Annette Bening Gives a Stellar Performance

What would it be like to be raised by a single parent, bipolar mother? This movie gives a true insight to that dilemma based on the autobiographical book by Augusten Burroughs. Deirdre Burroughs (Annette Bening) starts out the movie pretty believable. She is neglected by her husband Norman(Alec Baldwin) and adored by her 13 year old son Augusten (Joseph Cross). But when Norman finally has enough of her ranting, he leaves forever.

Deirdre then becomes the patient of a nutty psychiatrist, Dr. Finch(Brian Cox), and eventually turns over custody of her son to him. The doctor is a typical 1970s shrink that believes in popping pills for everything, group therapy, and letting your anger out. Meanwhile, Augusten is forced to live in the doctor's home with an assorted group of nuts: his wife Agnes (Jill Clayburgh) looks and acts like she has just had a lobotomy but ends up his savior; Hope Cox (Gwyneth Paltrow), the doctor's older daughter who hears messages from God; and Natalie (Evan Rachel Wood), the younger daughter who is rebellious and becomes Augusten's friend; and finally, Neil Bookman (Joseph Fiennes), another adopted son of the doctor who seduces Augusten into homosexuality.

It is amazing that Augusten kept his sanity throughout all of this.

Annette Bening gives a wonderful performance as Deirdre the mother, who eventually gets so doped up that she goes into a stupor. Several times, she is taken away in a strait jacket.

If you enjoy psychiatric movies like "Sybil," "White Oleander," or "The 3 Faces of Eve," you might enjoy this movie. However, this movie is produced more or less as a comedy. Sadly, considering that this story is basically nonfiction, it is abominable that this child had to try to survive through such an ordeal.

I won't tell you how it ends, but there are some reconciliations. However, some of the ramifications of the past cannot be changed.

Running With Scissors - The Book is Much Better!

I read Augusten Burroughs' book, "Running With Scissors" soon after it was published and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Burroughs has an uncanny way of making the most horrific scenarios of his childhood funny. His entire childhood and teen years were full of sadness, insanity, and downright horror. Still, he draws the reader in and the book is hard to put down, thanks to his wit and twisted sense of humor.

Sadly, the movie pales in comparison.

While the actors played their roles well enough, the movie lost most of Burroughs' view of things. It's as if the script was just a straight take of the words Burroughs wrote. There was not much of a sense of irony to any of it.

Annette Benning was good as the young Burroughs' mother. In fact, she may have captured her character better than anyone else. While Gwyneth Paltrow was okay as Hope, she just didn't bring the absurdity of her character to life. Jill Clayburgh was an excellent choice for Agnes Finch, and Brian Cox played Dr. Finch quite well.

Actually, all of the actors were fine. But the movie just does not bring the book to life.

My Advice: Read the Book. Forget the movie.

Running with Scissors

I read the book "Running with Scissors" on my therapists recommendation. It depicts the resilience of a young boy going through very strange experiences during his early teens. I was curious as to how it could be played out on screen, so bought the DVD. I rarely watch R rated films so was at times shocked at the content and language. However it was true to the story Augusten had written. It definitely portrayed both the sadness and horrible experiences he had, but still maintained the humor of his bizarre living situations. How anyone could manage to come through with any sense of normalcy is amazing.
Fortunately Augusten had a close and nurturing connection with his mother in his early years so could see how crazy making his world had become His mother became more ill and dependent on her psychiatrist, who ultimately was the most "crazy" of all. The film as a whole was a blend of comedy and tragedy with a mix of characters who kept my attention. A matter of things couldn't get worse, but sure enough, turning the next corner, things got worse.
I would recommend the film to a mature audience, but feel its subject matter and language would be inappropriate for children

Too awful for words.

Honest to God, whatever possessed ANYONE in Hollywood to have anything to do with this sorry excuse of a movie is beyond me. Can you imagine Annette Bening, Joseph Fiennes, Alec Baldwin, Jill Clayburgh, Evan Rachel Wood, Brian Cox, Joseph Cross right on down to the assistant caterer, reading the script for this drivel and thinking "I HAVE to be a part of this!" A quick rundown of the story; a young teen boy's schizo failure of a writer mom decides she would rather pursue success than to raise her 14 year old boy, so she allows her nut-job therapist to adopt him. This therapist gets messages from God in his bowel movements (I am NOT making this up). The boy's alcoholic dad wants nothing to do with him. Meanwhile the therapist's other adopted son, who wants to kill him, begins an affair with the 14 year old boy, who decides he is probably gay. Then there are the nutso daughters and manic depressive wife of the therapist...oh well, don't want to ruin the storyline, such as it is. And the studios wonder why people don't go to the movies anymore?!?

My heart truly goes out to Mr. Augusten Burroughs!

The book is th first and foremost requirement before seeing or even considering purchasing this movie!!! The movie does not do justice to the work written by Mr. Burroughs in his novel "Running With Scissors."! He is very talented and I highly recommend reading his work starting ith the book "Running With Scissors.". The best part of the movie is the performance by annette Benning, which if you read any of the reviews she is the one given the spotlight. I purchased the movie since I am a collector of Mr. Burrough's but I hope he does not feel that his dedicated fan's feel that this poor work had any reflection on his genuine talent! I say rent it if anything but to not read at least this one book by this author is a great loss!
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