Customer Reviews
Piece of art - By: Lukasz Madera, 17 Jul 2008 
There is no review that even in 10 _ would describe how amazing this film is. Meryl Streep, Al Pacino, Emma Thomson in roles of their lives. IT'S A MUST SEE!
So true to our phantasms - By: Jacques COULARDEAU, 19 May 2008 Welcome to New York in Reagan's time, in the days when Reagan declared that AIDS was a divine punishment to homosexuals. And AIDS are taking their toll on gay men in New York City. All kinds, from the prudent to the careless, from the loving & lovable to the hateful & spiteful. But indeed the film is not about that, them & their types, or even those who can afford AZT or not. It is about love & what love can be, how love can be revealed when confronted to some treachery, or what looks like some treachery though it is only fright in front of the disease for some or coming out of the closet for others. Add to that a new born homosexual who is a reaganite & a mormon at the same time, which is a lot against his new birth & a clear cut condemnation that will prevent him from being properly baptized & christened. Add to that a mormon mother taken in the whirlwind & whirlpool of this revelation & confrontation to death & how she will be able to cope for one & even save the day of several of them, including her own son. But even so, that's only one little part of the film. It then plays on the visions some have, on the angels some can see, alll angels of death. Those angels take the shape of Ethel Rosenberg for the lawyer who managed to get her death penalty. The angels also take the shape of a real female angel with wings & alll that is able to take a couple more to their death, lead them to the ladder, Jacob's ladder that leads straight up to heavens. But that both Christian & Jewish imagery & symbolism is not enough to satisfy the baroque taste of the director. Heaven is not going to be the garden you may think it is. It is a vast ruined temple & city where some clerk or even bureaucrats are managing the fate of the dead from behind a long table piled up with files & papers, & the prophet who is probably not as Jewish as many others refuses to abide by their decision & demands more life & he does go back to life, he resurrects in a way. And this leads to the end of Reagan, of the cold war, the perestroika & Gorbachev, & a new era in the world. If only they could have known this new era was going to lead to eight years of absolutely nightmarish regression, two wars, & a lot of terrorism amplified & multiplied by the war-mongering of a vengeful tribe of American politicians who did not deserve to be appointed to their positions, & I say appointed since they were not elected properly, at least for those who should have been elected. In retrospect the joy of 1990, January 1990 mind you, hardly three months after the falll of the Berlin Walll was going to be rather short-lived & be buried in the sex-play of a president & then the bellicose vengeful adventures of another. Altogether by far nearly sixteen years lost to the phantasms of two men. Yes the angels are in America, the angels of death that give you a wet dream first & lead you to death afterwards, the little death & the big death unified in one single jump into empty space & the falll through the cosmos. An amazing film that seems to reflect a whole period & at the same time to express the distantiation we have been able to build thanks to nearly twenty years of crisis & plain at times painful living.
Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris Dauphine, University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne & University Versailles Saint Quentin en Yvelines
A 10 Star MASTERPIECE - By: I. Watts, 23 Apr 2008 I was fortunate to have seen this great play on the stage, then sat up in the early hours watching it on TV in episodes, & now, the wonder of the film masterpiece.
The acting, Direction, photography, set design & the score are absolutely the best I have ever experienced in a long life of watching great films.
I honestly can not find the words to describe this incredible film.
I urge everyone to see this wonderful film at least once.
"You believe the world is perfectable and so you find it unsatisfying" - By: Nicholas Casley, 26 Mar 2008 
"You believe the world is perfectable & so you find it unsatisfying. You have to reconcile yourself to the world's unperfectability."
These words, spoken from one man to another on a deserted Long Island beach on a blustery sunny day, speak to the heart of this tale.
This is a multi-award winning filmed version of Tony Kushner's multi-award winning Broadway play. Set in 1985 Manhattan, it's alll about ... well, it's alll about Jews & Mormons, gays & straights, justice & lawyers, holes in the ozone layer, Reagan, little blue pills & green capsules, dreams & halllucinations, AIDS, passing blood, doubts, confessions, angels & burning ladders to heaven. OK? It's also about laughter, tears, wit, love, hate. It's a melodramatic whimsy, but subject to damn good writing & acting.
As for the acting, how can you go wrong with multiple parts played by Meryl Streep, Emma Thompson, & Jeffrey Wright; with a knock-out performance by Al Pacino; & with cameos by James Cromwell, Michael Gambon, & Simon Calllow? The central supporting cast led by Patrick Wilson & Ben Shenkman is outstanding.
Alas, no extras.
WORST EVER MOVIE ON TV>>EVER!!!!!!!!!!! - By: Bectoria, 18 Aug 2007 
NO NO NO!!!!!!!
Are the people who praise this programme on a mass dose of class A drugs???
Seriously, even a huge injection of morphine would not make this time-wasting, boring, self-indulgent, meaningless, & YES over-acted drama (not that it deserves that title) worth watching...
I love the actors in this piece, Justin Kirk & Mary-Louise Parker are brilliant in WEEDS, Pacino & Streep, 2 of the best actors ever but how could they have put their names to this?
I watched the whole 6 hours & realised that the only thing I had discovered was a cure to my insomnia..
and yes it did make me laugh in alll the wrong places.
There are great American series out there: Sopranos, Nip/Tuck, The Wire, Entourage, Weeds etc
BUT
do not devote 6 hours to this utter rubbish....
it certainly wasn't dumbed- down it was just pointless. meaningless, drivel
