Film Excess - Free Ukraine - Stop Putin - End the war NOW!!: Igby Goes Down (2002)

5/19/2024

Igby Goes Down (2002) - Steers' debut is a New York gemstone

♥♥♥♥

Off-center and pensive sits co-star Kieran Culkin upside a blue wall on this poster for Burr Steers' Igby Goes Down

Igby Slocumb is 17 years old and from a wealthy family, but he wants to break free and find his own path in life. Which is easier said than done.

Igby Goes Down is written and directed by debuting Burr Steers (Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (2016)).

It is a morbid, funny and tragic dramedy. Kieran Culkin (No Sudden Move (2021)) is strong as Igby; Claire Danes (Evening (2007)) is terribly cute, - until she chooses Ryan Phillippe's (Antitrust (2001)) Ollie over his younger brother Igby, - and Susan Sarandan (The Client (1994)) and Jeff Goldblum (Hotel Artemis (2018)) are funny.

The film is very New-Yorker intellectual and too much at times. Bill Pullman (The Equalizer 2 (2018)) doesn't really work as Igby's mentally ill father, and the good-spirit Mickey-Mousing of the opening music is grating. But although Igby Goes Down, like its title character, isn't flawless, it is an original and brisk movie.

Burr Steers: Charlie St. Cloud (2010) - Steers and Efron's second collaboration is lukewarm

17 Again (2009) or, Teentainment Deluxe

Watch a trailer for the movie here

Cost: 9 mil. $

Box office: 6.9 mil. $

= Huge flop (returned 0.76 times its cost)

[Igby Goes Down premiered 23 May (Seattle International Film Festival) and runs 98 minutes. Phillippe was paid 500k $ for his performance in the film. Shooting took place from February - April 2001 in New York. The film opened #24 to a 306k $ first weekend in 10 theaters in North America, where it peaked at #15 and in 156 theaters (different weeks), grossing 4.7 mil. $ (68.1 % of the total gross). The 2nd an 3rd biggest markets were the UK with 689k $ (10 %) and Germany with 499k $ (7.3 %). The film was nominated for 2 Golden Globes and an Independent Spirit award and won a National Board of Review award, among other honors. Roger Ebert gave it a 3.5/4 star review, translating to a notch over this one. The film is among the last to show the original World Trade Center twin towers before they were destroyed by Islamic terrorists 9/11 2001. Steers returned with 3 TV credits prior to his theatrical return 17 Again (2009). Culkin returned in Lymelife (2008); Danes in The Hours (2002). Igby Goes Down is certified fresh at 75 % with a 6.90/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

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Donald Sutherland has passed away

Born in Canada, Sutherland battled polio as a child. His first credit was in Suspense (1963, TV-series) and his first film was The Castle of the Living Dead (1964). Later credits in his remarkable career include The Saint (1965-66), The Dirty Dozen (1967), M*A*S*H (1970), Kelly's Heroes (1970), Klute (1971), Don't Look Now (1973), 1900 (1976), Casanova (1976), The Eagle Has Landed (1976), Ordinary People (1980), A Dry White Season (1989), JFK (1991), Outbreak (1995), Fallen (1998), Virus (1999), Fierce People (2005), Pride & Prejudice (2005), Lord of War (2005), The Hunger Games (2012), The Undoing (2020, miniseries) and many more. He passed away at age 88. R.I.P.

Roger Corman has passed away

Born in Detroit, Michigan, Corman had a sprawling, intellectually hungry life as a youth and young man before arriving with his first film in 1955, Five Guns West. He would follow that with titles such as Apache Woman, It Conquered the World, Attack of the Crab Monsters, Teenage Cave Man, A Bucket of Blood, House of Usher, The Little Shop of Horrors, The Pit and the Pendulum, The Intruder, The Raven, The Terror, The Masque of Red Death, The Tomb of Ligeia, The Wild Angels, The Trip, Bloody Mama and many more. As a producer he was behind almost 500 films. Arguably among the most important filmmakers of the 20th century, Corman passed away at age 98. R.I.P.

William Friedkin has died

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Film Excess - Free Ukraine - Stop Putin - End the war NOW!!

Eagerly anticipating this week ... (17-24)

5/19/2024

Igby Goes Down (2002) - Steers' debut is a New York gemstone

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Eagerly anticipating this week ... (16-24)

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