This is not the bunch to invite over to your house, and many might even want to skip the two-hour film with its talky, pathetic prose. These characters would probably be despicable even if they weren't addicted to some narcotic. And the talk is endless; conversations that finish with a door slam are taken up moments later on the cell phone (a nice updating touch by Rabe). What draws big-name actors to Rabe's work is the chance to work on one's raw acting talent. Penn and Palminteri fit their roles like gloves, and Spacey again proves he is one of the most watchable actors around. Every nuance, bad pun, and irrelevant slip of Spacey's wicked tongue has a brutal kind of poetry here in a film that can be admired but not loved. --Doug Thomas
