Paramount Pictures has bought "Diminished Capacity" from Myriad Pictures and the comedy will be released theatrically."Diminished Capacity" is be adapted from the novel by Sherwood Kiraly. Starring are Matthew Broderick, Virginia Madsen and Alan Alda and follows a man and his uncle, both dealing with memory problems, trying to sell a valuable baseball card. Director Terry Kinney's delightfully poignant and bittersweet comedy poses the question: How much is a good memory worth? That's the question that faces newspaper editor Cooper (Matthew Broderick) after a debilitating concussion takes him from the political pages to comic strip detail. Looking for answers, he travels home to Missouri where his now senile Uncle Rollie (Alan Alda) is on the verge of losing his home. When a valuable baseball card is thrown into the mix, these two men along with a motley group of hometown friends, including Cooper's high school sweetheart, Charlotte (Virginia Madsen...
- 2/11/2009
- Upcoming-Movies.com
Paramount Pictures has bought "Diminished Capacity" from Myriad Pictures and the comedy will be released theatrically."Diminished Capacity" is be adapted from the novel by Sherwood Kiraly. Starring are Matthew Broderick, Virginia Madsen and Alan Alda and follows a man and his uncle, both dealing with memory problems, trying to sell a valuable baseball card. Director Terry Kinney's delightfully poignant and bittersweet comedy poses the question: How much is a good memory worth? That's the qu...
- 2/11/2009
- Upcoming-Movies.com
Paramount Pictures has bought "Diminished Capacity" from Myriad Pictures and the comedy will be released theatrically."Diminished Capacity" is be adapted from the novel by Sherwood Kiraly. Starring are Matthew Broderick, Virginia Madsen and Alan Alda and follows a man and his uncle, both dealing with memory problems, trying to sell a valuable baseball card. Director Terry Kinney's delightfully poignant and bittersweet comedy poses the question: How much is a good memory worth? That's the qu...
- 2/11/2009
- Upcoming-Movies.com
Didn't we invent film festivals so we could sequester all the star-studded "how I spent my summer vacation" indie film projects and keep them out of our arthouses? Who let Diminished Capacity escape? Based on a novel by Sherwood Kiraly, and directed by character actor (and Steppenwolf Theater vet) Terry Kinney, Diminished Capacity stars Matthew Broderick as a Chicago newspaper editor who's busted down to proofreading the comics page after a car accident leaves him with short-term memory issues. Ordered to take a vacation, Broderick heads to Missouri to visit his uncle (Alan Alda), an Alzheimer's-afflicted eccentric who's invented a device that translates the movements of fish into typewritten poetry. No sooner does Broderick arrive than he's heading back, accompanying Alda on a mission to sell a rare baseball card. The addled duo is joined by Virginia Madsen, Broderick's childhood sweetheart, who has her own appointment in Chicago with a.
- 7/3/2008
- by Noel Murray
- avclub.com
Sundance Film Festival
PARK CITY -- In Diminished Capacity, actor-turned-first-time director Terry Kinney has a solid premise and two intriguing characters but only the lamest story to tell. Consequently, the film plays like diminished comedy.
The extremely talented Matthew Broderick and Alan Alda play a respective nephew and uncle, each struggling with memory loss, thereby creating a team Broderick calls, in one of the movie's few witty lines, Slow and slower. But yielding to the story demands of a novel by Sherwood Kiraly (who co-authored the script), these two are thrust into the world of baseball cards and sports memorabilia shows, an arcane and, as it works out, mirthless arena for these potentially compelling characters.
The project from Steppenwolf Films, a division of the famed Chicago theater company, did attract a stellar cast including Virginia Madsen, Bobby Cannavale and the great Lois Smith. But from the start, the film fails to get any comic traction. Boxoffice appeal is limited to those eager to see Broderick and Alda in unusual roles -- and possibly Chicago Cubs fans whose long-suffering fate is the butt of many jokes.
A head trauma has short-circuited the brain of Chicago journalist Cooper (Broderick). He must write notes to himself to aid his memory, and his newspaper job is tenuous as best. One problem here is that the film lacks the courage to really deal with "dimcap" symptoms. The film's star still gets his share of funny lines, he remembers everything he needs to and this supposedly scrambled memory plays no real role here as it did in a film like Memento.
Cooper's mom (Smith) summons him to his small Missouri hometown to help her settle Uncle Rollie (Alda), who shows signs of senile dementia. Here, too, you get not the pain and misery of an ailing elder -- as with the mentally fogged father in The Savages -- but a comically pixilated oldster obsessed about drying socks and tying baited fishing lines to typewriter keys so the fish can write poetry.
One of Uncle Rollie's obsessions proves downright intelligent. He possesses a rare baseball card, dating back to the last Cubs' World Championship, that is worth a fortune. So Slow and Slower take off for a Chicago baseball memorabilia show to sell the card. Along for the ride are Cooper's high school sweetheart, Charlotte (Madsen), who is now divorced and available again, and her son, Dillon (Jimmy Bennett).
All the characters that converge on this convention center seemingly suffer from "dimcap." The town drunk (Jim True-Frost), who follows the card-sellers, Cooper's Chicago buddy (comic Louis C.K.), a rabid Cubs fan (Dylan Baker) and a crooked dealer (Cannavale) are nothing more than cartoons. The theft of the card, a duplicate card and a few badly staged chases and fights are slapstick at its worst.
Alda actually is kind of interesting as the mentally unstable uncle, but Broderick appears to be sleepwalking. Madsen has little to do, and everyone else plays things far too broadly.
Cubs fans deserve a better tribute than this, but then again they are long suffering.
DIMINISHED CAPACITY
Plum Picturse/Steppenwolf Films/Hanson Allen Films/-Hard-Lunsford/Benedek Film
Credits:
Director: Terry Kinney
Screenwriters: Sherwood Kiraly, Doug Bost
Based on the novel by: Sherwood Kiraly
Producers: Celine Rattray, Galt Niederhoffer, Tim Evans, Daniela Tapling Lundberg
Executive producers: Bill Benenson, Pamela Hirsch, Bruce Lunsford
Scott Hanson, John Allen, Ed Hart, Eric Warren Goldman
Director of photography: Vanja Cernjul
Production designer: Dan Davis
Music: Robert Burger
Costume designer: Sarah Holden
Editor: Tim Streeto
Cast:
Cooper: Matthew Broderick
Rollie: Alan Alda
Charlotte: Virginia Madsen
Mad Dog McClure: Dylan Baker
Big Stan: Louis C.K.
Lee: Bobby Cannavale
Dillon: Jimmy Bennett
Donny: Jim True-Frost
Belle: Lois Smith
Running time -- 89 minutes
No MPAA rating...
PARK CITY -- In Diminished Capacity, actor-turned-first-time director Terry Kinney has a solid premise and two intriguing characters but only the lamest story to tell. Consequently, the film plays like diminished comedy.
The extremely talented Matthew Broderick and Alan Alda play a respective nephew and uncle, each struggling with memory loss, thereby creating a team Broderick calls, in one of the movie's few witty lines, Slow and slower. But yielding to the story demands of a novel by Sherwood Kiraly (who co-authored the script), these two are thrust into the world of baseball cards and sports memorabilia shows, an arcane and, as it works out, mirthless arena for these potentially compelling characters.
The project from Steppenwolf Films, a division of the famed Chicago theater company, did attract a stellar cast including Virginia Madsen, Bobby Cannavale and the great Lois Smith. But from the start, the film fails to get any comic traction. Boxoffice appeal is limited to those eager to see Broderick and Alda in unusual roles -- and possibly Chicago Cubs fans whose long-suffering fate is the butt of many jokes.
A head trauma has short-circuited the brain of Chicago journalist Cooper (Broderick). He must write notes to himself to aid his memory, and his newspaper job is tenuous as best. One problem here is that the film lacks the courage to really deal with "dimcap" symptoms. The film's star still gets his share of funny lines, he remembers everything he needs to and this supposedly scrambled memory plays no real role here as it did in a film like Memento.
Cooper's mom (Smith) summons him to his small Missouri hometown to help her settle Uncle Rollie (Alda), who shows signs of senile dementia. Here, too, you get not the pain and misery of an ailing elder -- as with the mentally fogged father in The Savages -- but a comically pixilated oldster obsessed about drying socks and tying baited fishing lines to typewriter keys so the fish can write poetry.
One of Uncle Rollie's obsessions proves downright intelligent. He possesses a rare baseball card, dating back to the last Cubs' World Championship, that is worth a fortune. So Slow and Slower take off for a Chicago baseball memorabilia show to sell the card. Along for the ride are Cooper's high school sweetheart, Charlotte (Madsen), who is now divorced and available again, and her son, Dillon (Jimmy Bennett).
All the characters that converge on this convention center seemingly suffer from "dimcap." The town drunk (Jim True-Frost), who follows the card-sellers, Cooper's Chicago buddy (comic Louis C.K.), a rabid Cubs fan (Dylan Baker) and a crooked dealer (Cannavale) are nothing more than cartoons. The theft of the card, a duplicate card and a few badly staged chases and fights are slapstick at its worst.
Alda actually is kind of interesting as the mentally unstable uncle, but Broderick appears to be sleepwalking. Madsen has little to do, and everyone else plays things far too broadly.
Cubs fans deserve a better tribute than this, but then again they are long suffering.
DIMINISHED CAPACITY
Plum Picturse/Steppenwolf Films/Hanson Allen Films/-Hard-Lunsford/Benedek Film
Credits:
Director: Terry Kinney
Screenwriters: Sherwood Kiraly, Doug Bost
Based on the novel by: Sherwood Kiraly
Producers: Celine Rattray, Galt Niederhoffer, Tim Evans, Daniela Tapling Lundberg
Executive producers: Bill Benenson, Pamela Hirsch, Bruce Lunsford
Scott Hanson, John Allen, Ed Hart, Eric Warren Goldman
Director of photography: Vanja Cernjul
Production designer: Dan Davis
Music: Robert Burger
Costume designer: Sarah Holden
Editor: Tim Streeto
Cast:
Cooper: Matthew Broderick
Rollie: Alan Alda
Charlotte: Virginia Madsen
Mad Dog McClure: Dylan Baker
Big Stan: Louis C.K.
Lee: Bobby Cannavale
Dillon: Jimmy Bennett
Donny: Jim True-Frost
Belle: Lois Smith
Running time -- 89 minutes
No MPAA rating...
- 1/23/2008
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
IMDb.com, Inc. takes no responsibility for the content or accuracy of the above news articles, Tweets, or blog posts. This content is published for the entertainment of our users only. The news articles, Tweets, and blog posts do not represent IMDb's opinions nor can we guarantee that the reporting therein is completely factual. Please visit the source responsible for the item in question to report any concerns you may have regarding content or accuracy.