Billy Lee Harman This film is two movies, its scenes including Catherine Keener, and its scenes excluding her. The link is the iguana, now a symbol of Eisenstein's dialectical idealism montage theory of cinematic art, indicating Keener's pseudo-intellectual influence on this cinematic production. Soviet Cinematographer Sergei Eisenstein responded to the Soviets' perverting Hegel's "phenomenology of mind" into what they called dialectical materialism by calling his Zen koan approach to cinema dialectical idealism. And, since then, emulating his use of discordant montage has been a right of passage for cinematographers and directors. But Keener's dialectic detracts from the iguana's. HITRT

david-sarkies This is an independent American film which stars Brad Pitt. This is before Brad Pitt's rise to fame but from here we can see that he is a pretty good actor. The movie is about a man, Johnny Suede (Brad Pitt), who finds a pair of Suede shoes, and with these shoes he believes that he is complete. In the end though he is not. It seems at the beginning of this movie that every thing is going to go his way, but in the end it does not.The movie follows two relationships that Johnny has. The first is with a young rich girl whose mother owns a recording studio. This is a relationship made in heaven as it seems that everything Johnny ever wanted has landed in his lap. Her mother likes him and it looks as if he is going to become a star. His friend warns him though that if a woman's mother likes you then the woman does not. In the end Johnny says something and the girl throws him out.The film maker is very clever with how he makes this movie. He does not let you know where he is going to go. He will dangle what looks like a opportunity in Johnny's face yet nothing will come of this opportunity. He runs into the most popular singer of the time, Freak Storm, and makes friends with him. He offers a record deal but nothing ever comes out of it. From what we see, Freak Storm just took his money and left Johnny with food poisoning.Johnny protects a woman, Yvonne, from a peeping tom and strikes up a relationship with her. Yvonne is a very loving woman, someone that Johnny does not deserve. This brings back images of Clerks where the girlfriend is the one that cares for the main character yet the main character does realise it until it is too late. Johnny's low point is on his birthday as this is when his best friend walks out on him and he wonders on home only to be drawn away by a woman on the train. As I said, the film maker does an incredible job in twisting your perception of the movie around. It is difficult at times to see if it is a dream or not, but he will drop in a little hint, like a midget cowboy or a naked man, to let you know that something is wrong.The dreams seem to play an important part in the movie because it seems to be a form of appearance and reality. Is what appears to Johnny is in fact another reality. When he is dying of food poisoning, he is rescued by both women, only one of the rescues is a dream. The dream is what Johnny wants while the reality is completely different. The end is very inconclusive and we are left to make of it what we will. As the narrator says, some say he got it back others say it was found on the side of the road outside of Delaware. The movie is left hanging and it is up to us to finish it.

mattymatt4ever "Johnny Suede" is not a film for all tastes. Not because it's a very strange piece, but because it's not an example of that in-your-face cinema that many are accustomed to. This is Tom DiCillo's directorial debut. I saw one of his recent films, "The Real Blonde," and I found it to be very impressive. So I felt quite curious about checking out his early work. There's not even a hint of flashy direction, and it's obvious throughout that the makers of the film were running on a low budget, but I didn't worry about those things. Brad Pitt (before he became a household name) is great--and perfectly cast--in the lead role. Next to his role as Tyler Durden in "Fight Club" I would say this is one of the best performances of his career. I just felt, in every aspect, he was made to play this character. Even the pompadour looked perfect on him, and I couldn't imagine any other actor wearing it better. His character, Johnny Suede, is so utterly likable that you feel obligated to scurry along on his little journeys. Johnny is not the smartest guy on Earth, not the classiest either and certainly not the most successful. He lives a pretty simple life in a ratty apartment, listening to vintage records by rock and roll legends. He has dreams of becoming a rock and roll legend himself, and is the leader of a band. However, the band never quite takes off. None of that "I dream of becoming a rock and roll star and the next minute I'm staring at crowds of screaming fans chanting my name" garbage we see repeatedly on VH1 as one of the "Movies That Rock." This is the life of a real struggling artist, who does have talent and potential, but can't quite get off the ground. Well...not yet. His love life isn't all too successful, and that's what's hindering his ability to proceed in his daily endeavors. First he falls in love with a beautiful girl whose current boyfriend likes to beat her. He has every right to believe that the sparks are flying between them, but suddenly she just blurts out, "I don't love you, Johnny." Then he falls in love with Catherine Keener. Things go well between them at first, but like in his previous relationships things also get shot to hell eventually. And we feel sorry for this poor guy. He may not be smooth or unusually charming, but that's the point. He's a nice, unpretentious average Joe who seeks true love and quite frankly he's doing everything in his power to make these relationships work. I've always admired Brad (A.K.A. Mr. Handsome), but I considered this performance especially unique. Though he's just as handsome as he was in "Legends of the Fall" and "Meet Joe Black," he's not on screen to portray his now-proclaimed status as the "Sexiest Man Alive." He just plays a normal guy, living a normal life and seeking a normal relationship. Though we may not all go for the "pompadour" look or listen to classic oldies on an old record player, we can all relate to his character in some sort of way. And speaking of music, I love that line where he says, "Real music has no time." When you listen to great songs by great artists like Bill Haley and the Comets or Ricky Nelson, you don't think about what time period they came from because they're timeless. At first, I thought this movie might've been set in the 1950's, but in all actuality it just involves a man who happens to be fascinated by the trends of the 50's, and I'm down with that. Don't expect a plot, because this is strictly a character-driven effort. And with a strong central character like Johnny Suede, I felt amazingly captivated and had an unspeakable urge to keep on watching. I guess you can call it a slice-of-life comedy-drama. I highly suggest people check out this overlooked gem. You'll laugh. You'll have fun. You'll have a good ol' time. My score: 7 (out of 10)

George Parker "Johnny Suede" is a slice of life flick which tells of a peculiar fictitious character, Suede (Pitt), who has a 10 inch pompadour, worships Ricky Nelson, is a wannabee musician/star, is naive or stupid or both, and has little else worthy of mention. The slice the film presents (the story) is off-beat and creative in the minutia and anticlimactic in the whole. Pitt and Keneer and Levels work well in their roles but can't make up for a story which is about as satisfying as a baloney sandwich on Thanksgiving Day. A no brainer for channel surfers.