Tied for the best movie I have ever seen

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

It was OK. I don't see why everyone loves it so much. It wasn't very smart or deep or well-directed.

One of those movie experiences that is so good it makes you realize you've been grading everything else on a curve.

Chapter 27 is a very tragic film, both in the subject matter of John Lennon's murder as well as its sheer amount of unreached potential. Firstly, I'll get this out of the way: Jared Leto's performance is absolutely sublime. He plays a Mark David Chapman who is awkward, sad, and kind of a loser, but simultaneously very chilling and dark. It is truly the performance of an actor who has completely immersed himself in the role, and brings it to a 6 from a 5 or even a 4 singlehandedly for me. In fact, all of the performances are at least decent. The direction is interesting, showcasing Chapman's deterioration as it goes on, and the use of hand-held camera in most shots gives a much more realistic, human feel to all of the increasingly disturbing goings-on throughout the film. There are a few very interesting recurring motifs that enlighten some of the stranger aspects of Chapman's personality, and begin to explain. It has all of this going for it, so the question remains: where does this movie fail? Well, I think it must be mentioned that the film was cut a full 16 minutes from its original Sundance version. Whatever the reasons for these cuts, whether the original version was poorly received and the missing minutes may have actually detracted from the rest of the film or simply a classic case of production studios not understanding an artistic vision, they severely hurt the overall product. I have read that the main point of the film is that Chapman is a metaphor for America as a whole, which has never managed to pull itself out of a state of adolescent confusion. This theory is supported by certain parts of the film, particularly at the beginning and the end, but I'm not sure that the director's vision is really focused enough to actually make that the case. Chapter 27 seems generally confused as to its intended purpose. Is it a character study of a severely damaged individual? No, the film distances itself from that interpretation almost immediately when Chapman narrates that his early childhood and abusive father is "not important". Is it a tragedy of a man who wants nothing more than to find an identity, and in doing so destroys his life? That is closer, and some evidence does bear that out to a point, but again I don't feel as if the tone of the film's conclusion really makes that the case. Perhaps this has been rather vague, but the truth is that Chapter 27, while certainly interesting, is a woefully pointless piece of cinema. Jared Leto's performance aside, this film is really nothing very special; it simply exists, rather uninterpretable. With all that it has going for it, it could have and most likely should have been much better.

Many viewers seem to want to blame the director of this film for shooting John Lennon all over again, or emphasize that former sigh-guy Leto put on 80 pounds to inhabit the slovenly, corpulent body of Mark David Chapman and to no avail Those of us who lived through the Beatles, who admired them, were horrified by what seemed to be an inexplicable killing--and wanted explanations, as we want to understand the killing of a beloved celebrity or a president.As depicted in this film, the twisted psyche of this killer is not revealed--as as Friday says in Dragnet, we just get the facts, which are vivid enough to give us some idea of the weird hallucinations that went on in the mind of a killer obsessed with one of the most influential men on the planet. Since you know how this story is bound to end, you only might want to watch it if you want to see an acting tour-de-force or get some notion of what kind of sickness infested the man who called himself Holden. This film is not a cheerer-upper, and doesn't offer the usual voyeuristic excitements, but it seems sincere and well-assembled and Leto deserves credit for not wanting always to be The Dreamboat Guy.

this film is very hard to review. i watched it because i think Jared Leto is a very good actor and i was fascinated by the story of the murder of John Lennon as i have heard of the name Mark David Chapman so many times in my life.. overall this film has very bad reviews but i think people don't like it because the film itself has sympathy for Mark David Chapman. i think that this film was a disturbing and unnerving account of the lead up to John Lennon's death and i thought it was quite good. Jared Leto's performance for me is outstanding in this film and was one of the reasons why i kept my eye on the screen, without Leto this film wouldn't have fascinated me as much. as a piece in itself its pretty good the dialogue is OK and the directing is alright but nothing special.i would possibly see this film again but only because of Leto's performance. if you like Leto see this film. it is quite fascinating but the film is very dark and very disturbing more so than i expected. the film really makes you visualise how this man killed John Lennon and how he was just a complete psychopath. but this film doesn't answer the question why because there is no answer to why John Lennon was murdered. i would rate this film 6.5-7 out of 10. its good but nothing special.

Here is a powerful portrait of the tortured and alienated man who stalked and killed John Lennon.Jared Leto is scary as the alternately withdrawn and clingy, slow-talking loner John Chapman. Also excellent is Lindsay Lohan as a Beatles groupie who is slow to pick up on Chapman's weirdness but flees him in time to stay safe.Manhattan is a glowing backdrop in this tale of misdirected rage, and the musical score works well here to heighten the drama. Yet, surprisingly, there is no Beatles music in this film."Chapter 27" hints at the devastating effects of social isolation and the horror that can result when people don't take a ticking time bomb seriously.One glaring and frustrating omission is the lack of almost anything about Chapman's background. Given this film's interest in psychology, this paucity accounts for my ranking this film only a "5".