Salinger (2013)

For a documentary that has at its disposal one of the most intriguing and mysterious figures in modern day history, it's a mighty shame that Salinger comes off so amateurish and lame, despite an ability to remain watchable thanks to its undeniably juicy content. This juicy content is so full of untapped goodness though, that in the end Salinger can be seen as a missed opportunity to truly get to the bottom of Salinger the writer once and for all.Filmed by screenwriter wunderkind Shane Salerno who has given us such screen gems as Armageddon and Alien Vs Predator: Requiem, the feeling of Salinger is all over the place with quite shoddy re-enactments and some questionable stock footage making up a large part of proceedings, it's clear that Salerno struggled to put all the right eggs in the quite large basket. For a film that runs nigh on 2 plus hours, by the films end you still get a niggling feeling that some details where skimmed over or other details played out to long and the things we do find out make us less likely to appreciate J.D Salinger as a person.I (as many others are) am a big fan of Salinger's work on Catcher in the Rye and while there are some interesting aspects and info shed about the book you can't help but feel a slight sense of sadness knowing that the man who wrote this novel was such a basket case of a human being. Parts of the documentary focusing on Salinger's personal life and preference for much younger women than he is, paints him as a preying type of male and his treatment towards his family and encounters with fans again displays him as a quite nasty human being. Whenever these aspects of the film take centre stage it makes it mighty hard to care for the story and the story works best when the focus is on Salinger's early life in the army and his return to normality afterwards. Other aspects of the film such as a horrid score and some random talking heads who have no real right being there again detract from a bizarre tale.Finishing off with some revelations and giving an insight to the man who wrote one of the most loved books of all time makes Salinger a passable film but one that can easily be written off as a misfire and with years spent on its construction it's hard to imagine how such a mundane effort was produced as the final product. For die-hard fans only, the rest of us would be well advised to read the man's famous novel once more.2 and a half New Yorker rejection letters out of 5 For more movie reviews and opinions check out - www.jordanandeddie.wordpress.com

Interesting, eye-opening, documentary on the great novelist JD Salinger. Well-researched, it includes details of his life that weren't widely known. Has the usual documentary stuff: a linear blow-by-blow account of his life, including some the more pivotal events and how they later affected him. Quite fascinating how his character is shaped, and how he then puts some aspects of his own character, and experiences, into his writing.However, it's not all wine and roses and only positivity. All aspects of Salinger's life are revealed, and some will surprise you. Perfect he was not.On the down side, I felt that most of the interviews with stars were unnecessary. They really didn't have much to add and were just there as a cheerleader squad.Very interesting and well worth watching.

Novelist W.P. Kinsella long ago helped America to "feel his pain" (that is, CATCHER IN THE RYE author J.D. Salinger's rage at a world in which Charlie Chaplin, 53, was able to elope with "Jerry's" presumed finance, Oona O'Neill, 17, when Pearl Harbor sent the 24-year-old virtually unpublished author overseas to go Nazi hunting on D-Day). Hollywood was so concerned about this powerful icon's deranged and unstable mind, that when they turned Kinsella's novel SHOELESS JOE into the Kevin Costner movie FIELD OF DREAMS, they felt compelled to transform the book's "J.D. Salinger" into a Salinger-lite character portrayed by James Earl Jones. In Salinger's mind, SALINGER makes clear, Charles Chaplin's well-publicized serial cherry-picking proved that the "GREAT DICTATOR" and everyone else over 30 were "phonies," giving young people license to "put their people hunting hats on." The historians interviewed in SALINGER concur that CATCHER has instigated more murders that any other American novel in history, with Mark David Chapman's assassination of John Lennon and John Hinckley's wounding of President Reagan just being the tip of the iceberg. A monster in his domestic life who is quoted by a friend as saying he wishes CATCHER had never been published, Salinger was so wounded by Chaplin that he was inspired to carefully craft CATCHER as a book bound to be "cool" to normal young people, but also to serve as an insidious Trojan Horse to push young men with "borderline personalities" over the edge to extract young Jerry's revenge against randomly picked celebrities such as Lennon and Reagan perceived as "phonies" by troubled minds (such as Salinger's). While J.D. did not have the guts to confront Chaplin himself, SALINGER makes clear that CATCHER inspires legions of "copycats" to go gunning for any prominent figure who incurs their delusional wrath or envy. Therefore, SALINGER implies that the editors at Harcourt Brace and the NEW YORKER MAGAZINE were heroes for having patriotic qualms and REJECTING Salinger's pleas to publish CATCHER, while the staffers at Little, Brown should be sued just as perverts circulating child pornography are today for the damage caused when they foisted CATCHER upon a mob of susceptible minds.Since you cannot put toothpaste back into the tube, NOW IS THE TIME "to nip in the bud" the posthumous publishing of the last 40 years of J.D.'s scribbling! SALINGER director Shane Salerno ludicrously implies there is a 50-50 chance these sure best-sellers (after all, they have name recognition) will be "literary masterpieces." I say the interviews of ACTUAL SALINGER ACQUAINTANCES and female stalking victims during Salerno's documentary PROVE that these books (if they actually exist) will be "Manchurian Candidates" to further corrupt American youth. Even Salinger admitted he was "crazy" by the time 299 straight days of combat topped by stumbling upon sky high stacks of nude corpses in one of Hitler's death camps first put him into an Army hospital with a "mental breakdown," and then caused him to illegally marry a die-hard card-carrying Nazi chick in Occupied Germany whom his unit was supposed to be punishing! Once this marriage was annulled, the Jewish Salinger converted to Eastern religions, adopted a mostly-peas diet, ignored his second wife and kids, and hunkered down in a concrete bunker to furiously type up thousands of "mash notes" to any underage teen girls whose addresses he got his hands on, actually deflowering a few of them on out-of-the-country trips financed by his mountain of CATCHER royalties. SALINGER documents every aspect of this disturbing psychosis, but CANNOT see the forest for all the trees! Who cares if J.D. landed on Utah Beach on D-Day with six chapters of CATCHER's manuscript under his uniform? It's likely there was some G.I. a few yards to his left or right with eight or nine chapters of a BETTER, SANER novel who got BLOWN UP--chapters and all--by a German artillery shell. No American should "feel his pain"--vicariously, or at the hands of a Holden Caulfield wannabe--ever again! Burn Salinger's papers now, before they attack us AGAIN like the BLOB!

I loved this movie and found it thrilling. Only a few days ago did I begin to read Salinger's short stories again as well as RAISE HIGH THE ROOFBEAMS, CARPENTERS. Of course everyone has read THE CATCHER IN THE RYE and I agree it remains a right of passage.I came to this movie with high hopes and that always scares me, because I set myself up for a downfall. This came through for me.It is an intense psychological portrait. The 299 days he spent at continuous war, from D-Day to the concentration camps, most certainly carved out his soul to his dying day. And how could it not? As someone who has always been interested in platonic love, I was very moved by his friendship(s) with young women that did not include sex.This movie thoroughly investigates the ego, drive, and mystery of this artist. The portrait is not always flattering and sometimes it is downright pitiful, but it seems genuine to me.I would recommend it to not only fans but also any writer or artist who knows something about the thrill of achievement and the horror of fame.I look forward to the publication of the posthumous work with relish.