Wonderful character development!

Let's be realistic.

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

True to its essence, the characters remain on the same line and manage to entertain the viewer, each highlighting their own distinctive qualities or touches.

"Oh, I'm coming inside youuu...!"If this is the sort of dialogue you want, I suggest you delve a little deeper into your DVD store (the hidden depths and secret passages), and get a porn film. Pornos are far quicker in getting to the point - and even the characterization is sometimes better than in TCOTW.However!... A warning, lest you think there is hardcore porn in TCOTW: this crap is strictly soft-core, so don't expect something like "9 Songs", "Intimacy", or "Sex Is Comedy", other similar sex-driven plot-less garbage, masked as "art".Alarms started going off in my little head the moment I read the credits: "screenplay by Ellen Benjamin Wang". Apparently, the director's wife (probably 30 years his junior) must have one day felt that her husband owed her a shot at writing movies, as return for everything she had done for him (hint hint). In fact, maybe the screenplay is loosely autobiographical? A lonely millionaire seeks out an expensive female escort to keep him company in a five-star Las Vegas hotel... I was also surprised that Paul Auster had sunk so low as to waste his time on such cretinous and pointless material.This is what I refer to as a "lifeless movie". D.O.A. The mood is dead, the visual style (filmed mostly on video - whoopdie!) is more bland than your dull neighbour's sea holiday footage. The "hip" shaky-camera shtick gives yet again the impression of a drunken "director of photography" who stuck his camera you-know-where and then filmed the movie from behind, randomly taking in images, sometimes missing the actors completely. The near-lack of a soundtrack only underlines the deadness of everyone and everything involved. Was this crap inspired by "Idiots 95", Lars von Trier's wonderful little crackpot cinematic-revolution firm? The wobbly camera, the sex, the ugly look, and the lack of music certainly adhere to the rules of "Morons 95". We're offered two lead characters who are uninteresting and bland. I could almost see Molly Parker as a stripper (although, they're usually rather mangy-looking), but when it is mentioned that she fixed car-locks and plays the drums, I could have laughed. I could have but didn't, because the movie had already put me in a semi-slumber during its first several minutes. Parker plays an uninteresting, mentally hollow stripper; Sarsgaard plays a run-of-the-mill nice guy: an uninteresting rich and polite semi-nerd. When the two of them were together sparks flew! No, not really... But I'm sure that Ms.Wang intended to have us see those sparks - wherever they may be. Where have those sparks gone? Or were they never even thrown in the film in the first place? Ms.Wang, you need to find out who took those sparks that were meant to be in all those "sexy", "emotional" scenes. I think someone stole them. Or perhaps the sparks abandoned the set, running as fast as their feet(?) could carry them, unwilling to have anything to do with this dull project.Thank God for the miracle of modern science! No, not the internet, computers, or DNA research; I'm talking about the remote control. Using this simple yet effective tool, I managed to finish this 85-minute movie in less than 70 minutes. I know, still too long for this malarkey, but that's at least 15 minutes of my life saved, and every minute counts when you're as bored as I was, watching Ms.Parker try to be sexy with her laughable stripping and tiny butt.So what was the ultimate point of this shamelessly plot-less film? Basically, this is a "when-is-the-penetration-gonna-happen" kind of story. At the outset of their Las Vegas "adventure" Parker tells Sarsgaard and the poor viewers that there will be "no kissing and no penetration", but even the most clueless viewer knows that that's exactly what has to happen at some point. And when it happens it's... it's... rather uninteresting, just like all the previous events. In that great finale they kiss, they have (un)emotional sex, Parker is still frigid, Sarsgaard is still in love - and sobs like a baby after just having semi-raped Parker. He did that to her because he was heavily frustrated. 10,000 bucks and such disrespect? Ts, ts... Maybe the message of the film is this: "rich semi-nerdy young millionaires are often unable to get the proper sexual escort service that they really need". Wow. That IS "deep".Or maybe the movie wants us to muse over whether the vagina or the internet is "the center of the world". (I'm not making this up.) Now, that's DEEP! A little correction. I just found out that "Ellen Banjamin Wang" isn't a "Wang" but a "Wong". Furthermore, she is not a real person but a pseudonym which Wayne Wang so very ingeniously created to represent all the great and inventive minds that put so much thought into this intellectual exercise. Maybe that's why the movie sucks this much: half a dozen writers collaborating on what is essentially a non-story... that can never end well.There is more entertainment to be found in reading the name "Wayne Wang" over and over than watching this film.

I recently saw this movie again and although the topic may still be important in todays society, as a subject for a movie it however seems a bit outdated. However, it is still a very nice movie. A lot of people are drawn towards this film because of the rumors of graphic visual material. However this is not a pornographic movie and less "shocking" than a movie like "Baise-moi". But this is definitely not the essence of the movie.It deals with the subject of realism in several aspects. One is the reality or artificiality of the life of the computer dude that lives through computers. The internet is his world and is taking over the real world. He can no longer relate to people in a regular way and starts an artificial relationship with a stripper. The movie deals with the question how real these relations can be and where the real world and real emotions fit into this artificiality.This aspect is enhanced by the use of different ways of filming. At certain times it is filmed like any other movie and this cinematic quality fits the "artificial" aspect of the movie. At other times the makers switch to a style of filming whose hand-held camera footage is reminiscent of documentaries and reality shows and whose graininess reminds us of home movies. I find that the makers have made some very nice and efficient cinematographic choices to bring their message. For that alone I find the movie worthwhile. People seem to forget that hand-held does not automatically equate to Blair Witch type movies and can convey so much more.Definitely an interesting movie to watch.

"You don't *look* like a stripper..." was the first clue. Director Wang, who clearly OK'd Zalman King/Adrian Lyne film style ad and packaging art, was hardly hiding the reality vs. fantasy (or real vs. fake) themes of his superb dot-com romantic tragedy much past the opening credits.Wang's use of hand-held camera, grainy 8mm, incandescent lighting color wash, high-definition close ups, and assorted traditional noir and verite style cinematography and direction is a breakthough exploration of digital media.Vegas visitors brave enough to leave their Strip casino/hotel cocoons during daylight hours will surely be struck by the almost surreal difference between how ugly and unglamorous the city is by day and how other-worldly beautiful after dark. Florence, however, is no Vegas... Get it? Florence (Italy), is *real*, and every flaw she (the city) may have simply adds to the unearthly beauty she emanates. Whether filmed in handi-cam, Fisher-Price pixelvision, or 70mm IMAX, at high noon or midnight, the beauty of Florence (Italy) is timeless and media-independent. At least in the hands of Wayne Wang, Florence glows with or without the lipstick and latex...I mean neon.Richard's visit to the Venetian Casino/Hotel near the end of the movie completes the tragic romantic (city) metaphor. The "canals" at the Venetian Hotel are truly as pathetic as the film depicts them. The problem is, these two tragic lovers have always kept a safe distance away from Florence (Italy), or *reality*, and are tragically resigned to a Vegas-reality. Or a dot-com reality...Filmed digitally and rendered as cinema verite, even duplicating the "grainy" silver halide crystal image artifact of low light film stock with a digital effect extends the film's theme to the medium communicating the artist's expression.Great film.I just wish my many shares of homegrocer.com were as valuable as a single used copy of a DVD of this film....or a single apple from an actual grocer.....

...Wayne Wang's notorious, controversial and explicit "CENTER OF THE WORLD" (Artisan, $.. is a much more polished piece of work than "Romance." It also explores the bleak terrain of emotional isolation. This time the protagonist is a rich internet geek (Peter Sarsgaard) who literally contracts with a rock and roll drummer and part-time stripper (Molly (Parker) for a sexual get-away in Las Vegas. The phoniness of Vegas and the impersonal internet are more than metaphors for what amounts to virtual sex in real life. The basic elements are familiar in countless other love stories, but here the physicality of the two main characters dominates everything. In many ways we root for them to break out of their protective shells and actually connect with the hearts.Sometimes the walls we build to keep out the bad cuts us off from life itself. This film, shot on high definition video, evokes a more personal and immediate response and is much more effective on DVD than it is projected in a theater. Longing for intimacy but in the grip of a fear of letting go leaves the main characters with only the option of exploring physical sensations as soulless.