Review of Igby Goes Down

I went into the theatre expecting to be either entertained or challenged in my thinking. Nothing happened. I take it that this was a comedy, a black comedy. But even in black comedies, people laugh. No one laughed. People with full buckets of popcorn were getting up in the middle of the movie and leaving. It had occurred to me to do the same, something I have never done. I found nothing insightful or even artistic about this, unless you think that walking out of a theatre feeling chilled to the bone by a set of characters you wanted to have some feelings for, but you can find no reason to feel for them -- if this is artistic, then art sucks. This was not art. It was a self-indulgent wallowing in pity for shallow, spoiled people who deserved no pity.

If you waste your money on this movie, as I did, don't say you weren't warned. Again, I had high expectations of this film. God, I hate film reviewers who think anything ice cold must certainly be art.

P.S.: There was only one good performance in the entire movie, laden with great performers -- that of Kieran Culkin. So what were Susan Sarandon, Ryan Phillipe, Claire Danes and Jeff Goldblum thinking when they got into this?