Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #211828 in DVD
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Aspect ratio: 1.77:1
• Format: PAL
• Original language: German, English
• Subtitled in: English, German, Polish, Czech, Hungarian, Icelandic, Hebrew, Turkish, Danish, Swedish, Norwegian, Dutch, Greek, Hindi

Amazon.com essential video
Christina Ricci had a great year in 1998. The young actress continued to cast off her youthful image from the Addams Family movies and made a big splash on the independent movie scene, especially in this scathingly witty comedy in which Ricci has the central role. Here she plays Dedee, a buxom, sexually precocious teenager who's pregnant, cynical, and looking for a volunteer father for her unborn child. This takes her to the home of her gay half-brother (Martin Donovan) whose current lover (Ivan Sergei) becomes Dedee's latest target for seduction. That's just the start of the mischief that Dedee so masterfully orchestrates, and Lisa Kudrow (from TV's Friends) is also on hand to deliver some of the movie's most quotable dialogue while fending off the affection of a local policeman played by Lyle Lovett. If all this sounds rather sordid, rest assured that the movie's got a warm heart (well, sort of) beating beneath all of its sharp-edged sarcasm. Writer-director Don Roos (Single White Female) injects most of the movie's appeal and humor through Dedee's voice-over narration, which constantly reminds us that even the most familiar movie clichés can be cleverly overturned. As a result, The Opposite of Sex is the opposite of boring. --Jeff Shannon

Customer Reviews

Meaning saturated in every line.
One of the best independent films I've seen this year, THE OPPOSITE OF SEX focuses on the narrator of the film, Dedee Truitt, played by Christina Ricci. Perhaps her best performance so far, her dialogue is witty and knowing, her timing impeccable. She portrays Truitt as sort of an actress with no thoughts about getting into pictures or theater but just to get by. She flees to her sometimes understanding gay half-brother, Bill, falls in love with his boyfriend, and takes off with him to a distant place. Meanwhile, and there is a lot of "meanwhile"s in the script, that you seem to get overwhelmed, Bill's deceased love's sister, Lucia Delury, played with great strength by Lisa Kudrow, buys plane tickets to go after the newly formed couple. The film is packed full of truly interesting characters, imaginative one-liners, and a hearty script, one that could only been dreamed up by someone who has gone through this all and survived. That someone should be congratulated. Writer-director Don Roos has made a masterpiece, in my mind anyway. Just because it is an independent film and you have never heard of it, don't pass it by.

For fans of edgy, offbeat, black comedies
For fans of independent, offbeat, dark comedies, The Opposite of Sex is a surefire winner. Christini Ricci will make your jaw drop with her self-centered, selfish, reckless, and over-the-top behavior as Dedee Truitt. Her bitingly sarcastic narration adds much to the film and made me laugh out loud. As outstanding as Ricci is, Lisa Kudrow also manages to shine as Dedee's goody-two-shoes arch-emeny (yes, these two are out for blood in the movie).

Is this movie for everyone? Certainly not. If you do like being hit over the head with shockingly dark humor, then give this movie a try. There actually is some heart underneath all the back-stabbing, betrayals, crime, and seediness in here, too.

wicked good movie
Having spent the past few minutes reading through other people's reviews of this movie, I just want to hunt down the authors of the negative, even the tepid, reviews and shake some sense into them. This is one of the sharpest, most brilliant movies I've seen in a long, long time. This is the movie I am making my friends watch one by one; the one that hasn't worn thin over 7 or 8 viewings. No, it's not for everyone: If you're really wedded to Johnny Galecki's total-nice-guy character on Roseanne, or Christina Ricci as an innocent young teenager, you might not enjoy this. And I'd have to lump you with the nicer people Dedee refers to early in the movie: "We call them losers." The actors have had the sense and good taste to move on rather than recycling themselves; why don't you?