The Death & Life of John F. Donovan

I remain dubious and hungry: the movie globally lacks of achievement and seems unfinished.

Pros: the sensitivity of Xavier Dolan, the interpretation of the actors, the music, the photography, ...

Cons (only one actually, but a crippling one): the hubbub! I have the feeling that Xavier Dolan tries to artificially fill the relative emptiness of the script dealing with an epistolary relationship modestly reduced to a secret garden with a kaleidoscopic narrative, fuzzily alternating between Rupert and John on the one hand, the present and the past on the other hand.

To be watched again in a decade or two, with another look.

True to form, Xavier Dolan has given us something original and profound. This is a beautiful story about time, progress and boundary-crossing forms of friendship and love. The film has its minor flaws but the acting is great from everyone involved (even Kit Harrington, usually rather one-note in my opinion, gives a wonderfully nuanced and haunting performance), an awesome soundtrack, equal parts style and substance, and exquisite cinematography. The critic reviews are shockingly unfair and not at all representative of the great quality that this piece of art embodies.

If you think the movie failed you probably didn't understand the true meaning. It is a movie about soul searching and life with depression. It is about how life with depression requires you to wear a mask because of the expectations of those around you, it's about the lack of intimacy and being truly and personally open with others even those closest to you, it's about trying to live your life based on what you think others expect of you and think you deserve. It is a movie about finding one person who you can truly talk to because you connect and you feel they don't judge you. It's a movie about life and figuring out how to let yourself be happy. Beautifully done movie with great depth yet only some will truly understand it on a personal level.

This film tells quite a complex story about a man who recalls his correspondence with an actor when he was a child. The story is mostly about the actor, and it's quite sad. The number of famous faces is pretty amazing as well. It can do with a quicker pace, but overall it's ok to watch.

I had been wanted to watch this and then read the reviews and thought I wouldn't bother. I only ended up putting this movie on as I'd seen everything else and couldn't sleep. Did I watch the same movie as the people who hated it? I understand each to their own but for me the acting was great and the story would have resonated with so many different people on many levels. A rare script to have so many great actors in it so they obviously saw the wow factor.