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80For all its decadence, it moves effectively from outrageous camp humor to stark pathos and in the process manages to be oddly touching. As for Culkin, he succeeds as an adult actor in completely unexpected ways.
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75Culkin plays Alig as clueless to the end, living so firmly in his fantasy world that nothing can penetrate his chirpy persona. Whether this is accurate--whether indeed any of the facts in the film are accurate--is not for me to say, but it works.
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75As stagy and awkward as some of the Warhol/Morrissey films of the early '70s.
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70Culkin's Alig has the face of a debauched cherub, but the former child star never quite captures the charisma everyone swears was an essential component in Alig's success. Green's St. James steals the picture out from under him (poetic justice of a sort), and the supporting cast is nothing short of amazing.
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Emotionally distressing yet compulsively watchable,
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60Overall, I have to recommend the film for its alternate take on the whole "Leaving Las Vegas," "Basketball Diaries," "Less Than Zero" drug-induced tragedy genre.
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58Taking on the sneeringly blase Alig may be a cagey career move for Culkin, but it's a disappointingly thin performance.
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50The plot is sordid and predictable -- indiscriminate nightclubbing leads to escalating drugs, promiscuity, and violence. Things perk up cinematically in the last few scenes, but by then it's almost too late.
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Most moviegoers will have trouble looking past Culkin the actor, who does a decent job of sending up youthful fame in a movie that's barely worth the effort.
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50Better than I expected but still not entirely convincing. As a cautionary tale for demimonde-sters, though, it has its useful points--never argue about money while you're in a K-hole, that sort of thing.
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50Alig's superficiality seems to have been his only talent. His banality is a problem that the film can't overcome.
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50So what is the picture saying? With its uneven tone, flat direction (on bad-looking digital video) and varied performances, very little.
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50His (Culkin's) performance is earnest and brave, but also mannered when it should be un-self-conscious, and awkward when grace is called for.
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50There isn't an ounce of genuine affection on display. Fenton and Barbato already made a documentary of the same title about Alig, and their fascination with this vapid, charmless pied piper of decadence remains a mystery.
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40Party never gets rolling.
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40A colorful, lurid and ultimately so-what look at obnoxious personalities careening down their own road to ruin.
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40If this were witty, it might have qualified as a downtown version of "All About Eve"; if it were believable, I wouldn't have come away feeling that the actors (including Dylan McDermott and Chloe Sevigny) were wasted.
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38In the end you don't believe what you're watching, and you don't care. This party is a drag.
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38Devotes most of its energy to its costumes and makeup, which are fabulous. But that and a tabloid-worthy star just aren't enough to revisit this sordid tale as a kind of twisted comedy.
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30The film's only real bright spot is Seth Green, who, as Culkin's sidekick, brings Party Monster a droll wit it otherwise lacks. It's such a dreary mess that when Culkin insists that life in prison isn't too different from being a club kid, it's all too easy to believe him.
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30The psychologizing in Party Monster never goes deeper than what you might get out of Dr. Phil on a bad day.
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25Feels fake, forced and indigestible.
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25Macaulay Culkin still can't act, and it's no longer cute. His performance in Party Monster is so embarrassing one doesn't know where to look.
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25"Prison isn't all that different from a nightclub,'' comments Alig toward the end. Funny; this movie isn't all that different from prison.
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20A colorful mess, all style and substances and little else.
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20There's really only one reason to see Party Monster, and that's Seth Green's scene-stealing performance as former (and somewhat reluctant) New York club kid James St. James, the boy who would be queen.
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The distance between tawdry and tedious can be amazingly short. It is traveled with Concorde speed in the arch Party Monster.
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20The wanton fabulistas of Party Monster are as boring and insignificant as the very "normals and drearies" they so contemptuously deride.
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10Unwatchable.
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User score distribution:
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Positive: 14 out of 18
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Mixed: 0 out of 18
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Negative: 4 out of 18
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JenyL.10I just loved this movie! It had the perfect cast.. the only word I can think of to say is that it was FABULOUS!!!
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BrandonT.10