Product Description

A sexy, romantic comedy about modern couples coming together in funny and unexpected ways, PLAYING BY HEART features an amazing cast of hot stars! Paul (Sean Connery -- FINDING FORRESTER) and Hannah (Gena Rowlands -- THE MIGHTY) discover that even after 40 years of marriage, they can still learn some very surprising things about each other! Meredith (Gillian Anderson -- THE X-FILES) is a serious theatre director who isn't looking for a relationship ... but has one looking for her in the person of the funny, persistent Trent (Jon Stewart -- JAY AND SILENT BOB STRIKE BACK)! Then there's Joan (Angelina Jolie -- TOMB RAIDER) and Keenan (Ryan Phillippe -- GOSFORD PARK), young people searching for love in an L.A. club scene where the rules of dating seem to change every night! A witty, charming motion picture that critics loved -- you, too, will fall for this seductive treat!

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #4436 in DVD
• Released on: 1999-08-17
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Aspect ratio: 2.20:1
• Formats: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD-Video, Letterboxed, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 121 minutes

Amazon.com
This amiably amorphous comedy-drama about a myriad of articulate and witty people pondering the meaning of love was originally titled Dancing About Architecture. As one of the lovelorn puts it, in trying to explain the elusive nature of desire, "Talking about love is like dancing about architecture." However, with the way the characters in Willard Carroll's film talk, it sounds like they could dance a samba around Frank Lloyd Wright. This undiscovered gem doesn't have a particular destination in mind, as it weaves in and out of the stories of its high-profile ensemble, but it does offer some hilarious, sharp dialogue and quiet surprises. Carroll focuses his film on four couples, all in one way or another battling with the problems of relationships, ranging from long-marrieds (Gena Rowlands and Sean Connery) to Gen-X club-hoppers (Angelina Jolie and Ryan Phillippe). Ostensibly, part of the film is invested in the mystery of how all these characters are interrelated, but keen viewers will be able to discern the connections among everyone. It's the uniformly excellent performances, though, that make Playing by Heart compulsively watchable. Most striking, surprisingly enough, are Jolie and Phillippe, the youngest members of the cast who reveal heretofore hidden depths of talent. Jolie in particular increases her already-soaring stock as an actress. Equally impressive are Gillian Anderson and Jon Stewart, who transcend their yuppie personas in their awkward enactment of the timeless dating rituals. Other cast members, including Dennis Quaid, Anthony Edwards, Ellen Burstyn, Jay Mohr, and the always luminous Madeleine Stowe, are quite good, though saddled with story lines that are occasionally less than compelling. The only complaint you'll have is that once everyone's connections are revealed, you'll wish this cast had more of an opportunity to interact. The journey toward the film's bittersweet end, however, is marvelous in and of itself. --Mark Englehart

From The New Yorker
One of those crowded movies that want to be read like a book of connected short stories. Written and directed by Willard Carroll, who seems a little too proud of his own dialogue, the picture is set in an improbably luscious Los Angeles, where the most pressing problem seems to be the difficulty of finding a date. The cast is split into couples, with the occasional loner: we get Sean Connery and Gena Rowlands as an almost happily married couple, Madeleine Stowe and Anthony Edwards as adulterous lovers, Angelina Jolie and Ryan Phillippe as brightly hued clubbers, Ellen Burstyn and Jay Mohr as mother and son, and Gillian Anderson and Jon Stewart, who would make a nice couple if she weren't so screwed up about it. Finally, there is Dennis Quaid, who wanders around town unloading his grievances on strangers-just the kind of helpless storyteller, one suspects, that Carroll would like to be. The movie adds up, all right, but it fails signally in its desire to be more than the sum of its parts. The ending is a cute weave of the narrative strands; we are meant to be surprised by the revelations and charmed by Carroll's sunny suggestion that all is right with the world. His performers-especially Stowe and the breakneck, baby-faced Jolie-deserve better. -Anthony Lane
Copyright © 2006 The New Yorker

Customer Reviews

IT'S ONLY ME, BUT:
THIS MOVIE IS ABOUT 4 MODERN COUPLES COMING TOGETHER AND ABOUT HOW THEY CONNECT AND HOW THEY ARE CONNECTED. ANGELINA JOLIE GIVES A PREFORMANCE THAT SHOWS SIGNS OF HER GREATNESS IN ACTING. JM

A Feel Good Movie
"Playing by Heart"

A Feel Good Movie

Amos Lassen

I don't understand how I missed "Playing by Heart" until recently. It is positively delightful and charming with a wonderful cast. We watch
eleven articulate people work through affairs of the heart in Los Angeles. Mark (Jay Mohr) is dying of AIDS and his mother (Ellen Burstyn) comes to his bedside and they need to talk openly and honestly. Other characters include Sean Connery (Paul) and Gena Rowlands (Hannah)
as an older couple. Rowlands discovers that Connery considered having an affair during their forty year marriage and she has to deal with it. Keenan (Ryan Phillippe) and Joan (Angelina Jolie who gives a wonderful performance) are two club kids looking for companionship in a cold world. Jolie shows great emotion in her role and together the two are a very "hot" couple. Gillian Anderson plays a lonely theater director and John Stewart is a lonely architect. The two play their roles with a chemistry that makes them totally convincing. Then there is the most ridiculous of the couples, Madeline Stowe and Anthony Edwards. They play a married couple who cheat on each other but we never know much about them, Last is Dennis Quaid, a loner who spends his time in bars telling stories to anyone who will listen to him
In the end all of the stories come together in a very clever way. The story has its weaknesses but the characters carry the film and the acting is excellent throughout. "Playing by Heart" took me quite by surprise as there is not a single dull moment on the screen. We do often see films about how to maintain relationships and it deals with the meaning of love and how far someone will go for love.

Much to like about this movie
There is a lot to like about this movie, for me chiefly the performances of Ryan Phillippe and Jon Stewart. Everyone in the cast is quite good, but these two stand out for me.

With Ryan Phillippe there is never a contrived or insincere moment. He's an actor who holds something back ... he allows us to feel there's more to discover about his character, some secret we can find if we look hard enough, something interesting. He and Angelina Jolie slip into a relationship that is poignant and romantic. I wonder what might have happened next.

Why has Jon Stewart never done another romantic role? ... he's engaging, likable, believable as a man who falls in love with a woman who turns out to be one of three daughters whose romantic entanglements, along with those of their parents, form the basis of the plot. He's without artifice, natural, real. It is our loss that Jon Stewart has chosen not to do more acting.

A nice little film, as good or better than so many being produced today. Released in 1998, it doesn't seem dated either in appearance or subject matter.