IMDb user comments for
Weapons of Mass Distraction (1997) (TV)

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10 comments in total

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3 out of 3 people found the following comment useful :-
Outstanding - a must see film!, 30 June 2005

Author: jd110 from Spain

What Robert Altman did for Vietnam with M*A*S*H, Stephen Surjik (director)and Larry Gelbart (writer) do to modern media corporations with Weapons of Mass Distraction.

If anyone wants to know how the mega rich owners of big corporations are "screwing the little guy" and getting away with it, then you HAVE to watch this movie. The film uses biting satirical comic writing to deliver its message about how money and media power dominates the political process to the detriment of all but a very few people at the top. Imagine the screenplay being written by Voltaire or Jonathan Swift. Gabriel Byrne and Ben Kingsley's performances as the two greedy media moguls who will do anything, no matter how sleazy or illegal, to get their way, are brilliant. Jeffrey Tambor is fantastic as Byrne's personal assistant whose morals are as ambiguous as his sexuality.

A wonderful film, a savage attack on what happens when too much power is vested in the hands of too few. Watch it and wince.

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3 out of 3 people found the following comment useful :-
About a New Renaissance, 10 October 2003
Author: manuel-pestalozzi from Zurich, Switzerland

This movie has a brilliant, intelligent script (starting with the title!) which makes a very interesting connection between the famous Renaissance Princes and present day Media Moghuls. I will check out other movies based on scripts by Larry Gelbard as soon as I can!

Remember the Borgias, the Medicis, the Viscontis, the Sforzas and all those other guys who came from nowhere and rose up to seats of great power and founded lasting dynasties in Renaissance Italy? Those so called Condottieri were brutal and ruthless, yes, but they also furthered the arts and sciences. Maybe they did it solely for their own glory, but in the end the larger community could profit from the result. This came to my mind when I watched Weapons of Mass Distraction.

Lionel Powers and Julian Messenger are two testosterone driven characters who rose out of the gutter to establish international media empires. In the movie they are contesting for the ownership of a football team. They both don't really need it, they just have this constant urge to confirm their potency to themselves. A game of power and betrayal unfolds which becomes more wicked as it reaches deeper an deeper in to the hidden corners of different people's biographies. The electronic media is used to discredit and destroy anyone who could stand in the way of the «big boys». And no quarter is given.

Despite of all the modern gadgets, it becomes quite clear that it is a timeless story that is told here. Almost every character seems to be a reflection of court life in past centuries: there are crown princes, jesters, courtisans etc. etc. Thanks to the mass media these characters zap through real and virtual space until it is impossible to tell the one from the other and truths multiply - but all remains profoundly human.

There are direct references to the Renaissance age - to me it seems I detected gestures and postures who come out of paintings of the period. Then there is Powers' family crypt, where the big man retires to in times of distress ... The two big guys are contrasted by a small guy, a «peasant» who is at the mercy of those who wield power. His outlook on life is in its entirety conditioned by TV - but whose is not? - and you feel that Weapons of Mass Distraction is a movie about a post democratic society.

Gabriel Byrne and even more so Ben Kingsley are fabulous in the leading parts, so is Chris Mulkey who plays the «peasant» very convincingly. Also memorable are Jeffrey Tambor as the really sleazy adjutant and Paul Mazursky as the owner of a potency clinic. Ladies play second fiddle throughout but several of them are very pretty. The jokes are generally coarse but intelligent and well placed in the story. The most memorable moment is the the owner of the potency clinic explaining the different kinds of enlargments he has to offer for the male sexual organ - it's very detalled and really not very appetizing!

Friends of Architecture watch out. It seemed to me that Julian Messenger's office was installed in Louis I. Kahn's famous Kimbell Art Museum in Fort Worth. If my guess is right, they did not use those wonderful spaces very well.

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2 out of 3 people found the following comment useful :-
Another one of those movies I just "happened" on late one night ..., 21 August 2005

Author: jrahn from Florida

Insomnia was acting up late one night and I started channel surfing and happened on this flick on Cinemax ... there was only about thirty minutes left of the movie but even at that point it SUCKED me right in.

It's a great flick to watch on a Sunday afternoon - watch it closely. Gabriel Byrne and Ben Kingsley are excellent. I think this was the first movie I saw Jason Lee appear in.

The multiple stories coinciding into one single story of rich scumbags tearing into other's lives for their own gain.

Illeana Douglas's character (and her husband) ... their story ... the secret histories of the rich scumbags ... a lot going on in this movie ...

HIGHLY recommend it.

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a memorable film., 23 October 2006

Author: victorpaskow from United States

just because i had my caps lock on doesn't mean i'm shouting! this movie is great. it's one of a kind. i first saw it when i was a young teenager. the film has stuck with me since. it's dark, funny and i enjoyed the all star cast. check this one out if you think your life isn't going the way you want it to.its also not a well known picture, so if you can get your hands on it, i would advise you to do so. these other people don't know what they are talking about. i also think that a ten line minimum is too much. you start talking about nothing just to get your 3 line comment in. any ways keep up the good work you IMDb. you are doing a great job.

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1 out of 2 people found the following comment useful :-
Larry Gelbart!, 22 January 2004

Author: apusfilms from United Kingdom

The writer Larry Gelbart has to be one of the greatest talents of several generations.

Why isn't he a household name?

Check his CV - and if you're over 35 you'll have been entertained by his narrative, his humour, his wit. He's tickled you. And at the same time made you think.

That's when you should get an Oscar. When you can make someone laugh and think at the same time. That's really good writing. Really good thinking.

Thanks for being a really good thinker Larry.

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2 out of 4 people found the following comment useful :-
funny, 16 October 2002

Author: marlowe_is_dead from Antarctica

I liked the fact that this satire became more and more outlandish & soap opera-esque as it continued - reading one of the other user comments, it would appear not everyone got this...

7.5/10

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0 out of 1 people found the following comment useful :-
Not "The Player", but still entertaining, 29 December 1999

Author: Dano-33 from Oklahoma

I rented this film because Ben Kinsley is was of my favorite actors of the present time. I thought the acting was funny and smart, the dialogue delicious, and the humour extremely dark. It's not the best film or television movie ever made, but it was entertaining and kept my interest. I wouldn't recommend this film to everyone, but it was one of the brightest and most refreashing films I've seen from HBO.

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0 out of 1 people found the following comment useful :-
Very well done satire, 12 July 1999

Author: John Kipplinger

A great story about the "silent" (if you count out the use of their media) attacks that two television tycoons carry on each other; all to determine who will be the owner of an important football team. While the two are "having fun" in destroying one another, the middle class is living through (and watching) the consequences.

It deserves at least 7 out of 10.

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1 out of 3 people found the following comment useful :-
Too deep, 6 May 2005

Author: flowerboy from India

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

I must be real stupid. This movie was too deep for me. I couldn't figure out what was going on for most of the time. For example, why did that guy jump off the roof and kill himself at the end? What was the point of that parallel story about the out of work guy who kills a bus load of school kids? why did the son's helicopter have to fall and put him into a coma? what is it with this Cricket girl? i was actually quite engrossed towards the end because i thought the movie would reveal itself to me and i'd get the answers to all my questions, but alas, it didn't. i guess i'll have to spend many more years researching on IMDb before i'm ready for a movie of this caliber.

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3 out of 9 people found the following comment useful :-
A prime example of satire gone awry., 31 January 1999
Author: Stu-5 from Western Australia

Weapons of Mass Distraction proves to be an inconsequential mess of loose plot points and unanswered questions. In what was initially supposed to be a satire, it only gets lost in it's web of lurid, superfluous, irrelevant occurrences.

Two billionares rival over ownership of a famous American football team. That's what we understand from the blurb. Unfortunately, the references to that are just so vague that it is somewhat of a sub-plot. There really is no plot. It goes nowhere!

On one end of the spectrum we have Robert Altman's fine satire "The Player", focusing on big business and movies. On the other end of the spectrum we have this.

Combine this: helicopter accident, closet gay businessman, jewish holocaust surviver, appendage enlargement, trans-gender wife and adulterous cable repairman newly fired. That's precisely what the film is!

It's awful. One out of ten.

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