Amazon.com essential video

Robert Crumb is known for his disturbing, yet compelling, underground cartoons: his most famous works made countercultural icons out of Mr. Natural ("Keep on Truckin'...") and Fritz the Cat. Terry Zwigoff delves into the odd world of the cartoonist in his documentary film Crumb, and the picture that emerges is not always pretty--at moments, it's almost repellent--but it's a fascinating glimpse into a very strange mind. Interviewing immediate family--Crumb has one suicidal brother, one semi-psychopathic brother, two sisters who declined to be interviewed, and a tyrannical mother--Crumb begins to look a bit saner. Given his surroundings, it's remarkable that he has survived so well. His hostilities toward women may turn some viewers off, but his wife, Aline, seems to be a grounding point, and she provides a solid counterbalance to the man.No one shies away from discussing incredibly intimate things (namely, sex!), which explains much of R. Crumb's cartoons. This documentary can definitely be considered a masterpiece for the cult crowd, and as for the rest of us, it's sure to make us feel a little better about our own lives! --Jenny Brown ... Read more

Reviews (51)

On behalf of Charles...
I own this film and I must say that I like Robert Crumb's taste in the blues and I share a lot of his views about the shallowness of American culture. He's a purist, creatively brilliant, and holds to his artistic values. Nevertheless, I couldn't help feeling that I would like to have seen him have the presence of mind to "lower" himself enough and get paid outrageously enough to do a lousy album cover every once in awhile so he could have perhaps helped his brother Charles to get the mental health care he needed and out of that gawd awful home environment with that crazy mother of his. Of course, if he had he probably wouldn't have been Robert Crumb with his all-consuming eccentricities and self-preoccupation with the female anatomy and big butts. Still, considering he was quite aware of being raised in a twisted family, it didn't seem to occur to him that he might have been in the position to help his two brothers reclaim their lives by throwing some major financial resources their way so they could have a better chance to overcome their sadistic father and demented upbringing. In his own way, Charles had his own genius and needed psychiatric care. Maybe RC tried and it just wasn't portrayed in the movie. On the other hand, I never got the impression the thought ever crossed his mind, because there's little evidence he thought about anything other than himself, his art, his immediate family, and outlets for his never-ending sexual obsessions -- or so it seems. If he had, I think I'd have more respect for him as a person than just as a supremely gifted artist.

Disturbing, shockling funny, and eerily hypnotic
Robert Crumb is well known as one of the pioneers of the underground comic book era of the 1960s, and his "Keep On Truckin'" logo is still well-known today. His comics were (and still are), bizarre, outrageous, shocking, and often offensive. But the story of real-life creator of such psychedelic highlights as Zap Comics and Fritz the Cat is so weird and unusual in itself, you'll remember it for a long time to come. (Robert Crumb describes the Church of the SubGenius as the only religion he could consider joining.) Terry Zwigoff's masterful portrayal of Crumb is presented in such a manner that even as you're shocked at some of the things he draws (e.g. Mr. Natural in "A Bitchin' Bod"), you see that compared to the other people in his family, he looks almost normal. It's presented in a modest, low-key style that you can't tear your eyes away from after you start watching it. The scene of Crumb's brother Max eating cloth while sitting on a bed of nails is strangely entrancing.

Thanks to Zwigoff for documenting the Family Crumb
What a fascinating family, so glad they let us glimpse their eccentricities head on, to me it was liberating. Here is a family of lovable oddballs, some coping with life more effectively than others. They are not made from a Picture Perfect American Family mold, for sure! In Robert Crumb's comics, surface normality and conformity is no guarantee that no desires and emotions, perverse and otherwise, lurk beneath. So I'm grateful to Crumb for having the moxie to put it out there in his drawings. Honesty is both healing and creative.

Keep on Truckin'...
"Crumb" is the sad and funny documentary of a damaged man who happened to find a beautiful and reasonably lucrative outlet for his peccadilloes. It's also the brutal portrait of two men - Robert's brothers - who were not so lucky.

"Crumb" offers amazing access to R. Crumb and his family, but the man himself remains an enigma - an entertaining and fascinating enigma, but an enigma nonetheless. Still, Zwigoff's probing camera gets behind the man and his art, his fans and detractors, and delivers a wonderful portrait of the man and a great appreciation of his work - even his most off-putting, misogynistic work.

But it's when Zwigoff talks to Robert's family that we see the true effects of a horrible, and horror-filled, childhood. Both of his brothers are intelligent and considerably talented, but they were unable to find a healthy outlet to escape a tyrannical father (his abuse is only hinted at in the movie), and their stories are deeply affecting - and difficult to watch.

So "Crumb" is either life-affirming or terribly depressing. I vote for the first option, which is why I'm the proud owner of the DVD. You wont find a much better documentary, or a more powerful drama, than "Crumb."

Great Documentary
Wow! I knew R. Crumb was off-beat, but I had no idea how much so. And his family is really messed up, much worse off than Robert Crumb. His siters refused to be interviewed forthe film, but his two brothers should be institutionalized. If you question your own weirdness and sanity, take a look at the Crumb family in comparison; It may cheer you up. Something totally worthwhile is the scene where Crumb is going through his older brother's comics and notebooks. Want to "see someone go insane?" Here you go. Warning, R. Crumb, and his friends and family's honesty is commendable yet some viewers may not appreciate the talk of masturbation, racial slurs, and gender roles. ... Read more

Reviews (278)

Quirky, and sadly funny.
I haven't read the graphic novel "Ghost World," and didn't have any preconceived ideas about this movie before I saw it (that I know of).

"Ghost World" is the story of a slightly odd girl, Enid (played transparently by Thora Birch), and her obsession with the unloved things of this world, starting with her encounter with Seymour (Steve Buscemi), a fried-chicken company administrator by day, geekish collector of 78s and other miscellanea by night. It's also the story of the changes in the relationship between Enid and her not-so-odd friend Rebecca (Scarlett Johansson), who after high school, is rapidly transforming into a fairly mainstream adult.

The movie has an offbeat sensibility that is both funny and slightly jarring at times, but that delivers a very true-feeling story of post-high school "what do I do now?" syndrome. The thing I love about this movie is that, as opposed to the fake silicone slickness of most "teen" movies, this has a funny-sad real feel that represents the not often glorified underbelly of society. The film is populated with entertaining characters, from the pseudo-artistic art teacher (Illeana Douglas), to the bumbling soft-spoken father (Bob Balaban), to cameo characters such as "Weird Al" the fifties diner waiter, and Doug, the white-trash mini-mart loiterer. As Enid says, "these are our people!"

"Ghost World" is kinder than a John Waters movie, truer than a teen movie, and better than most similarly-true independent movies.

Accentuate the positive
Terry Zwigoff's "Ghost World" is that rarest of hybrids -- a human comedy, brilliantly and bizarrely funny, but suffused with a profound sense of melancholia. The experience of watching it is deliriously pleasurable, but the humor emerges from the film's unfailingly generous reservoir of empathy; by the end, you're not sure whether to respond to these characters with laughter or with love. It is quite clear that Zwigoff feels both.

And that's what critics of this fine film have overlooked -- that although 17-year-old Enid (Thora Birch) looks at the world with bitter, unremittingly sarcastic eyes, "Ghost World" couldn't be less cynical or judgmental if it tried. Of all the characters on display, most of whom Enid despises and ridicules, there isn't a single one who isn't really good at heart; even the art teacher (a ridiculously funny Illeana Douglas), who has been derided as a one-dimensional caricature, has an untouchable core of decency.

Indeed, the character for whom "Ghost World" retains the harshest criticism is Enid herself. As much as we adore her terrifying intelligence, her single-mindedly retro fashion sense, and her contempt for all things phony and pretentious, we aren't allowed to forget her self-destructive habits or her unwillingness to grow up even as the world around her charges resolutely forward. Her best friend, Rebecca (Scarlett Johansson), once her partner in crime, has taken on a normalcy and sense of perspective that Enid finds tiresome, which is partly why she takes refuge in a lonely middle-aged bachelor named Seymour (Steve Buscemi, in a shoulda-been-Oscar-nominated performance). Their bond is at once improbable and emotionally convincing, and Zwigoff harmonizes Birch's and Buscemi's own highly idiosyncratic styles into a marvelous, unforced chemistry.

Compassionate and subtly optimistic, "Ghost World" only falters slightly with a few misfired pop-culture references and an ending that's both ambiguous and too overstated, but even that misstep proves strangely satisfying. With a character as unforgettable as Enid, it's good to know that there's such a thing as closure -- even if it's open-ended closure.

A movie about ideas and people in the real world
Here's an unHollyowood film about life, roles, friendship and departure that transcends most of the trash available on the big or little screen. I saw this on TV last night, followed by the big screen spectacular "Three Kings". It was more than clear to me which film was about ideas and real life, and which one was a cure for insomnia. I'll talk about the one about ideas and real life.

Unlike the Amazon synopsis and Leonard Maltin's opinion, this movie is not about alienation. It is about a cynical high school graduate's attempt to find a niche to fit into when her world undergoes changes she cannot understand. Thora Birch ("American Beauty") is very good as the high school graduate with a dark view of everything in the world...until she meets milquetoast record collector Steve Buscemi. There is a good deal of cliche in this meeting but it serves to break the holocaust of darkness in her life, which is compounded by her best friend changing roles, her schlemiel father being an empty, vacuous figure in her life, and her indecision about what to do with her own life.

Birch focuses on loser Buscemi, trying to improve his lot in life. She successfully helps set him up with another woman, then injects herself in his life in a way to locate her own life when everyone she knows seemingly abandons her. When this fails, she follows the pattern of the only other stable role model in her life, a mentally ill middle age man who sits at a bus stop, waiting for a bus that never arrives. When his bus one day arrives, she decides to take it, too, as the movie ends.

This is Birch's final removal from the world, the alienation most critics disucssed. I prefer to think of it as role acceptance, as finding her niche, as getting to a place she wants. This very simple film portrays a reality for many high school kids that come from single parent homes and lack direction after school. It tells a real story in an uncomfortable circumstance. People that enjoy nice neat stories in films will be very distrubed watching this. People whose minds look for meaning in film portrayals will become more involved the longer the movie goes on.

ghost world
So I've been watching some cult type movies recently. The ones that are referenced all the time, or half the people on livejournal have an icon of. Ghost world is one of those movies. I had no idea what the plot was about before I watched it. ( I was hoping it would be a supernatural movie, but alas, it is not)
I think its a good drama with some funny parts. The characters are realistic and likeable. Some parts make you think, oh that's like me, or thats like how so and so behaves. Which isn't seen very often in movies, perhaps thats why people like this so much. I dont think it's arty, though. Parts I didn't like: the bus thing, and what happened when she got drunk, and her typical 'I'm unique, really' scene/emo look. The rest I liked pretty much. The part where her teacher is analyzing someone piece of rubbish art is very true to life (turner prize, anyone?). It's a nice comedy drama type movie, and I would watch it again. Good acting too. Thanks for reading!

Interesting movie--interesting characters
From reviews I'd read, I expected to be blown away by Ghost World--much the way I'd been blown away by American Beauty and Lost in Translation. I wasn't. It's a good movie, mind you. Interesting characters who feel very genuine albeit somewhat one dimensional, and an odd tangle relationships. It also very effectively captures the alienation of smart teens growing up in a world that seems populated by zombies of one kind or another. So, it's very much worthwhile watching it--maybe more than once. (I can't help but think of Thora Birch as a smart version of Kelly Osbourne from her dress and mannerisms in this movie. But that's neither here nor there.)

So what's wrong with it? What keeps it from being great? In part, it's the almost relentlessly brooding tone that keeps the characters from being fully realized human beings. Maybe, just maybe, there are people as unreliable, aimless, and alienated all the time--just like Thora Birch's character. But do we really need a movie about someone who is so malignantly morose? And no one else in the movie really picks up the slack, showing that intelligent people can be sharp and effective, as well as cynical. Without that counterpoint, the story has a mushy center, and starts to get--well--a little boring. ... Read more

Reviews (1)

An obscure gem...
This is an early documentary by director Terry Zwigoff ("Crumb", "Ghost World") that focuses on an old time music/blues player named William Howard Armstrong. Armstrong was 75 at the time this film was shot, but he was still capable of some blistering playing. We get to see him play the fiddle, the guitar, the banjo, the ukelele, and some hybrid instruments. He appears with the players he has been with for years and years.

Interspersed between the musical shots are slice-of-life vignettes where we get to hear our hero trading philosophy and folksy wisdom, along with some very ribald stories, with his compadres. We also get to look at some of his colorful, "realist" (artist's own description) paintings of African-American life. But the real treat for me was a treasure he has kept locked up since he created it. It's a "prostitute's bible" with folktales, how-to guides, anecdotes (personal and otherwise), cut-out magazine photos, and some charmingly explicit and colorful drawings. I would pay at least $100 for a copy of it. When asked why he keeps it locked away, he replies that he does so to avoid "the man" keeping him locked away. It's unfortunate that this video hasn't been released on DVD, because in effect, its obscurity does keep Louie Bluie locked away. ... Read more

Reviews (149)

Raunchy, funny, but repetitive. And not for the kids.
"Bad Santa" is a movie from that dirty magazine row tucked in the back of gas stations: It is thrilling, and funny, and eventually a little tiresome and disappointing, to watch Billy Bob Thornton play a degenerate, drunk thief masquerading as a department store Santa Claus. Appropriately named Willie T. Stokes, Thornton achieves a kind of white trash zen, slurring, stumbling and cursing his way through nativity sets.

And Willie's just the jumping off point. "Bad Santa" is a comedy cast like a noir picture, where every player reveals a touch of the bizarre. There's Willie's dwarf partner (Tony Cox), a fat kid who takes to Willie as a father figure and Willie's Jewish girlfriend (Lauren Graham), who has a Santa fetish. Bernie Mac and John Ritter have smaller, goofy roles as department store employees; the late Ritter, sadly, is again cast as a nebbish, probably gay man for no particular reason and to little avail.

The humor is repeatedly pitched at basic crassness, or maybe just a notch above, as Thornton and his co-stars run the same gags into the ground; there are only so many ways the dwarf can verbally dress down Willie, or Willie dress down the kids. Some scenes border on scatological "Who's On First?" routines. Terry Zwigoff's direction is painfully flat and amateurish for a guy who made "Ghost World."

The idea, of course, is to offer perfectly intelligent, affluent adults a bargain-budget 90 minutes to indulge in the communal loathing of precious tykes and holiday materialism while extolling the virtues of loose women, cheap whiskey and stone cold burglary - essentially a middle finger to the very suburbanites that will be among its biggest fans. If your SUV can handle an evening in the cold, there are worse ways to get over yourself.

Note: "Bad Santa" has drawn some fire from Christian conservatives for debunking that long held Christmas myth that, apparently, Santa and Jesus are long lost buds. That couldn't be better publicity for a movie like this.

FOR THOSE WHO LOVE DARK COMEDY
If you love comedy, especially dark comedy then this is the movie for you. When I first saw the commerical on TV I knew I had to see this movie and I was right- it was excellent. Movies arent meant to be the same and I have never seen a Santa like this before!!!! It's a collectible item if you ask me and a must have. People with a sense of humor shouldn't miss it.

FEARLESSLY BAWDY BUT FUNNY
Bad Santa has many crass gags, it almost drags you into a dark alley of tasteless humour and thrashes you up. Imagine Billy Bob Thorton in a comic lead role, tough to visualize. But the man is bloody hilarious! Some parts are better scripted than others, but for a film that's so determined NOT to have a heart, it does surprise you with one. A wonderfully perverse treat that goes by in a flash, so it can't be all that bad any way. Recommended!

The funniest movie ive seen in a long time
this movie is god awful funny, if you have a problem with sex or language this movie is in no way for you. For all of the rest of us, this movie is hilarious. Billy Bob Thorton is funny as hell throughout the whole movie and you will be quoting him for weeks after. please, if you dont mind language or sex, watch this movie, you will love it.

A Funny Contrast to The Christmas Story
It's true, most reviews I have seen, they have described "Bad Santa" as a Christmas movie for cynics. Billy Bob Thornton takes a huge risk with the leading role, as a hard drinking, swearing, unkempt department store Santa with a fetish for plus-size women.
Let me be completely frank...although I admit most kids nowadays have been seasoned with the F-word, I think the language in the movie alone would dissuade most parents from screening it for young children. This is for adults, folks. Anyway, Bad Santa teams up with his partner, Marcus (who masquerades as a black elf) to rob department stores every Christmas. They have an interesting modus operandi..get jobs at the mall at Christmas time as Santa and elf, break in after hours, and abscond with the store's safe contents and assorted loot. Next season, different city, different mall, and so on. Thornton's Santa, real name Willie, is portrayed with no redemptive qualities. He is talked every year into the robbery scheme by his diminutive partner Marcus. Let's face it..Willie is only good at two things..drinking and safe cracking. The fact that Willie can barely tolerate people and hates children creates a great deal of comedy in itself. His exchanges with the children who sit on his lap and the department store manager (well played by the late John Ritter)are both shocking and funny in their audacity.
Anyway, through a bizarre set of circumstances involving a young boy (it was a stroke of genius for the director to cast the child as a fat, socially inept stalker) and a kinky bargirl who has a fetish for Santas, Willie goes through a slight reformation..sort of. Don't get me wrong..there are no "It's a Wonderful Life" brush strokes of cinema in here. "Bad Santa" knows why some people spend Christmas in bars..and gets more than a few twisted laughs from its observations. ... Read more

Reviews (51)

Strangely compelling
With his Mr Magoo glasses big enough to reflect a film crew, Goofy-like body and mouth transfixed into a seemingly permanent wry grin, the satirical artist Robert Crumb looks like a bizarre cartoon even in real life. It is the first thing one notices in Terry Zwigoff's intense and weirdly moving documentary portrait Crumb, about the man who signposted the Sixties generation with the likes of Keep on Truckin' and Fritz, the randy cat. The next is Crumb's opening comment that if he doesn't draw, he feels 'cranky and suicidal', yet the same feelings creep into him when he is inspired to put Rotring to paper. If ink seeps through his veins, it is like some bad blood that runs in the family. Zwigoff turns his camera on Crumb's tormented brothers Charles and Max, men who gave up the pen long ago and consequently shut-down. A group photo of them as kids depicts them in their Sunday best with sharp, Fifties crew-cuts and flannel-polished complexions. But behind all the neatness, their's was an 'Ozzie and Harriet hell' made particularly difficult by sadistic father. It's a familiar story of dysfunctional values and the children's subsequent escape into a world of cartoons.
Only the twist is that Robert found that such respite already had a charge to it " he confesses to having been sexually attracted to Bugs Bunny at the age of six.
Zwigoff, who has known Crumb as a friend for more than 25 years and took six years to make the film, elicits the most candid of interviews with his subjects " to the point that they at times feel like a family-therapy session that includes the artist's ex-wives and girlfriends as well as his current spouse, the cartoonist Aline Kominsky. All have a line on his sexual obsessions, both off and on page. Indeed, the film carefully argues through his more extreme and grotesque visions of women. This is, after all, a man who sniggers as Max tells him how he used to molest girls. No doubt about it, the Crumb siblings are in pieces. The film ripples with a bleak humour regarding their situation which prompts a nervous laughter, while in the end the profound question that haunts Crumb is just how Robert drew himself out of the depths of madness that his brothers drowned in.

We'll Take The Crumbs.
Robert Crumb is SO anti-social, that you almost want not to praise him or the film, as it would most likely elicit only contempt and disgust from him at your pathetic interests. But he's such a talented, not to mention twisted (I mean that as a compliment) artist, that you have to admire him. While his style, and his hysterical, irreverent characters, are not for everyone, his honesty pervades all his work. He's famous, but deplores the celebrity, phoniness, and notoriety that fame brings. While not exactly surly, he begrudgingly acknowledges that some people like his work, the work being created for basically his own amusement. That the work pays for his treasured relative anonymity and elusive privacy is a bitter irony. I love good documentaries, though there's not that many, and this is one of my favorites. It's just a very intrusive but irresistable visit into Crumbs little world, where his art and beloved records of the 1920's and 30's are his obsessions (along with sex), the materialistic, vulgar society that he's forced to co-exist with of little interest to him. You also get to meet his bizarre family who probably isn't really any more bizarre than many others. I especially get a kick out of his refusing to sign autographs in the movie, as I have a treasured copy of his "Zap" comix, which he inscribed to me. This is a must see film for anyone who's a fan of the creator of "Fritz The Cat", "Zap Comix", Janis Joplins "Cheap Thrills" famous album cover, etc... His "R. Crumbs Coffee Table Art Book " is a great accompaniment to this movie, his dialogue that accompanies his comics hysterical and sometimes too familiar. A great glimpse into a very interesting, unique talent. Some people work hard to appear "eccentric", but he's the real thing, though he still gives off a gentleness and likability. Admire the man, just leave him alone.

Thanks to Zwigoff for documenting the Family Crumb
What a fascinating family, so glad they let us glimpse their eccentricities head on, to me it was liberating. Here is a family of lovable oddballs, some coping with life more effectively than others. They are not made from a Picture Perfect American Family mold, for sure! In Robert Crumb's comics, surface normality and conformity is no guarantee that no desires and emotions, perverse and otherwise, lurk beneath. So I'm grateful to Crumb for having the moxie to put it out there in his drawings. Honesty is both healing and creative.

Keep on Truckin'...
"Crumb" is the sad and funny documentary of a damaged man who happened to find a beautiful and reasonably lucrative outlet for his peccadilloes. It's also the brutal portrait of two men - Robert's brothers - who were not so lucky.

"Crumb" offers amazing access to R. Crumb and his family, but the man himself remains an enigma - an entertaining and fascinating enigma, but an enigma nonetheless. Still, Zwigoff's probing camera gets behind the man and his art, his fans and detractors, and delivers a wonderful portrait of the man and a great appreciation of his work - even his most off-putting, misogynistic work.

But it's when Zwigoff talks to Robert's family that we see the true effects of a horrible, and horror-filled, childhood. Both of his brothers are intelligent and considerably talented, but they were unable to find a healthy outlet to escape a tyrannical father (his abuse is only hinted at in the movie), and their stories are deeply affecting - and difficult to watch.

So "Crumb" is either life-affirming or terribly depressing. I vote for the first option, which is why I'm the proud owner of the DVD. You wont find a much better documentary, or a more powerful drama, than "Crumb."

Great Documentary
Wow! I knew R. Crumb was off-beat, but I had no idea how much so. And his family is really messed up, much worse off than Robert Crumb. His siters refused to be interviewed forthe film, but his two brothers should be institutionalized. If you question your own weirdness and sanity, take a look at the Crumb family in comparison; It may cheer you up. Something totally worthwhile is the scene where Crumb is going through his older brother's comics and notebooks. Want to "see someone go insane?" Here you go. Warning, R. Crumb, and his friends and family's honesty is commendable yet some viewers may not appreciate the talk of masturbation, racial slurs, and gender roles. ... Read more