X
- 2023
- TV-14
- HBO Max
- 1 h 28 m
- 2023
- TV-14
- HBO Max
- 1 h 28 m
Summary Since the late 1960s, Albert Brooks has been a major force in American comedy with his smart, sometimes absurdist, and truly unique sense of humor. From stand-up, to acting, to writing and directing short films, to his seven, iconic, original motion pictures, including “Modern Romance,” “Lost in America,” “Mother,” and more, Brooks has p...
Directed By: Rob Reiner
- 2023
- TV-14
- HBO Max
- 1 h 28 m
- 2023
- TV-14
- HBO Max
- 1 h 28 m
Albert Brooks: Defending My Life
74
7.8
Where to Watch
Summary Since the late 1960s, Albert Brooks has been a major force in American comedy with his smart, sometimes absurdist, and truly unique sense of humor. From stand-up, to acting, to writing and directing short films, to his seven, iconic, original motion pictures, including “Modern Romance,” “Lost in America,” “Mother,” and more, Brooks has p...
Directed By: Rob Reiner
Where to Watch
Top Cast
Metascore
Generally Favorable
Based on 7 Critic Reviews
74
86% Positive
6 Reviews
6 Reviews
14% Mixed
1 Review
1 Review
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
Metascore
Generally Favorable
Based on 7 Critic Reviews
74
86% Positive
6 Reviews
6 Reviews
14% Mixed
1 Review
1 Review
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
With Brooks’ close friend Rob Reiner serving as director and interviewer, the HBO documentary Albert Brooks: Defending My Life serves as a wonderful Greatest Hits retrospective of Brooks’ invaluable contributions to the entertainment world, as well as a brief but insightful look at Brooks’ upbringing, which provides some therapist couch-worthy insights into his motivations and his particular brand of comedy.
This film will be a treat for anyone who loves any part of Brooks' career, or all of it. And its subject is so fascinating and open-hearted that one can imagine people who've never heard his name until now getting something out of it, too.
User Score
Generally Favorable
Based on 14 User Ratings
7.8
71% Positive
10 Ratings
10 Ratings
21% Mixed
3 Ratings
3 Ratings
7% Negative
1 Rating
1 Rating
User Score
Generally Favorable
Based on 14 User Ratings
7.8
71% Positive
10 Ratings
10 Ratings
21% Mixed
3 Ratings
3 Ratings
7% Negative
1 Rating
1 Rating
Amazing. Funny. Entertaining. Whether you're a longtime fan or new to Albert Brooks' work, this is a must watch. He really is the greatest.
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Loved this movie so much! I could have watched hours more. I had no idea the depth of his stand-up and influence on so many comedians. I loved his movies Defending YOur Life and Lost in America, now I need to rent Modern Romance immediately because everyone talks about it in the film. His acting is and has always been brilliant but this shows a true pioneer throughout his life! Officially declaring an Albert Brooks Festival on my couch this weekend!
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Both a comprehensive primer and a nostalgic celebration, it successfully makes the case that few 20th-century funnymen were as daring, pioneering, or outright amusing.
The Brooks-Reiner banter is so understated and natural as to basically feel like eavesdropping on one of their lunches, which practically yields more memories than insights.
All of the friends and acolytes singing Brooks’ praises are great, but it’s possible that Defending My Life would have been more satisfying had it just been Brooks, Reiner and some fantastic clips. As it is, the doc might leave you yearning for additional depth.
Watching Mr. Brooks’s career roll out in a compressed form is quite a treat, though Mr. Reiner seems to race toward the finish to include everything that he needs to get in.
While Brooks deserves acclaim, he deserves it in a format as compelling and dynamic as he is. “Defending My Life” is simply too flat.
There are a hundred documentaries that could be made about Albert Brooks and his impact on our culture. Rob Reiner has done an amazing job with the first one out of the gate. Everything you would hope for, clips that haven’t ever been seen, even in these days of YouTube. Anyone who enjoys comedy should watch this movie, to understand what they have been laughing at, and where it came from.
Albert is the bridge, the catalyst, between vaudeville comedians and what we are seeing now in the movies and on television. For fans of Albert Brooks, there’s a lot of stories behind what we have enjoyed, and a lot of material you might remember but couldn’t get to see.
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O título brinca com o que talvez seja o filme mais conhecido de "Albert Brooks" como protagonista, "Defendig my life", traduzido no Brasil por "Um visto no céu", gravado com a icônica "Maryl Streep". Por isso, a tradução do subtítulo deste documentário no Brasil ficou muito aquém, "Rindo da vida" está longe de captar o que o filme se traduz.
Confesso que não conhecia muito o ator, e o documentário basicamente é sua entrevista com o diretor Rob Reiner, etrecortado por muitas cenas pretéritas.
Inicialmente, Albert Brooks ganhou destaque como um talentoso comediante de stand-up nos anos 1960 e 1970, e talvez por isso falar sobre ele tenha chamado tanta a atenção, já que há uma febre de stand-ups contemporaneamente. Brooks também é conhecido por sua carreira no cinema e na televisão, tendo dirigido e estrelado vários filmes de comédia que se destacam por seu humor inteligente, mas sinceramente, nada de genial ou revolucionário.
Mesmo com depoimentos como de Spielberg e de outras figuraças de Hollywood, a sensação que fica é de um ode que não condiz com o produto. É extremamente irritante ver o documentário babar tanto o ovo do representado que se perdeu qualquer forma de naturalidade.
Há depoimentos no encerramento do tipo "gostaria de ter a carreira dele", ou tratando-o como, no mínimo, gênio da comédia, inclusive comparando-o com Chaplin. OK, parece exagero, mas está tudo lá, registrado.
Longe de desmerecer o homenageado, mas assim o documentário, infelizmente, perde muito sua credibilidade. É basicamente uma memória de seus trabalhos, o que faz com que tenhamos a sensação de mergulhar sobre o personagem, e não na pessoa de Albert Brooks. Logo, um documentário par ser visto como curiosidade desse grande artista, mas que absolutamente não trará nada de novo.
Report
When someone helps to shift the direction of something, regardless of the milieu involved, there’s a natural inclination to want to celebrate that individual’s contributions. In the area of stand-up comedy, one of the names that frequently comes to mind is Albert Brooks (born Albert Einstein – really). In the 1970s, his inventiveness took comedy in a new direction, inspiring others to follow suit and forever changing the art form, and this new HBO documentary from Brooks’s lifelong friend, director Rob Reiner, is an apparently sincere attempt at paying tribute to the writer-actor-comedian-director. Unfortunately, this effort misses the mark in many respects (though it admittedly improves markedly in the picture’s back half). Perhaps the biggest issue here is Reiner himself; as someone who has known Brooks since high school, he’s probably too close to the material to present a balanced view of his subject. Many of his interview sequences with Brooks come across as two old friends reminiscing about the past without providing sufficient back story information for the viewers, the result being a vehicle that’s a little too “inside” for audiences to fully appreciate the point of their conversations. What’s more, the film has an annoying tendency to gush, especially when it comes to the comedian’s early routines, work that may have been cutting-edge when first introduced but that, frankly, hasn’t withstood the test of time. Toning down the hype here would help immeasurably, particularly in the film’s interview segments with peers and admirers (including such entertainment industry heavy hitters as Chris Rock, Wanda Sykes, Ben Stiller, Sarah Silverman, Larry David, David Letterman, Conan O’Brien, Jon Stewart, Stephen Spielberg, James L. Brooks and Judd Apatow, among others), which often treat Brooks as the sole progenitor of innovative stand-up comedy. This is clearly a case of overstatement, especially since there were others at the time doing similarly inventive routines. The picture’s opening sequence, largely devoted to the foregoing, rambles along far too long, too, delaying its treatment of what works best in this documentary – an examination of Brooks’s achievements as the director of such movies as “Real Life” (1979), “Lost in America” (1985), “Defending Your Life” (1991) (his best work) and “Mother” (1996), as well as his performances in films like “Taxi Driver” (1976), “Broadcast News” (1987), “Drive” (2011) and “Concussion” (2015) and his animation voiceover work in “Finding Nemo” (2003), “Finding Dory” (2016) and his multiple appearances on the long-running TV series The Simpsons. These are the endeavors in which Brooks’s brilliance truly shines, and they generally deserve better, more complete treatment than what they receive here. Don’t get me wrong here – I’m a big fan of Brooks; however, I wish his talents and achievements had been showcased in a better film than what’s on offer here. If you really want to get to know Brooks better, watch one of his films – they’ll show you more about him than anything featured in this documentary.
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Production Company
Castle Rock Entertainment,
Final Cut Partners
Release Date Nov 11, 2023
Duration 1 h 28 m
Rating TV-14
Genres
Awards
Hawaii Film Critics Society
• 1 Nomination
PGA Awards
• 1 Nomination
American Cinema Editors, USA
• 1 Nomination
