The World According to Garp

Underrated performances and movie

A masterpiece of drama, comedy, satire and social commentary that feels a bit like an epic about an incredible life. It’s mostly highly respected, especially for the acting, but it’s also not an easy watch, which might explain why it’s a bit underrated. Robin Williams had only done tv, a cameo in a 1977 comedy and then Popeye. Casting him this early (1982) in such a heavy drama took some imagination. Williams is brilliant, portraying a real, imperfect, vulnerable person surrounded by colorful characters who still feel real. Garp features some of the saddest moments in film, realistically tragic. By the end, it can feel a bit exhausting, but I view Garp as a story about how life actually feels. We have some success, some triumphs, some love, but also much pain, many mistakes and losses. Garp is a special film, painful, funny, and moving, complete with a heartbreaking ending.

Well written, acted, directed. True work of art!

What a fantastic motion picture! What once may have been perceived as overly eccentric now seems wholly plausible and almost prophetic - a sign of the times, as Harry Styles would say. I would dare say that the four performances by the leads are perhaps the best of their careers - although this was a cinematic launching pad for them. Close and Lithgow received Oscar nominations, and I would have included Williams and Hurt in the love fest as well. The comedy seemed richer than the last time I watched it, the drama more heartbreaking and the whole enterprise almost devastating. Williams' later dramatic work often felt a bit maudlin, but he is quite generous with his performance here in that he basically plays the straight man and allows those around him to be the outrageous ones - very rare in his filmography. And Close is simply breathtaking here, one of the great film debuts of the last several decades. This is a marvelous, marvelous motion picture, and this revisit has not only cemented its place among the best of its year right behind SOPHIE'S CHOICE and TOOTSIE.

Based on John Irving's novel of the same name, "The World According To Garp" is neither as whimsical, nor as zany as its title and veneer let on, with Robin Williams's talents left largely wasted and the film's thematic backbone rendered mostly to obscurity. At the end of the day, this really does feel like a straight-up adaptation of the novel, a no-frills blow-by-blow of events as they occur in the text and nothing more. With that, there's a discernible lack of focus to behold throughout, as the film leads the viewer through the topics of sex, progress, feminism and moral ambiguity without ever really giving us a position to consider regarding those realms of discussion. I will say, for all the problematic characters that populate this film, it's pretty progressive to see the most likable one to be John Lithgow's "Roberta Muldoon." Aside from that, though, I didn't think this one was that much to write home about. Can't say I regret the watch, but there's just not a lot here aside from the performances.

"I never needed a father" Garp shouts to his mother as she leaves. How I couldn't disagree more. A tragedy of a movie and the only people I feel sorry for are Garp's children and perhaps Garp himself in some twisted way. Honestly, it would be better that Garp not exist at all as a character. I've never read the book, but what an awful film.

Screenwriter Steve Tesich's adaptation of John Irving's The World According to Garp is true to the spirit of the source material from beginning to end as it touchingly documents the moments that define one man's life. As Garp, Robin Williams proves himself to be an actor with considerable dramatic chops, as does Glenn Close, in her screen debut, as Garp's passionately feminist mother. The movie is alternately poignant, amusing, unsettling and, ultimately, tragic, but it is also filled with valuable life lessons – appreciation of family and friends, the importance of forgiveness, acceptance, and overcoming unimaginable adversity, among others. Unfairly and inaccurately promoted as a comedy when originally released, The World According to Garp ultimately proves to be a compelling and original drama about life.

Not funny or dramatic. Psychotic is a more appropriate word.

This is a strange film, I think its fair to say - sort of madcap but not in the usual way for Robin William films. The main character is certainly quirky and somewhat interesting but the plot narrative didn't really work for me, as I felt that not much in the way of context was given to things. It felt a bit too long drawn out, although, to be fair, I thought Roberta Muldoon, played by John Lithgow, was another interesting character - I enjoyed the scenes featuring 'her' (a transsexual) and him. I felt that Garps mother - her feminist manifesto aspect, I didn't feel it really fit into the film somehow. Its a quirky and a fairly watchable film, with the titular characters conception being explained in a slightly disturbing way at the start of the film. Its not quite an awful film, it has potential but it just doesn't quite...work for me and usually I like character dramas and I like quite a lot of Robin Williams' films, so it was a little bit of a disappointment. I wouldn't especially recommend it, no.

What's the world according to one person? The late Robin Williams, John Lithgow, Mary Beth Hurt, and Glenn Close directed by George Roy Hill During WWII a nurse named Jenny Fields gets pregnant but the father is deceased Her parents aren't happy about the whole thing Williams is TS Garp, he grows up into a struggling young writer He finds his life and work dominated by his unfaithful wife and his radical feminist mother, whose best-selling manifesto turns her into a cultural icon Being rich and famous, she starts a center for troubled women, and while Garp marries and has children, he remains a constant, if somewhat critical, observer of the strange community that forms around Jenny The film is ultimately too long but the heart is in the right spot