Watch Heaven For Free

I wanted to like it more than I actually did... But much of the humor totally escaped me and I walked out only mildly impressed.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.

It's funny, it's tense, it features two great performances from two actors and the director expertly creates a web of odd tension where you actually don't know what is happening for the majority of the run time.

God awful movie...don't believe the 'hype' it is weak, lacks no guts nor plot, gives every impression that it's a students movie for Year 11 Drama studies! I could not see what others saw in it. Everything screamed B movie! The restaurant scenes were shot ALL at the same table with the brassy blonde sitting behind both times, once when she went with her husband, once with her lover. Man were they that short for extras?The movie lacked any credibility even by trying to be bad to be good it also failed in it's use of dark light throughout.The 'chairman of the board' should have used his film for something at least credible. This was a shocker 1/10

Although the technique is used with greater skill in "28 Grams," "Heaven" uses a back-and-forth-in-time editing technique to keep the viewer on their toes and constantly thinking. The technique always reminds me of a friend telling a long complicated tale who will break to say, "Oh, I forgot to tell you, before we went A-B-C, there was this incident where X-Y-Z happened." Not a good way to explain it, but I find it an interesting way to let a story unfold. Danny Edwards plays a transsexual, not a transvestite (as the previous reviewer erroneously identified the character-- there is a major difference between the two) and does a splendid job creating a believable and sympathetic character. If the film lacks anything, it's that no one seems to have a cell phone right when when would come in handy (and be expected.) It's also never explained why Robert Marling (the architect character at the story's center) supposedly only has "$200 in the bank" in one scene, only to be gambling two grand just hours later. There is one sloppy edit where the bouncer, Sweeper, turns away from a jerk he's just smacked away from the strip club, that quick cuts to a close up where his face is turned another direction, then cuts back to the first camera angle. Other than that, the time shifts in the editing are what keep the movie fresh and interesting.

Based on a myriad of very positive comments here, as well as my experience watching the director's previous film _The Ugly_ and enjoying it, I rented _Heaven_. What an awful film! Don't believe the hype. There's a very good reason this bypassed theaters and went straight to video. It's an ugly, mean-spirited, depressing film, with characters that it is hard to understand and like. The acting is good--it's amazing to see Richard Schiff, so likeable on _The West Wing_, playing such a sleaze. Martin Donovan is good, as are Joanna Going and Patrick Malahide. Too bad the story doesn't have more going for it. And what's with the son of Donovan/Going's characters? Both of them have obvious American accents, but the kid talks like he just got off the plane from Australia or New Zealand (the latter, I guess). Other than chopping things up and presenting them out of order, so that what we think is going to happen isn't necessarily what does happen, this film really has very little going for it. _Memento_ it is NOT! Here's hoping that Scott Reynold's next film, _When Strangers Appear_ is an improvement.

Very unappealing distorted characters and a gruesome violent theme. It is hard to like a movie when the story is unremittingly violent and barbaric while the characters are cold and (Donovan excepted) unappealing to look at.