Running With Scissors
September 6th, 2007 by Chris Titmus
If I had to describe Running With Scissors in one word, it would be very ‘quirky’. Get the rage on the page women!
It’s based on the book Running With Scissors by Augusten Burroughs, and is a semi-autobiographical account of Burroughs’ childhood. It focuses on the years of Augusten’s life from the age of thirteen when his parents’ relationship comes to a tumultuous crisis point, and his mother seeks the help of a psychiatrist, Dr Finch.
Brian Cox plays the eccentric 70s psychiatrist with the weirdest family on the block, who has a very bizarre way of ‘treating’ his patients. He hands out medication like lollies, administers electro-shock therapy in his home, and recommends he meets with his clients for five hours a day, every day. Soon after his parents split, Augusten is unexpectedly dumped at Dr Finch’s house to live and fend for himself while his mother works out her life.
It is with sadness that we see Augusten’s realisation that there is no one he can go to for help, he is completely at the mercy of adults who have pretty much lost all sense of reality, and he’s going to have to make his own way with this mad bunch. There’s a lot of laughs in this bizarre movie, and lots of ‘what the heck’s?’ but the overall heavy feeling that develops centres around the impact on all of this on Augusten’s young life.
Annette Benning does a great job of playing the flighty and annoying mother, who we see transform from highly-strung wife, to drugged out, slurring patient, to surreal, laid back lesbian poet. Alec Baldwin has a relatively small role, and is pretty boring as Augusten’s defeated, apathetic alcoholic father. Joseph Cross does a great job as the young Augusten, despite being seven years older than the character!
My favourite character is Dr Finch’s wife Agnes (Jill Clayburgh), who eats dog biscuits from the bag while watching the same old black and white movie over and over again. She is actually the most sensible person in the film. My second-favourite character is Hope Finch, played brilliantly by Gwyneth Paltrow. This is a must see!
ELOISE GURR
