User reviews

Like nearly everyone I watched PGL and had to finish the thought by seeing the final product. The first time I sat down with it I couldn't get past the first 15 minutes, but when I returned later I got through the whole film somehow, mostly comparing PGL content with screen content.

For me, it just wasn't funny. At all. I didn't really like any of the characters (except perhaps the over-the-top Dad) and much of the dialogue was just odd and unrealistic. I got very tired of Leonard (Tom Bell) and I think he was supposed to be lovable and quirky but instead was annoying and overwhelming in every scene. It seemed he was the star, not Fiona or William/Charles or even the story. I dunno, even writing about this lackluster bland-fest has left me unmotivated to even finish this review. Skip this one folks.

I had such a delightful experience watching this movie in the comfort of my home, accompanied by a glass of wine. The unique mix of formalism and the beautiful chaos woven into the storytelling dissection truly resonated with me. The character of Leonard, brought to life by an incredibly talented actor, added an extra layer of enjoyment with his superb comedic timing. It's baffling to think that this actor isn't a household name in the world of comedy; their performance was nothing short of outstanding, leaving me eagerly anticipating more from them in the future. If you're looking for a film that combines humor, thoughtful storytelling, and a touch of insanity, this one is a must-watch.

I have a feeling that the crucifixion of this movie in the user comments is from PGL viewers who didn't like Jason on the show, didn't get their film selected, or were sticking up for Effie. The most difficult part of enjoying the movie was the fact that most of the scenes were shown out of sequence during PGL, so you already knew the ending before the movie started.

I would call this a dark humor movie, but not necessarily film noir. It does try to shine the light on the troubles of the rich family, but a lot of that doesn't come until the third act. There were a few plot holes, and frankly some of the scenes don't quite ring true. The acting was good though and there were more than a few lines that I laughed at (in particular towards the end).

Normally the brothers would have had a flashback to develop their characters more, but as the movie was effectively a one location picture, they had to do all of it with dialogue that worked for the most part. The Fiona character was developed well enough, I think; however, the sisters and the mother, while competently acting, didn't have a lot of dialogue to offer except for the third act. Bruce Davison was spot on, as usual.

There were a few uncomfortable moments in the beginning, but maybe I adjusted or perhaps the tone became more even because I liked it a lot more at the end then I did in the beginning; the final shot is excellent. Give the director and writers credit, that is a strength that most movies don't have even if they had ten times the budget.

I just finished watching HBO's latest season of Project Greenlight and it's resulting movie, The Leisure Class. Because of editing, and well you know TV, I'm not sure whether the director or the producer was the bigger problem with this endeavor. The show was entertaining, the movie was not. While the acting was solid, with decent performances all around, this dark comedy was not funny. The story was not interesting or new but you could see the actors trying to work with what was essentially a stale script. It looked like exactly what it is, a low budget film from a first time director who thinks way to highly of himself.

I'd watch the show and skip the movie. Yet another big "Meh" a for Project Greenlight film and this falls completely on the director and producer.

I think that once a little time has separated THE LEISURE CLASS from the trumped up drama and cheap "reality" of Project Green Light, the film will be treated a little more fairly.

Not that it's a good film. It mostly isn't.

The whole first half is filled with unearned character motivations, plagued by pacing problems and tedious to the point of boredom, particularly anytime Tom Bell is talking. Bell's character is almost insufferable. An alcoholic so destructive to any social situation he's in that he must be mentally I'll. This could be seen as a pretty ambitious character for a social satire, except that it's all meaningless, which is most evident when he turns out to be a good guy in tune with his flaws for the tidy ending. So the bell character ends up neither being enjoyable nor consistent.

Where the film does deserve some credit is in its thematic ambition, its mean spirit and... the hunting room. Now this is the scene everyone complains about the most, but it's the only part of the movie that actually worked on a substantive level for me. Once the tone of the film grows darker and the cast descends into the basement the film tilts towards the brilliant. This is in large part due to the amazing performance by Bruce Davison. To be fair, Davison is the only actor with a real character to work with in this film. A character that's been hiding his true ugly-resentful-misogynist nature all along. He is the leisure class. Corrupt, selfish and old- world to a fault. And as he reveals himself, Davison gives it his all, almost saving the movie for me.

But don't worry, after that it's pretty much back to its sloppy ways as it rushes towards an unearned resolution.

A side note, Bridget Regan turns in a strong performance that lives almost entirely in her subtle reactions, mostly because she doesn't have a lot to work with.

I just binged through the last season of Project Greenlight and right before the final episode, I decided to give "The Leisure Class" a chance. I'd already read the reviews on IMDb and seen that the movie had a 3.9, but felt like I was better served in making my own judgement, despite the bias of having watched the show.

The movie is flawed, for sure and having watched the show, it's hard to feel like it couldn't have been better if a few things had gone differently.

That said, this is definitely worth a watch. It IS funny. It's a dark comedy. This reminds me more of "Running With Scissors" or "Death At A Funeral," but certainly not as good as either.

Ed Weeks, Tom Bell and Bridget Regan are all spot on. The flaws lie more in the script than anything else. Sadly, this flick seems to have been the death knell for Jason, Tom and the Project Greenlight series.

I would absolutely encourage anyone to give this movie a shot; it is worth your time.

And regarding other comments:

1. It is funny! 2. Fiona evolves and comes out STRONG. 3. Character development is there, though it doesn't follow the typical three act structure, WHICH, if you watched Greenlight, you should be aware of. By the end of the flick, if you don't care about ANY of the characters, then you may have missed the point.

...It's a Reality TV Programme.

Jason Mann was cast as the Bad Guy / Scaepgoat and sometimes so was Effie. The real villains were Marc Joubert and perhaps Ben and Matt - who all did everything to appear nice, level headed rather than honest. Effie suffered for being to honest and blunt. We all have agendas and she was too willing to show all her cards which worked against her a lot.

The reason why this film has been rated so low is because people are mixing their personal opinion of Jason and the Film. These are two separate things. Jason is no different to any other director - yes he had a vision and he was very single minded about it and most good directors are. Sometimes that works out and other times it does not. His only problem is that of course he was entitled but you're only as entitled as what others allow you to be and Matt, Ben and HBO all colluded in that self delusion.

Nonetheless lets talk about the film. It isn't very funny, that's true. In fact it's quite boring and laborious to watch. It's not a stinker though and isn't as bad as people have painted it. I've seen far, far worse first time films and the directors have gone on to make other more competent films.

Basically the biggest problem is that it feels as though they shot a first draft of a screenplay rather than something more advanced. The weakest part of the film are the two leads, especially Ed Weeks (Charles) who is so limited as an actor that I was baffled he was picked as a lead. In the original Short an actor called David Manson played the lead - more successfully I feel. Ed Weeks failed to bring any life to the character and failed to have more than 2 expressions throughout the movie. Everything seemed non-consequential to him. Because he couldn't act at being in love properly and his performance wasn't believable then he had to say it through clumsy dialogue...lazy acting.

Bridget Regan who plays Fiona made the best of poor dialogue and character development . Props to Bruce Davison who it felt like he was carrying the whole thing. He has been criticised for over-acting but at least he brought some kind of absurdity to the piece. I think he deserves credit - also for a poorly written character.

The film does look like a film - it looks expensive. So that's a plus and I think underneath there - perhaps a few drafts later was a good film. Right now it's forgettable. I think Jason is capable and I am sure he'll be given lots of opportunities to make right in the future. With more time and working with realistic limitations he might come up with something decent.

One last point: Going back to the series - I hope this is a lesson learnt that White dudes picking other white dudes to make film does not a good film make - let's try looking elsewhere next time - let's see what surprises we discover as surely they have nothing to lose now.

The Leisure Class is what you get if Wedding Crashers had a child with Mr. Bean, and it didn't have a funny bone in it's body. The film tries too hard to be a British Rom-Com similar to 4 Weddings and a Funeral; and fails. Don't try this at home, kids!

The story is unfocused, poorly structured, and reeks of desperation. Desperate to be funny. The film switches from comedy to drama, and that kills what little momentum it had.

The dialogue is stilted. Much of the dialogue and action is driven by dues ex machine. Things happen, or are said, in the movie for no reason other than someone said: "wouldn't if be funny if?" It never works.

I just don't get why Project Greenlight decided this was the film to go with. I have to assume that sexual orientation (of the writers, one was the director) came into play.

I watched the film after seeing the latest episode of PG. It's the episode where the HBO guy tries to tell the Director his film isn't getting through to the audience. The Director pouts like a little bitch. This after a screening, that amazingly, said the audience didn't get it. The Director still did not see the light. He was upset that he couldn't make the film "without interference." His artistry was assailed.

Anyway, after that little temper-tantrum, I had to see it. BTW, the HBO guy was correct in adding the explanation by the female lead as she comes down the stairs.

I've been watching Project Greenlight along with all the other reviewers here, but I feel like these reviews have generally been unfair and weighted by feelings from the show.

The story is solid. You've seen some derivative of it before, but find me one you haven't. The character development could be stronger, most of these people are thin stereotypes, but, again, find me a movie not full of them. You do get a sense of who the 2 main characters are immediately, tho and their chemistry is fantastic. They're the heroes of this movie and they bolster it all the way through. The comedy is good: farcical slapstick. although I personally would have liked to see it ramped up a bit more. As was stated in the show, I would also have liked to see more progression in the main female lead and the pacing does feel a bit rushed.

Overall a good solid effort with a few great performances. Not your favorite movie but enjoyable, and certainly not as pannable as the sour-grape-eating, wannabe-directors have reviewed here.

I have watched this movie 4 or 5 times on HBO However, it was only after noticing one or two scenes that looked somehow familiar first viewing that we realized it was the Green Light movie project. The films title wasn't mentioned very much in the Greenlight series..it was just "the film"

The critics of this movie seem to be Greenlight Runners Up who failed to get the award. Since all their comments have nothing to do with the movie but are a critique surrounding its creation. The plot scenario is hilarious,.... the British humor is where I grew up.

Lots of sour grapes in rotten tomatoes.

,

I have a few rules when it comes to watching movies.

1. If I start a trailer for a movie and immediately like it, I turn off the trailer and watch the film with no questions asked.

2. (How I found 'The Leisure Class') If I read a description and like it, then I watch the film also with no questions asked.

**Background on me: I went to school for film and TV, and have also been involved in the creative arts all my life. I have seen everything from a scale of pure sh** to amazing. I don't know everything about film, but I do know everything about what it means to sit through some very Sh***y things.

--In continuation, I find that too often we focus on the ratings and don't actually form our own opinions without reading the ratings or hearing the critic's reviews. For me this film has an essence of the British humour that is in the original "Death at a Funeral" 2007. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0795368/

If you don't know British humour, then you wouldn't realize that this isn't your typical slapstick comedy or your American 'The Hangover' type humour.

A lot of the jokes were ridiculous, and the story is exaggerated. That makes a lot of people (especially people who go on IMDb) very anxious.

HONESTLY, sometimes you need to just have a mindless film. It takes a lot of skill to put our critical minds aside and give in ourselves to the film. Too often we have ideas of what we want a film to be, instead of letting the writer or director tell the story with a blank slate. I think this film was great, not for its amazing writing or comedy... but to tell a cohesive story that you can find yourself lost in. Not everything needs to be 10 stars.

Then again, I am so very tired of thinking. This movie allowed me to just relax and enjoy the theatrical quality of it.

Take or leave my review, but I didn't look at ratings first. This is my first review, but it shocked me so much how bad the rating was. I just had to voice that the film was good, maybe not great, but good enough for me.

The Leisure Class is the film green lit by the fourth season of Project Greenlight, this year produced by HBO and won by neophyte filmmaker Jason Mann.

For those of you unfamiliar with Project Greenlight, it is a competition produced by Matt Damon and Ben Affleck (and previously co-produced by Chris Moore who was inexplicably absent this season) in which one winner gets to make a movie. The applicants are typically burgeoning cinema creators or drowning creatives who long ago took the safe route of a standard job. After a hiatus, the fourth season finally returns after a ten year lull, and this time New York film student Jason Mann won. Initially Mann was to direct a film written by season one winner Pete Jones called "Not Another Pretty Woman" but after some finagling, Mann won over HBO and was able to direct his own project, The Leisure Class.

I'm a huge fan of the heart and premise of Project Greenlight – give someone, who would otherwise not have a chance at breaking into Hollywood, the opportunity to make a movie. There is something interesting about watching these bright eyed individuals learn about the indie film maker's experience dealing with a studio, a la getting thrown into the deep end. Without fail though, you end up cheering for the Greenlight winner and inevitably form a bias in your experience of the final project. In an effort to truly watch the film with favoritism, I refrained from watching the series after episode two and skipped right to the movie.

The premise for The Leisure Class is not complicated in anyway, a British man named William is about to marry into an 'old money' Connecticut family. This happy occasion is turned on its head when William's eccentric brother turns up and the truth of William's pedigree and intentions can no longer be hidden.

The Leisure Class as a film is riddled with problems from start to finish, which makes us shudder at the thought of the state of Not Another Pretty Woman, the initial screenplay which was to be made. Character development, acting, plot, tone, structure, cinematography, production design, editing – basically everything needs work and feels like a rough first draft that should never see the light of day except as a canistered film on a shelf.

If you pick away at all the physical imperfections, what comes down to it is The Leisure Class is a weak script. The pacing is terrible, unbearably slow and monotonous at the start, with bouts of fleeting and nonsensical mania. The core events of the film do create a substandard plot, but the dialogue and transitional occurrences to get us from one main plot point to the next are absent. Tonally, The Leisure Class is off-putting, jumpy and abrasive while being equally pointless.

Yes, the actors could have brought more to their roles than what was there on paper, especially the feebly written females, most notably Bridget Regan who plays Fiona, but that minor fix would not have been enough to save the film. The two leads, played by Ed Weeks and Tom Bell, who are the heart of the film needed significant guidance based on their performances which a more experienced director would have noticed or edited around. Their banter, which seems excessively ad-libbed at times, needed to be reined in considerably so that the core structure of the film was retained. Listening to the dialogue, you long for the characters to get to the point, patiently waiting for the movie to start, which it never does.

It seems as though Jason Mann was given every opportunity to succeed and utilize this film as a catalyst for his career and exemplification of his talents as a film maker. Based on The Leisure Class, Mann needs to go back to the basics of exciting and compelling story-telling before jumping into filming.

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My wife and I, after seeing Pete Jones pop up, simultaneously watched seasons 1 and 4. It was pretty interesting. Pete Jones had a hard time getting a handle on how to direct, but had a mélange of guys around him arguing over production issues. Jason Mann had a clear vision of what he wanted, pulled off some excellent directorial skill, and had one producer bring her drama. If I were to hire for a small film, Pete Jones would write the screenplay by himself, Jason Mann would only direct, and Effie Brown would have nothing to do with the production.

The film looked nice, moved along towards where it was headed, and had some good actors. Whatever was in Jason Mann's head did not translate to an overall satisfying experience. As I write this, I'm surprised the movie is at 3.9 on IMDb. I thought it would be closer to a 5. But I have to agree with the 3.9, 3 of which go to Tom Bell and Ed Weeks. If not for them, this film would be a disaster. It's obvious the best parts of the film were ad-libs between the two male leads.

It's my opinion that Effie Brown is a racist. Her complaining about the 'lily-whiteness' (her term) and focus on black crew-members betrays her. I have no issue with blacks, and other non-whites, getting a foot in the door in Hollywood. It's obvious to me that Effie Brown made sure the crew was out-of-proportion black-versus-white-versus-the-population. Her personal agenda became an albatross around the neck of the production. If she were reading this now, her eyes would be open, with a fake, wide, rueful smile to go with it. This was not the production to bring that drama. I hope she gets stuck on Tyler Perry films.

Jason Mann may or may not learn his lesson. It is telling that HBO's head, Len Amato, said he would want time before working with Jason Mann again. It was ridiculous that Len Amato had to hand-hold the end of production (that may be why he gets paid the big bucks). Jason Mann has not earned his stripes before or after this production. His skill as a director is evident. He understands lighting, angles, background, set-up, timing, and editing. His next project should be with the condition that he only direct, and direct as he is told by the producer (and as the script dictates). He made a blunder when he stated something along the lines of, "The director gets the final say in the creative process." Noooo, that is what Woody Allen gets to say/do. The director does his/her job, and the MONEY gets to say from the outset who has the final creative say. Now, if "The Leisure Class" makes $20,000,000, then I know nothing. Somehow I think it won't.

P.S. Imagine Woody Allen in the Bruce Davison role, and whimsy instead of drama. THAT would be a Woody Allen film to see, and with the EXACT SAME script!

I thoroughly enjoyed this one.

The entire movie made me feel like I was actually present with these people at these locations. As opposed to an overly produced green screen project.

Many scenes had an improvisational feel which made the interactions, dialogue and occasional awkwardness seem very realistic.

I think perhaps people go into it with the wrong attitude or too focussed on the meta.

Just watch it like a hurricane (an intrigant) coming through the lives of these people who are secretly all hanging by a thread.

We get to watch each of them unravel in a different way.

Certainly recommend it if you can appreciate interesting character work with some great absurdist humor. Don't watch it for the plot twists and turns, it's not a mystery or a thriller.

You can watch the scene that starts a little over 9 minutes in between just leonard and william to get a feel for their interactions.

Hope I helped some people give it a chance, it won't be for everyone, especially in the current generation. Don't try to identify with one person so much that you would want to be in their shoes. Think of it more like you're watching a car crash ;)

This was like a really bad British version of the wedding crashers. Both movies revolve around a wedding, both have high profile politicians as head of the house, both have a daughter that's a virgin, and both center around two guys with one being the odd ball. The difference? Very little in this movie is actually funny. I know this was a movie that was made as part of Project Greenlight. The fact Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, Pete Jones, and the head as of HBO Films thought this was a good script says all you need to know as to why Hollywood can't make good ORIGINAL movies anymore. Jason Mann fought to shoot this on film. It didn't matter. He could have shot on VHS because it's still just crap. Right from the beginning the dialogue doesn't make sense because there is no setup as to who these people are. This isnt a crime drama. It's supposed to be a comedy which means the audience should be able to sit back, relax, and laugh and not have to think hard and guess as to what's going on. Bottom line, don't waste an hour and a half of your life watching this.

I think Jason Mann is a rare talent. Delicacy is incredible and it was incredibly brave of him to push to make his own script with the opportunity he was given on PGL. Seeing how that all manifested in the face of all sorts of reality show drama and HBO restrictions is utterly fascinating. But even without being able to see behind the curtain of how this movie was made, there's a lot to love and respect in this film. The use of the location is inventive and the skewering of the wealthy family, especially with Tom Bell at the center, is a delight to watch. What a maniacal gem! I'm excited to see what Mann does next and hopefully, on his own terms.

I couldn't finish Project Greenlight, I found the one executive producer unbearable, the director ... well let's just say he came off ill.

This movie is funny, quirky and weird; in the rightest of ways. For the rushed way it was filmed and produced it is exceptional and definitely worth watching. The characters were believable, which is impressive considering their outlandish "devil may cry" nature. The dialog at times was less then spectacular but the scenes were well put together and the movement of the camera was pleasing to watch. A morbid sense of humor may be needed.