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American Splendor

HBO Classics

6.9

11,653

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Original title

American Splendor

Year

2003

Running time

100 min.

Country

United States

Director

Robert Pulcini, Shari Springer Berman

Screenwriter

Robert Pulcini, Shari Springer Berman. Comic: Harvey Pekar, Joyce Brabner

Cast

Music

Mark Souzzo

Cinematography

Terry Stacey

Producer

HBO, Fine Line Features, Good Machine

Genre

Drama | Based on a Comic. Independent Film (US)

Synopsis

Harvey Pekar is file clerk at the local VA hospital. His interactions with his co-workers offer some relief from the monotony, and their discussions encompass everything from music to the decline of American culture to new flavors of jellybeans and life itself. At home, Harvey fills his days with reading, writing and listening to jazz. His apartment is filled with thousands of books and LPs, and he regularly scours Cleveland's thrift stores and garage sales for more, savoring the rare joy of a 25-cent find. It is at one of these junk sales that Harvey meets Robert Crumb, a greeting card artist and music enthusiast. When, years later, Crumb finds international success for his underground comics, the idea that comic books can be a valid art form for adults inspires Harvey to write his own brand of comic book. An admirer of naturalist writers like Theodore Dreiser, Harvey makes his "American Splendor" a truthful, unsentimental record of his working-class life, a warts-and-all self portrait. First published in 1976, the comic earns Harvey cult fame throughout the 1980s and eventually leads him to the sardonic Joyce Barber, a partner in a Delaware comic book store who end ups being Harvey's true soul mate as they experience the bizarre byproducts of Harvey's cult celebrity stature.

Rankings Position

#35 Best Comic Book Movies

Awards: 2003: Nominated for Oscar: Best Adapted Screenplay

2003: Nominated for Golden Globe: Best Supporting Actress (Hope Davis)

2003: Sundance: Best Movie

2003: Cannes: FIPRESCI Award (International Critics)

2003: American Film Institute (AFI): Top 10 - Movies of the Year

2003: Independent Spirit Awards: 5 Nominations including Best Film and Best Director

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Critics' reviews

"This film is delightful in the way it finds its own way to tell its own story (...) The casting of Giamatti and Davis is perfect (...) Rating: ★★★★ (out of 4)"

Roger Ebert: Chicago Sun-Times
"Superbly conceived anti-biopic"

Desson Thomson: The Washington Post
"A one-of-a-kind marvel"

Peter Travers: Rolling Stone
"'Splendor' splendidly illuminates a banal life (...) Warm but not sentimental (...) Rating: ★★★½ (out of 4)"

Mike Clark: USA Today
"I can't say that this feature about the life and art of Harvey Pekar, made me want to run out and buy his comic books, but it does offer a highly interesting and original introduction to them"

Jonathan Rosenbaum: Chicago Reader
"Sad, tender, wise and beautiful film... It's a profound tribute to lives lived on the fringes of society -- to the introspective loners who are the most observant chroniclers of our times."

Scott Foundas: Variety
"Just as the author, in his comic books, discovered an original way to honor the challenges of everyday life, so have Berman and Pulcini come up with an inventive new movie hybrid that is its own formal breakthrough."

Lisa Schwarzbaum: Entertainment Weekly
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Ranking Lists Position

50 My Top 10 Movies from 2003 (45)
79 My Favorite Comic Adaptations (55)

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American Splendor

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