Product Description

Michael douglas plays the author of a wildly successful novel who is trying to write another but is struggling with the success of his past and the weight of his future. Special features: music video - bob dylan things have changes: location map with explanations by curtis hanson and much more. Studio: Paramount Home Video Release Date: 08/22/2006 Starring: Michael Douglas Frances Mcdormand Run time: 112 minutes Rating: R Director: Curtis Hanson

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #9670 in DVD
• Brand: Paramount
• Released on: 2001-03-13
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
• Formats: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD-Video, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English, French
• Subtitled in: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 111 minutes

Amazon.com
Wonder Boys is one of those movies in which more twists and turns disrupt the life of the hero in one weekend than would bother most of us our whole lives. Professor Grady Tripp (Michael Douglas) is an aging one-novel wunderkind at a small Pittsburgh college who's laboring on his seven-years-in-the-making, 2000-plus page second opus with no end in sight. The morning of the college's literary lollapalooza, WordFest, Grady's wife leaves him; that evening, his mistress (Frances McDormand) announces she's pregnant (she's also the chancellor of the school, as well as the wife of Grady's boss). Grady's voracious editor (Robert Downey Jr.) is also in town, transvestite date in tow, determined to read the highly anticipated new book; there's also the nubile student (Katie Holmes), who seems more than willing to ease Grady's pain. And then there's James Leer (Tobey Maguire), the mordant and brilliant writing student who's the catalyst for Grady's lost weekend, which involves a soon-to-be-dead blind dog, a stolen car, and the jacket that Marilyn Monroe wore when she wed Joe DiMaggio.

Had enough flights of fancy? It's only the beginning, and in the hands of director Curtis Hanson (L.A. Confidential) and screenwriter Steve Kloves (The Fabulous Baker Boys), Wonder Boys will have you begging for more. Adroitly adapting Michael Chabon's novel and distilling it to its droll, melancholy essence, Kloves and Hanson have fashioned a briskly unsentimental and darkly funny tale; these characters may be down on their luck, but they sure don't feel sorry for themselves. Douglas, by turns dryly sarcastic and sincerely heartfelt, single-handedly makes up for years of alpha-male posturing as the passive pothead Tripp, and whoever thought of pairing him with the resilient McDormand is brilliant--they convey the complexities and history of their relationship in a single glance or movement. And under Hanson's guidance, the rest of the cast is truly exceptional, with Maguire in a breakthrough performance and Downey at his manic best. The ending of Wonder Boys may feel a little too pat, but after everything these characters have been through, a happy ending seems a just reward. --Mark Englehart

Customer Reviews

Great Performances By All
"Wonder Boys" is a sweetly-serious "dramedy" about Grady, a middle-aged academic and author (Michael Douglas), whose life has settled into a rut. He suffers a series of life crises over the course of one long weekend, as well as coping with several outside crises that seem to fall into his lap. These include his wife leaving him; his girlfriend announcing she's pregnant; his pretty grad student hitting on him; his NYC book editor turning up to see his seven-years-in-the-making next novel; and a possibly-suicidal student who has written a novel of his own--could he be the next "wonder boy?" Also involved in the entertaining plot are a blind dog named Po; a waitress named Oola; and a fur-collared jacket worn by Marilyn Monroe when she married Joltin' Joe DiMaggio. The weekend's events shake Grady loose from his pot-fueled apathy and compel him to finally decide what it is he wants for the next stage of his life.
I missed this film when it was in the theaters. I am not a huge Michael Douglas fan, but this is a fine performance, one where he actually inhabits the character and "makes him real." He is marvelously supported by Tobey McGuire as James, a celebrity-death-obsessed writing student; Frances McDormand as the wife of the English Department chancellor (and Grady's pregnant girlfriend); and Robert Downey Jr. as Grady's on-the-prowl book editor in another of Downey's small-but-perfectly-nuanced, completely real performances.
This adult comedy treats all of the characters with affection and respect. There are no villains, just real people. Have fun playing "spot the character actors" (Phillip Bosco, Rip Torn, Richard Thomas, Kelly Bishop, to name a few).

Excellent movie.......
I loved this movie! It was hilarious with an amazing cast!

The movie has been out for awhile, but I never got around to watching it. I found out the movie was based off the book, "Wonder Boys" by Michael Chabon, so I had to check it out.

The cast includes Michael Douglas, Robert Downey Jr., Tobey Maguire, Katie Holmes and Frances McDormand! According to Amazon it also stars Philip Bosco ??, his role is about 20 seconds, if youve ever even heard of the guy!

The story was great, the laughs kept coming throughout it!

Highly recommended to anyone looking for a fun, everyday life kind of movie!

Wonderful "Wonder Boys"
"Wonder Boys" isn't quite a masterwork like Curtis Hanson's previous film, "L.A. Confidential," but it's excellent in its own way.

The humor in the film is subtle, but there are several guffaws to be had. The film follows a college English professor played by Michael Douglas during the weekend of Wordfest, a literary celebration that brings out a best-selling author (Rip Torn) whose prolific success only makes Douglas, who wrote one best-seller seven years earlier, feel like a failure. His marriage is on the rocks, he's having an affair with a colleague's wife (Frances McDormand), battling with his publisher (Robert Downey, Jr), and trying to comprehend the eccentricity of one of his most gifted pupils (Toby McGuire).

This is the kind of movie that should appeal to anyone who majored in English in college and delighted in mocking the pompous pinheads so often found in advanced literature courses. They are abundantly portrayed here.

Brian W. Fairbanks