Roger Dodger
2002 Directed by Dylan Kidd
Synopsis
After breaking up with his lover and boss, a smooth-talking man takes his teenaged nephew out on the town in search of sex.
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A huge jump for me on rewatch. Campbell Scott and Jesse Eisenberg are fantastic, even Berkley is solid. Nicely made. Would love to see this on Criterion in the future.
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Campbell Scott plays Roger silver tounged New York copy writer. Roger is having a bad day after being dumped by his lover, but when his nephew Nick (Jesse Eisenberg) turns up and asks to be trained in the ways of seduction, Roger agrees.
What follows is one night in New York as Nick gets to know his uncle and his selfish and immoral ways.
Scott and Eisenberg are very good, and I really liked the use of camera, making the viewer feel like a voyeur.
I couldn't help being reminded of Shame while watching this. As Roger displays some of the same loneliness and feelings as Fassbender's Brandon, all alone in the big city.
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The dialog is great, when the main guys goes on his rants of predictable behavior its both great and sad since he can't see the world any other way. His chemistry with Jesse is great too and the arcs of both characters are very believable.
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Solid acting and pretty interesting dialogue regarding sexuality. I found myself rooting for Jesse.
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A shared quest for sex by a shy 16 year old and his anti-social uncle results in life lessons for both generations.
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Nobody's seen this film. It's perfect.
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The film, much like the title character (sorta) Roger's approach, is all about manipulation. Point B is left to rot and boil while point A joyfully skips over its carcass, eyes fixed on point C's sexy ass. Roger Dodger takes one bracing, illogical turn - and then another. Writer-director Dylan Kidd sets up the Scott character as a talker - a bluntly hateful one - and follows this up with a series of exchanges between himself, his nephew (Eisenberg) and two nymphets. These exchanges - which we'll politely dub the second act - still feel as if they're in the midst of setting this character up (but, in actuality, its no more than stuck tires spinning in the mud). When…
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I was told this movie was extremely funny, so I watched it... I think I maybe smiled once? Roger is a thoroughly despicable character, and I'm not sure whether it was supposed to be one of those things where I laughed because what he said was so outrageously horrific, or whether I was supposed to be sympathizing with him, or what. Either way, this movie just didn't work for me at all on a comedic level. On a dramatic one, I was interested in what was going on with Jesse Eisenberg's character, but not enough to make watching the movie worthwhile.
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A huge jump for me on rewatch. Campbell Scott and Jesse Eisenberg are fantastic, even Berkley is solid. Nicely made. Would love to see this on Criterion in the future.
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Career best performance from the always great Campbell Scott here as Rodger, am over-analytical ladies man who after being jilted by his boss takes out his frustrations by trying to prove his methods aren't madness when his nephew, Jesse Eisenberg comes calling.
As in most indie comedies, there is an abundance of vocabulary heavy scenes but Scott's portrayal of Rodger is suitably brilliant enough that it engages and is very funny with it, whether you're laughing through identification or at the sheer nerve of the man.
Eisenberg copes very well up against such a great performance and marks himself out for the future while a supporting cast which includes Isabella Rosselini acting very european and Elizabeth Berkeley proving that she… -
Ein bis zwei gute Szenen. Mehr nicht.