Jailbait (2004)

To me, this movie is perfection.

Save your money for something good and enjoyable

This story has more twists and turns than a second-rate soap opera.

This is a gorgeous movie made by a gorgeous spirit.

I started watching this movie with no pre-conceived notions. (I only decided to see it based on the presence of Michael Pitt, who has proved himself to be a very capable young actor, and that it was produced by the same producer as L.I.E. I had heard nothing about it.)I wish I had read a review before hand and saved myself some time and money. (Though the review I read here for it wouldn't have stopped me from seeing the film. They seemed to think simplicity means "art".) The acting was surprisingly good. That I am willing to say. If you want an acting class on how to react silently on film, Pitt's performance is sublime. Sadly, those moments do not save this clunker of a movie.Some times you see a movie that was based on a play and you can feel the story not fitting the medium of film. This was a very similar experience to that. It was like watching a badly lit stage play with close ups. You are robbed of the joy of going to see a play while also being robbed of the pleasures of film. They are two completely different mediums and this movie fit neither one.If it was play at a local theater, I would recommend it solely based on the mental exercise that would accompany the play on the ride home. But as a film, I must say this movie left me feeling flat. The camera felt intrusive. The pace felt forced. The violence seemed tame and unreal. Even the dialouge seemed as if it were written by someone who had never seen the inside of a prison. (Or if they had, it was in 1957.)The actors clearly did the best they could. They had to take this job for the chance to do good work and not for money, but sadly the direction and script didn't allow them to make a movie you don't forget about ten minutes before the credits even start.

Thank God this film will finally receive its long-overdue theatrical release later on this summer! I saw it a while back at a film festival and thought it was one of the best independent films I'd seen in a long, long time. It is extremely powerful, disturbing, thought-provoking and funny all at the same time. The performances by all four actors are spot-on. Michael Pitt continues to impress. In fact, I think he went deeper emotionally in this film than any other, with the possible exception of 'Last Days.' Stephen Adly Guirgis surpasses his 'Palindromes' performance by a country mile. He's fantastic. And the film as a whole has a very mature, seasoned tone, pace and structure. It reminded me of some of Fassbinder's films. And early Louis Malle and a bit of Bresson. A great debut by writer/director Brett C. Leonard. I heard after the screening I saw that they shot the whole thing in 8 or 9 days. Incredible. Does anyone know when it will premiere in L.A.? I believe it opens New York sometime in July. Anyway, if it comes out where you live, I highly recommend it. A great example of auteur, personal film-making on a shoe string budget.

I just recently saw this fil at the Woodstock Film Festival and found it .... amazing.Michael Pitt and Stephen Adly-Guirgis were incredibly perfect for these roles. It was the first time that I had seen either actor and the cinematography made you feel claustrophobic and trapped as a prison cell. I think it really hit home about the prison system and how young men are raped and mentally abused by cellmates. It should send a message to the judicial system to monitor prisoners more and keep "chickens" from the hawks. Extremely provoking and sad. One of the best films of 2004.

`When in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes' from one of Shakespeare's sonnets was used in 1967 (before Stonewall) as the title of a play about men in prison and the sexual games that were played there.Jailbait covers much the same territory and it would appear (if this movie is taken at face value) that some parts of society haven't moved ahead at all.In this prison drama, essentially a two-man play, we see the interaction between the hardened lifer Jake and the much younger, much more frail Randy (played by Michael Pitt)The first scene with the two men is deceptively mild but towards the end of that scene we see that there is menace just below the surface of Jake's behavior. From the `wounded doe' look in Randy's eyes at the beginning of the second scene we can begin to see that something is wrong and while what it is seems pretty obvious (given that it's a prison movie) we are not really certain for some timeUnfortunately the movie doesn't progress much from there. Like the men, we seemed sentenced to remain in the same place for much longer than we'd choose to.This movie is worth seeing as a character study and there are some memorable bits but it seemed to cover no new ground nor present any new perspectives over the 30 year old Fortune and Men's Eyes (albeit this one showed that it had a much better budget and was by far more polished)I was ultimately left unfulfilled and wondering why this movie had been made.