X
- 2020
- TV-14
- Factory 25
- 1 h 25 m
- 2020
- TV-14
- Factory 25
- 1 h 25 m
Summary A bizarre rite of passage at the local deli determines the fate of a generation of teenagers, leading some to escape their suburban town and dooming others to remain.
Directed By: Tyler Taormina
Written By: Tyler Taormina, Eric Berger
- 2020
- TV-14
- Factory 25
- 1 h 25 m
- 2020
- TV-14
- Factory 25
- 1 h 25 m
Ham on Rye
80
2.4
Summary A bizarre rite of passage at the local deli determines the fate of a generation of teenagers, leading some to escape their suburban town and dooming others to remain.
Directed By: Tyler Taormina
Written By: Tyler Taormina, Eric Berger
Top Cast
Metascore
Generally Favorable
Based on 7 Critic Reviews
80
100% Positive
7 Reviews
7 Reviews
0% Mixed
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
Metascore
Generally Favorable
Based on 7 Critic Reviews
80
100% Positive
7 Reviews
7 Reviews
0% Mixed
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
Ham on Rye is not obviously political, but it is also deeply political, pointing out, in lazy, absurdist, carelessly clever frames a deep-set American wrongness that was quietly murmuring away long before the current blowhard moment, and that will continue long after.
The film’s purposeful archness challenges the sentimentality that marks many a film and real-life ceremony.
User Score
Generally Unfavorable
Based on 7 User Ratings
2.4
0% Positive
0 Ratings
0 Ratings
29% Mixed
2 Ratings
2 Ratings
71% Negative
5 Ratings
5 Ratings
User Score
Generally Unfavorable
Based on 7 User Ratings
2.4
0% Positive
0 Ratings
0 Ratings
29% Mixed
2 Ratings
2 Ratings
71% Negative
5 Ratings
5 Ratings
I agree with beebo42. This should have been a short. This could have actually worked with a 15 or 20-minute runtime. It's a classic example of the critics watching too many movies and rewarding anything "out of the box" even if it doesn't work. I get that critics are bored with conventional filmmaking, but this having an 80 score is absurd. Retire if coherent cinema no longer does it for you.
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What did I just watch? It's an interesting idea, but horribly low budget and amateurish. There's only one character that seems to have any training in acting, and most of the dialog feels improvised in a bad way. Worse yet, the premise is only worth about 20 minutes, max. So it had to be padded out with long drawn out shots of...nothing!
The theme of the movie (such as it is) is that once you graduate high school you either discover your purpose, meet your soulmate, and begin your career.... or you just get left behind to waste away in your small home town. None of your old friends stay in touch, all of your dreams fade, and even your own family seems disappointed in you somehow. You only get one shot to succeed in life and you can miss it in the blink of an eye.
Again, I like the premise but 2001's "Ghost World" explores almost the exact same themes but done a hundred times better. For anyone interested in this idea, please don't waste 120 minutes of your life on this movie like I did. Go watch a young Scarlett Johansson in "Ghost World" instead.
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The film never behaves as if it is anything other than a realist coming-of-age drama but there is something else going on.
Taormina purposefully dresses his cast and designs their environment in a way that throws them into a sort of temporal never-never land. He achieves a number of other startling effects in this impressive movie, which sheds its naturalism slowly as it embraces a surrealism that’s both disquieting and poignant.
While the narrative hardly goes into the fully unhinged direction it teases, it’s pleasantly askew and always marching to its own strange and, slightly off, beat.
Ham on Rye will frustrate literal-minded audiences, but it’s a work of gentle, genuine American surrealism — a lo-fi love song to those left behind by character and chance.
Quiet and carefully made but cryptic, it relies on the viewer to complete its metaphors.
Ham on Rye is a meaningless examination on white suburbia. Every second was pointless and all of the good faded away by the 40-second mark. You can sit a lead singer of an indie band (with 16 monthly listeners on Spotify) down with a computer complete with a screenwriting software program and even they couldn't muster up something as pretentious and shallow as this garbage. No scene felt memorable, or at the very meaningful and deserving of our time, and some day-in-the-life films can be interesting and movie (see Richard Linklater's filmography), but for the characters of Ham-on-Rye, not a single character was worth the time spent with them. It baffles me how many soaring reviews this film has. Take it from me and the other Metacritic users and do NOT waste your time.
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Production Company
Tago Clearing Film Studio,
Omnes Films
Release Date Oct 23, 2020
Duration 1 h 25 m
Rating TV-14
Tagline It's the most important day of your life, try not to think about it.
Website
http://www.hamonryefilm.com/
Awards
New Hampshire Film Festival
• 1 Win & 1 Nomination
Santa Barbara International Film Festival
• 1 Nomination
Locarno Film Festival
• 1 Nomination