Lianna (1983)

The Worst Film Ever

Great Film overall

When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.

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

That I was reminded of friends and their struggles, follies and foibles in watching this film is perhaps its highest praise. Sayles has succeeded in creating a real world peopled by real characters who act appropriately to the world around them, and at the same time tells a story about love and friendship that is transcendent. (What is a spoiler for a film like this? if you don't want to know what happens don't go further. It will not kill you or even harm your appreciation if you do, this is just not that kind of movie.) Lianna is married to a narcissistic college professor who dated her when she was a student. She falls for yet another professor. This one not as narcissistic and yet still flawed. Lianna's second professor is not accident she is the kind of person in authority that Lianna falls for. That this new professor has a conscience and I think means well for Lianna is a step forward, but first Lianna has a lot to learn about love and the effects of the rashness that sometimes comes with it.In her zeal to declare her love to the world, she rips that world apart and must spend the rest of the movie putting it back together. It is how she works with the betrayal and lack of support - plus help from strangers and friends alike - that pulls this movie out of exploitation and into drama.Sayles wrote a killer script, but he had a fantastic medium for his story in Linda Griffiths. She is so totally in touch with the character, the joys, the doubts and the worries, she shines. the other actors shine as well. Ms. Hallaren perhaps telegraphs her intentions, but no more so than some real people. Sayles is quite mercurial in this lecher/best friend role, but watch out for best friend Sandy played by Jo Henderson, wise and foolish and oh so pivotal.How friendships work is the real essence of the movie. Coming out is a vehicle for that exploration. The reactions here of various friends again ring true, you know these people, they work.Many people have commented on the setting, some finding it dreary. It is dreary, dreary the way the world is sometimes dreary. It is a ordinary place where people go through the extraordinary effort called life. Lianna is ultimately brave, though not necessarily the bravest character in the story for we all must deal with the effects of someone else's coming out. It isn't about who you sleep with, but it is how you deal with the person, how do we deal with news that doesn't really change who a person is, but does change how we see them. Lianna has lessons for all of us in this department.

A very interesting film and certainly a good example of John Sayles work. He wrote, directed and played the male lead in the film. Sayles, who wrote Lone Star, Silver City and Passion Fish among many others, is much better in writing and directing than acting, but he certainly portrays an asshole husband in a loveless marriage well.Linda Griffiths, in her first film, gave an incredibly touching performance as a woman who realizes that she is a lesbian after having two children. She goes through the emotions as she realizes the first person she ever loved is leaving her for an old girlfriend; she deals with the loss of her family; and she stumbles through as friends don't quite know how to deal with her.Anytime a marriage breaks up it is hard, but I believe it is doubly hard in this situation and this film really gives a good picture of what all have to go through.

I don't know what is more depressing: that the great John Sayles crafted this piece of cartoon character lesbian propaganda or that people today who have the tremendous increase in psychological knowledge available to them and should know better still can't see that Sayles was glorifying a narcissist.The "hero" of our film, Liannna, is attracted to emotionally unavailable people of either sex. Yet she takes no responsibility for her sick actions. She has no problem with unethical behavior, whether it be having sexual relationships with authority figures or a meaningless one-night stand of loveless sex with a stranger. Are we to stand up and cheer because she learns to act like her sexual predator husband in the bar? Lianna trades a loveless marriage with Dick for a loveless lesbian affair with Ruth. She abandons her two young children for a life of hedonism and doesn't give her devastating actions a second thought. All that matters is her being a naughty and daring pioneer for the sexual revolution. By the end of the film Lianna finds out everyone else is just as self-centered as she is.The sad conclusion drawn from watching Lianna is that John Sayles betrayed his audience. He used our moral outrage at Dick's unconscionable behavior to justify Lianna's initial actions, but she turns into another Dick. But now I know why he had to resort to such a cheap cinematic trick to engage the audience: throughout the rest of the film Sayles fails to make the case that this life is worth examining or this character is worth caring about.

An insightful portrait done by the master of portraying real characters, John Sayles. This was a sensitive but unsentimental portrayal of a woman coming to terms with being a Lesbian, well before it was every the trend to portray gay and lesbian characters in a sensitive light. I really admie John Sayles' ability to understand characters that seem so far removed from himself.