User reviews

A clear view from within the eurogroup during the Greek drama. Gavras is bold and shows high tensions, clear colors of the circus we live in, luck of democracy, solid reasons for criticism of an amateur leftist government including Yianis and a great Lulis acting this role. The finale though is weak imo. A solid 6! - but we must revisit the film a few years later. Gavras takes the risk and makes the movie from his and Varoufakis point of view and gives a true atmosphere of the time. If you watch the film watch it trying to stay out fro m political parties and personal views. Discuss it later.

First of all, I will start by mentioning the obvious: The negative reviews are by not-so-bright Greeks who can't review a movie for what it is, but for what it shows. The summer of 2015 was a pretty heated period in Greece, and many people have not forgiven the politicians involved.

About the movie. Don't expect a masterpiece. It is not. However it is a decent representation of Varoufakis's point of view, which on each own, is extremely interesting. Loulis's performance as Varoufakis is the strongest asset of this movie in my opinion. Bourdoumis was very good as well as Tsipras.

Photography was good. Editing was good. I found the sound editing irritating, like I do in most Greek movies (why is that? Any greek production sounds weird to me, like they can't keep steady the volume of the voices spoken).

7/10 from me.

Honestly I couldn't believe starting from the first scenes of the film that this was a Costas Gavras film. It screamed "quick and dirty" approach through out the entire movie. Bad direction, bad lighting and photography - almost amateur. It's really a pity that such an acclaimed creator made this work... Nice surprise from the Loulis in the role of Yannis Varoufakis, at least he was ok to watch.

I know no other film that takes you behind the scenes of EU politics like this one. A must see if you are interested in European politics or if you are inclined to read the politics section of any serious newspaper.

As far as the real events, i watched what I was expecting even me not having read Varoufakis's book. So almost nothing special here, no surprise. So, despite the "outsider's" role of Varoufakis, expected some more "insider's" information.

I liked the performance of almost all characters. They are totally in line with the actual person's image to the public, in a dramatic and brutal realistic way together. I would say it is Gavras style with a bit of Nikos Perakis'...

I liked the photography. Lighting and colors are top notch in bright and dark scenes. Especially the darks in Varoufakis' house or the semi-lighted scene when Varoufakis speeks to british bankers. Composition and perspective are also excellent. However, there was some lens distortion in the wide internal shots that could have been avoided. DOPs have managed this decades ago shooting film, so no excuse have them shooting digital nowadays, except it was a choice not a compromise, however i can see no reason for this in those particular shots.

As far as the screenplay and editing. Did not like it very much as a whole. Nice cuts, fluid scenes, but many important events are a bit squeezed at the end. Like the editor suddenly realised that he aproached the movie's time limit and had to exclude takes, or the producers suddenly run out of money. Maybe that is how Varoufakis book ends? Do not know, but it is a movie not a book and I believe great Costas Gabras could have done better here. Final documentary titles also seem to try and fill this gap, with no success in my opinion.

Interesting story about the greek financial crisis and the political struggles that were endured. Good insight into the struggles and flaws of the EU. Potentially quite a one sided view of things. Superb musical background.

Having read the book "Adults in the room" I was waiting much more from this film. My impression is that Gavras, trying to fit the book in a two hour movie has messed it up. In contrast to the book I couldn't see any evolution of characters but meetings meetings and more meetings (Eurogroup etc). Thé scenes failed to give the narration and the atmosphere that exist in the book. Moreover the film is messed up chronically. Someone who doesn't know the story cannot understand if the whole story occurs in a week or a month or more. The use of first names was really annoying. The Final scene is completely out of nowhere and is nonsense, coming from Greek musical from the 60's.

No in contrast to the book - which I consider as a must read - this film is a total mess. C'est dommage pour Gavras.

Costa Gavras, in my opinion, as an artist, sensed that something's not wright about EU policy and he felt it was necessary to publicise it, so people can be aware of the situation and start concerning. Obviously Varoufakis' annoying characteristics are clear, however the existence of key facts can be observed and understood easily from a rational human being. More specifically, the hypocrisy of EU, Prime ministers' naivety along with his willingness to help, the phenomenon of uneducated Greek ministers which unfortunately is a crucial factor of Greece's politicians, and of course Varoufakis' critical thinking along with a strong common sense. Also, the detection of the truth from Christine Lagarde closely to her understanding of backing's needity, Wolfgang's egoistic, childish policy, showing of a person who demands to be in charge because of his Country's economic superiority, resistant to help, and lastly EU's clear abeyance to Germany. Dissatisfactory critics are not understandable for me, since every detail referred on this movie, has been previously reported, every fact is online and anyone with a natural way of thinking can observe the truthfulness of the evidences.

Good casting and photography in a loyal transcript of Yanis Varoufakis' original book. However I found the direction uninspired and dry. The film could be watched as a dramatised documentary as the events are stripped down of any emotional attachments. It is recommended for people that prefer a visualised version of the author's excellent book.

It isn't one of the best of Gavras but still most reviews are from the individuals that disaprove of anyone trying to go against the european ang greek establisment and thus have a deep distaste for Varoufakis. Don't mind them and their low ratings. The garbage truck of history and the social unrest caused by their conservative fears that let the establisment continue their destructive "solution" in Greece and elsewere wil take care of them. See this movie with a grain of salt allways and make up your own minds.

Bad Aesthetics, mediocre acting and the directing was inconsistent with really bad, pointless cuts. The lighting and the filters were out of place and did not match with the script and the story telling. All these facts do not add with the budget of the movie or the expectations of the production. If you want to waste a bit of your time you can watch this.

This year I had the opportunity to attend Venice film Festival. One of the movies I saw there was Adults in the Room by Mr. Costa-Gavras. This movie is all about Greek politics and I'm from Greece too so I was excited to see how they were portrayed. The movie was excellent, it demonstrated the situation how it really was of course from Mr. Varoufakis book who was really an insider to the politics back then. All in all, the movie is worth watching especially for people who are into politics and don't pay attention to the bad reviews they are from Greek people with different political beliefs who also haven't seen the movie because it's not out yet. Thank you for reading.

Adults In A Room is based on the homonymous book, which is an unapologetic, shameless self-celebration of Yanis Varoufakis; but that's fine, as the book is authored by Yanis Varoufakis, who's fully entitled to consider himself as a god put on earth. Never mind history proved him wrong on every level, we live in the era of wild populism where reality is what you want it to be. What is instead amazing is that a respectable director like Costa-Gavras lended himself to the operation of endorsing the delusional fantasies of the book by transposing them extremely loyally onto the screen. This is in essence the story of Yaroufakis v Rest Of The World, and the result is: Yaroufakis wins! Yaroufakis got it all right, the rest of the world got it all wrong; Yaroufakis is the only hero in the room, the rest of the world is a bunch of wimps, arrogant, incompetent idiots. The movie is bad even on a purely cinematic level: there is virtually no plot apart the sequences of meetings if the Euro-Group are utterly boring, there are some scenes which are farcical and kitsch, performances are amateurish, almost theatrical. All in all, I felt the movie was an insult to intelligence.

I saw this movie at its premiere in Greece. I didn't realize how time went by, since the story and the directing were so fascinating that kept me at the edge of my seat. Of course I was so interested in the plot, since whatever is described in this movie has plenty to do with me as a Greek and as a European. But this is not a movie you can simply ignore, no matter one's political beliefs.

The acting of some of the actors was excellent, while others seemed to struggle. The soundtrack was superb and the plot unfolded in a natural way.

This movie does not have a happy ending, nor should it have. It is the most essential type of art. The type that gives you a glimpse behind the curtains of this world.

Apart from the scenario, which I could very well understand it would be one-sided and radical populist before even seeing the film, I was deeply disappointed by the technical aspects of the film too. In most of the parts, it looked really cheap and of minimum artistic value.

Gavras can do better and he has proven it in the past.

I was lucky to watch a sneak copy of the film and i must admit that in general it was way below my expectations. The book was much better. I gave one star because of some scenes. The adaptation was poor, the actors pathetic.

The story unfolds in very low and boring pace, without any suspense or drama feel. This is the style of Gavras, a typical school of so-called art cinema, where you usually leave during the interval. I did not as i was hoping till the last moment that the film would make a turn around.

Pure waste of time

Forget your political inclinations and all you had heard about Greece tragedy; the movie is basically the discussion of a recently elected left government to survive the pressure of the EU on agreements signed by its right predecessors. We know history and how ruined Greece is; perhaps not everything is true but the film is so intense that will keep you hooked for its two hours. Does not matter you do not know most of the characters. There are very few important because the rest are just puppets. There are many wrong things in Greece; but the insensibility of the great economic powers and bankers, the pressure of the money controllers to destabilize a government and force into dirty business to destroy even more the country is truly infuriating and sadly true.

How it ends; well read the news papers and it was not good for Greece

In brief, just clean your mind of politics and see this to understand how bad our world is.

What was this?Loulis played well and that's it.The other cast is bad.Mr Gavra it was your worst movie.

A modern political film from an expert director with a cast of mostly new actors. A must watch in your new films list.

Fictional representation of a great political tragedy dealt in an amateur way

This movie is as bad as the book is. Probably its the worst film of Gavras so far. Spiros Loulis is an excellent actor and the 1star is only for him.

Really great movie! It is very interesting to see the hypocrisy of EU and how naive Tsipras was.

This is one of the worst movies of Mr. Gavras. In my opinion, this one along with "Le capital" are very bad movies.

"Adults in the Room" is based on a really poor script. The story is of course one sided, it is fictional rather than political (which is bad for the movie as it strives to be political), in several occasions the script becomes hilarious, while the acting could only be characterized as ridiculous.

The problem with Mr. Gavras is that in both this movie and the Capital, he is dealing with subjects and issues he is completely unaware of. Instead of asking for some help, even for the sake of making the point as he would like to, he believes he can present to the audience financial, macroeconomic, legal or international relations issues in a childish, non-scientific way, ending up making a poor movie.

Greece is now borrowing from the markets with interest rates lower than the US, unemployment is falling, banks are open, many of the taxes imposed during crisis, are gradually being cancelled. Greece was saved by the Europeans, not by charlatans, which makes this movie even more irrelevant to reality, no to say anything worse.