The move from book to film does not always end well. There have been brutal disasters (All the King's Men"") and there have been wild successes (""American Psycho""), and while ""Running With Scissors"" may not fall into either category, it is a wonderful experience. It's colorful and beautifully cast. Annette Bening and Joseph Fiennes are spectacular. The movie's pulse is hard and clear, almost like a human heart as it takes its audience through odd moments of suspense, authentic human rage and a colorful mystique that cannot be defined.
""Running with Scissors"" belongs to no genre, and while it may stretch from the book quite a bit, it maintains the same sense of red and blue, happy and sad, easy and hard. These things press against each other and occasionally coalesce to create some of the most fantastic shots in American filmmaking today. Swift glances to an old woman's hand. Drywall glittering from the ceiling like snow. A quivering cigarette. The camera work is stunningly innovative, yet traditional enough to capture the breath of any audience. This is a good film; however, the book is, of course, much better.
The story of ""Running with Scissors"" is tough to explain. It's based on a memoir, so what's important is that they both maintain the same sense of color and movement. Joseph Cross plays Augusten Burroughs, an openly gay 16-year-old in the late '70s whose mother has just given him away to her shrink (Brian Cox). Annette Bening's performance as Auguesten's mother, Dierdre, is terrifying, psychotic and obsessive. Think Carolyn Burnham on acid.
Her character is the most vibrant and dynamic of them all""including Augusten, which is where this movie stumbles a little bit. Because the book is bursting with a colorful supporting cast, it is understandable that the film adaptation could get lost in the lives of each of them and consequently neglect Augusten. Of course, he is not completely forgotten. Cross gives an extraordinary performance, establishing a thousand different facets of human emotion and never allowing his audience to sit still.
Augusten is an extremely complex character, and this is one thing the film does well""but it doesn't do it enough. More often than not, the movie flings its audience into the sad, strung-out life of Dierdre Burroughs. Her valium addiction, her poetry and her delusional, fame-obsessed mind take a front seat in a movie that's supposed to be about Augusten. Bening is entertaining and disgustingly talented, but Cross's performance is amazing as well. It would have been nice to see more.
Essentially, ""Running with Scissors"" is a movie about its characters, driven by its fantastic camera work. While it's not as good as ""Little Miss Sunshine,"" it's somewhere along the same vein and definitely worth seeing.
