Noted Critic 'Mustafa22' Weighs in With First Review of All Good Things

It's allll about the Mustafas today, what with the casting of Isaiah Mustafa in Typer Perry's latest and this first! Look! Review! of the long-shelved, presumed-forthcoming Ryan Gosling/Kirsten Dunst true-crime biopic All Good Things. Its author: Distinguished IMDb commenter "Mustafa22," who presumably attended one of those secret screenings in Encino or wherever else the film has been making tiny inroads ahead of the fall movie season. Read on for some of his voluminous, spoilerific thoughts -- including the prurient essentials of Dunst's topless scene.

You'll recall that All Good Things is about the life and times of Robert Durst -- here re-named David Marks and portrayed by Gosling -- a New York real-estate scion whose wife disappeared in 1982 and who was later acquitted of murdering his neighbor in Texas. (Durst was also reportedly a cross-dressing enthusiast, just in case the story required a little more tabloid-ready pop.) Frank Langella and Kristen Wiig co-star. Andrew Jarecki last spring reclaimed the film from its cash-strapped distributors at the Weinstein Company, and as of late last month, all signs pointed to a new theatrical future with Magnolia Picutres.

But is it any good? Take it away, Mustafa22!

The performances were my favorite part of the film. Everyone did an excellent job and it kept me interested. As I stated before I have trouble with movies where the outcome is a mystery because I feel that by the end I haven't gotten anywhere except learning one man, the screenwriters, assumptions of what happens. But back to the performances. Kirsten, to me, was the standout, and really the only character I felt general concern for. She showed impressive range and I hope that despite this movies troubles she is recognized for it. Gosling also did well, but for the most part his character emotions are subtle, so despite him doing very well he won't be the one people talk about (for the most part) when they leave the theater.

All the other minor characters were very believable but their time on screen is limited. Langella was excellent as always and out of the supporting cast he had the most screen time. Kristin Wiig does well in the movie but like I said above, she isn't in it a whole lot, she doesn't have enough time on screen to wow you, only enough to show you that she can do more than comedy. I'd say under she's in it less than 10 minutes all together.

Going into the movie knowing only the cast and an extremely basic plot outline I couldn't have had more of an open mind. All in all I felt the movie was just okay, I gave it a 6 out of 10 for the IMDB score. The way it's setup is as a character study rather than a mystery or thriller. It opens with home videos of the Marks family as youngsters before the death of the mother. Then it jumps ahead to David Marks testimony but only briefly. The movie truly begins in the early 70's when Marks appears to be in his early 20's and then it goes from there, and every so often they slip in brief excerpts from his testimony. I'm not sure if you guys know the story and have read about what happens but when I looked into it after the movie I felt they did a pretty by the book job in terms of the real story, taking a few liberties here and there.

The pacing of the movie is fairly slow and usually I'm not one to complain but I felt like they spent a lot of time showing us who these characters were without actually showing growth. I'm trying to think of a way to explain what I'm thinking. They establish Marks as a decent guy with some demons and every once in awhile he has outbursts but for the amount of time they spent on character development I didn't see enough growth to warrant that much attention. They could have gone deeper and focused on him more. After the crime they wrap it up pretty quickly, about 30 minutes I think, but that was the most interesting I thought. They didn't show anything to do with the investigation though and I was curious about that part of it. It stays with Marks the entire time after.

Long story short, I felt with amount of time given to the characters they could have done more, especially with the performances that everyone gave. They could have shown the effect that the incident had on the minor characters, or even their views on the relationship, anything, giving them more screen time. I also would have liked them to show at least a glimpse into the investigation. The script was solid but nothing flashy so I wasn't too impressed. I know this is kind of confusing, I tried to be general and the way I wrote might be hard to understand so I apologize.

As for Kirsten yes there is one nude scene in the movie. It shows her climbing into the shower with Marks (Gosling) and you see her breasts. It is dimly lit but not dark if that makes sense. You can see her nipples if that's what you were wondering. The scene is extremely short though, maybe 10 seconds. They have a sex scene as well but it's PG-13 at the most.

And yes they do show Marks as a cross dresser. And yes he does age throughout the movie. It starts off in the 70's and goes into the 2000's and he ages realistically although he looked older than I thought in the 2000's.

So -- who's ready for a cocktail made with delicious Grey Gos? Ugh, never mind, just forget it.

· Just saw it. If you have any questions let me know... [IMDB]