the audience applauded

It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

While labeled as a comedy "Novocaine" is not your typical Steve Martin comedy. And while there are elements of comedy throughout the movie this was actually more of a crime mystery. And it was actually a quite nice change of pace for Steve Martin.The movie is about Frank Sangster, a dentist whose life is rosy red and dandy. When he, against his better judgment, prescribes Demetol to an unusual client, he suddenly finds himself under suspicion and murder. One thing leads to the other and Franks is well in over his head.The storyline was actually quite good and well thought through, keeping the audience guessing at what is going on. Director David Atkins actually managed to put together a very entertaining movie.One of the things that really lifted up this movie was the impressive cast, which included Steve Martin, Laura Dern, Elias Koteas and of course Helena Bonham Carter. There is also two great cameos by Kevin Bacon and Keith David."Novocaine" is a unique Steve Martin movie that should definitely be seen if you enjoy Steve Martin movies.

Whatever Steve Martin is in is probably going to be good, and this one was. It was a slow starter but it finally got off to a fast moving film. Steve, the dentist, was taken in by a drug user and when he gave her a prescription for 5 pills, he learned that she had added a "O" to his figure and made it 50. Once he started lying, he had to keep on lying to cover up the other lies. He was apparently an innocent victim and didn't know it for a long time. There was one murder of the addicts brother, and another murder of Steve's brother. He finally figured out the one person who could get all the information together and and set him up to be convicted. When he pulled his own teeth and replaced them in another false set, we could really see the sense of it all. The end was the greatest surprise of all.

Just seen by me on cable,and having read in the film mag that Steve Martin led the cast,I expected a funny film, or at the least, an interesting one.I was wrong. And all this picture does is suggest that some of the people who control feature films are a bunch of selfish, perverse and greedy egotists.Apart from 'Royal Tenenbaums' which for me is one of the unfunniest movies of all time, "Novacaine" comes very close to out-ranking it.The plot: Dentist has a female drug addict patient whom he fancies, leading to a whole series of bizarre and ridiculous events, mainly because of her addiction.Not only is the female lead totally mis-cast,most sane people would not, nor could not, in the context of the way this film is made, find anything remotely funny about drug addiction, quite apart from the nonsensical killings and unnecessary violence in this picture.I got the impression that whoever wrote and directed this film has no idea whether to create a comedy or a drama, as from my perspective it was neither........ just a total mess; looking to me like it was made up as it went along, wholly uneven,lacking any merit, humour or sense, and the actors much of the time suggest they are ad-libbing with mostly half-hearted performances. 1 out of 10.

If this movie had been labeled "A disturbing modern film noir," I would not have been expecting to be amused or entertained, and it would not have ruined my evening the way it did. True, I admired the direction and production values even as I loathed everything else and almost everyone in it. After about ten minutes I said, "I hope I stop hating this pretty soon," and after another twenty minutes I just quit trying to watch it. If I'd had any reason to suspect that I would be seeing a creepy violent Blood Simple or Red Rock West type of drama instead of a "comedy" of any kind it would have been a different matter entirely. I knew a Steve Martin movie was a crapshoot but this possibly interesting and obviously well made crime drama was appallingly mislabled. BEWARE!!!