox, puts any effort into a role, but he's got the "skill" of talking a bit too loudly, then a bit too quietly mastered. The film has a few decent jokes, and makes a passing attempt to comment on the plasticity of celebrity and the vindictiveness of journalism, but it's too long, and somehow still manages a rushed, sloppy ending, and unfortunately for a romantic comedy, the romantic element doesn't really work. A few of the jokes miss their mark as well, and the film does resort to Farrelly-grade crudeness now and again. How to Lose Friends & Alienate People does work as a comedy, and actually tries to say something relevant about the modern world, but a few casting, writing and pacing missteps do threaten to ruin your enjoyment of the film. It's worth watching if you've got an evening to kill, and you want a bit of undemanding fun, but it's probably not worth going out of your way to see.
Report
A disappointing movie. I never really found a reason to care about what was going on in this movie, and I'm not sure if it's just the writing or a poor performance from Simon Pegg but the main character just disgusted me. I didn't care about any of the characters and laughs were sparse. How to Lose Friends & Alienate People manages to be poor enough to alienate and lose its audience.
Report
Production Company
Number 9 Films,
Film4,
Intandem Films,
Aramid Entertainment Fund,
Lipsync Productions,
UK Film Council
Release Date Oct 3, 2008
Duration 1 h 50 m
Rating R
Tagline Brace yourselves, America.
Website
http://how2losefriends.com/
