Greetings (1968)

Did you people see the same film I saw?

Beautiful, moving film.

Absolutely the worst movie.

The plot isn't so bad, but the pace of storytelling is too slow which makes people bored. Certain moments are so obvious and unnecessary for the main plot. I would've fast-forwarded those moments if it was an online streaming. The ending looks like implying a sequel, not sure if this movie will get one

"Greetings" sees a trio of awkward young men acting, well... pretty damn strangely in 1960s New York City actually! These guys are really at odds with their environment and culture. Their eccentricities begin as a source of humor, (even if they might represent the citizen who has "too much freedom"), but eventually, these habits become eccentric, obsessive and finally disturbing. This escalation of behavior might run parallel to Government and society at the time, what with the Vietnamese conflict and the unsettled political climate. Or, it might not! The "episodic" nature of the film, the way it presents scenes like flipping through a scrapbook, is an uneven method in which to present it's satirical comments. In other words: some work and some don't. Sure, I'm sure a lot of the scenes FELT right at the time, (and there is some nice energy to many of them), but unfortunately some of them lack a direction and fall a flat, (but it IS forty years old!).De Niro has his moments too. A draft-dodging scheme he has is probably the best laugh in the film. His comedic skill is drawn upon fairly well in a number of scenes, (after all, he is the pervert of the group!). His friends are not as gripping though. A JFK conspiracy theory nut, (who is probably the most obsessive of all), lacks depth, and is really just there for a repetitive gag that didn't seem that clever to begin with. Likewise the "computer-date" enthusiast, who goes from nut-case to nut-case. He doesn't come across all that well either, and again, the same gag is dragged along for several evenly-spaced scenes.One of the things this film does well is show you New York City unflinchingly. 1968 has been captured very well, and it's astounding to see how unpopulated and thoroughly modern it looked, even then. We see these three shabbily-dressed, purposeless, bumblers haunting the bottoms of skyscrapers and climbing across architecture, all while engaging in some stream-of-consciousness-type strange banter. Weird stuff.The best things are the visuals, followed closely by some comedic flare from De Niro. But overall, it may only be those who have direct connections to this era or this city that may find a whole film out of "Greetings".

Of all of the Brian De Palma's films I had seen their had never been a comedy. His films are usually dramatic, scary or have a statement to say. About the closest he ever came to a comedy was Bonfire of the Vanities and we all know how that turned out. But going over his extensive body of work I found an old jewel by this man, and that jewel is Greetins. I admit this being pretty much his first film I should have came across it much sooner, but it was hard to find and took me about three years to uncover. When I got it and watched I never expected to laugh, I just thought it would be another statement about the time it was made in like most of De Palma's films and that would have been OK, as I like almost all of his movies, but this was a treat. From the very first frame until the last I was in a fit of laughter and that is a huge accomplishment for a film that is forty-years old. I have never laughed at a movie from the 60's the way I did this one. When the first actor walks into the African American bar and picks a fight so he can get beat up and put out of the army was magnificent. They only comedies of that time that still hold up for me are The Andy Griffith Show, I love Lucy and other situation comedies but never a film. The rest of the movie is cool because it follows three guy who are trying to get out of the draft and are heavily involved with different parts of the 60's counter culture. Robert De Niro, is a voyeur and obsessed with art I feel he is probably the character that most resembles Brian De Palma, the character almost is De Palma. One of the other guys is obsessed with the Kennedy assassination and is trying to find out the cover up, he is also involved in the hippie movement. The third guy is just a typical normal guy thrown in with these loons and is trying to stay out of the war. He goes as far to as to act gay and be like a militant. De Niro though rises as the star of the film and outshines every one else, I like him better in this then anything else he has ever done. I love when he is forced to go to Vietnam and instead of shooting a V.C girl he has her pose for a news camera and tries to make a voyeur porn. It was hilarious. Brian De Palma himself makes a brief cameo in this as a man on the steps of the draft building who De Niro does a funny rant too. Watch this movie and see how De Palma grew to become the master he is. I will say that this movie is not for everyone as it is a little racist and sexiest but if you take it in the context that it was made then you can see they real roots of it's comedy.

Brian De Palma, Robert De Niro in his first movie...it has to be good, right? That's what I thought. But I was hugely disappointed. "GREETINGS" is no more a comedy than SCHINDLER'S LIST. I didn't laugh a single time, nor grin or smile. It has one good gag, at the very end of the film, and if it had maintained that wit throughout I would have given it a higher rating.However it starts off very poor and only gets worse as time goes on. Made on a shoestring budget, and it shows in every scene. Continuity errors galore. De Palma, who edited the film, clearly has no handle on editing and literally jumps around from scene to scene. So, in one segment a group of characters are talking, and it suddenly jumps to fifteen minutes later in a different room, and they're still talking, and we're left wondering what on earth is going on.I only really wanted to see this because of Robert De Niro. I am a die-hard De Niro fan and will watch anything with him in it (I even sat through SAM'S SONG, which is even worse than this - by a long shot). However De Niro - despite top billing - is not in this film very much, and when he is, he's not very impressive. (Although he hardly does a bad job, either.) I couldn't believe De Palma was responsible for this film, it lacks all the typical Hitchcock trademarks of his. However, there are a few references - characters discuss the film BLOW-UP (1966) which he of course later loosely remade into BLOW OUT (1981) and at one point a female character subtly picks up HITCHCOCK / TRUFFAUT from a bookshelf and begins to read it.However the rest of this film lacks his typical visionary edge and I suppose it's because he was still learning (and that's clear in every frame). De Palma, never a friend of the MPAA, seems to push the boundaries a lot in GREETINGS and for the most part it's totally unnecessary. The whole subplot about De Niro's peeping-tom habits are disturbing and make us dislike his character - which is a problem since the sequel (HI, MOM! in 1970) revolves entirely around his character. (And for the record, GREETINGS was the first film awarded an X rating, which says something about its content. It's not too explicit nowadays, but we're left wondering WHY De Palma had to cram so much unnecessary sex and nudity into his film, because it seems like it's just there for the sake of being controversial - and almost 40 years later it is not controversial anymore, which makes it all the more outdated and pretentious.)Overall I was hugely disappointed in this movie. It's not funny. It's sophomoric, with stupid editing and direction (just watch the scene where De Niro and co. walk down a street and De Palma puts it in super-fast-motion - what the hell was he thinking?!). That, plus an unbearably outdated '60s overtone (and you thought EASY RIDER was outdated!) and truly awful theme tune (it sounds like the Beatles on drugs), make GREETINGS a truly disappointing experience.

You know those smug, interminable hippie improv routines in BILLY JACK? The ones where you sort of get the feeling they're supposed to be comedy, but you're thrown off a bit by the fact that they're not actually funny? And then you think maybe it's supposed to be satire, except for the fact that it isn't saying anything about the real world or real people?Put together ninety minutes of those things, and you've got GREETINGS.People might look at my screen name and think that my dislike of this movie is based on its left-wing politics, but this film is no funnier (and no more meaningful) when making fun of hippies, JFK assassination bugs, or artistic charlatans than it is when making fun of "establishment" figures and soldiers. Boring and pretentious, GREETINGS fails equally as comedy and as commentary.