In Los Angeles, the lonely and paranoid Bob Maconel (Christian Slater) is a complete loser: at home, in spite of living in the same address for five years, his next door neighbor ignores his existence and he only talks to his alter-ego golden fish in his aquarium; in the office at ADD company, he is abused and humiliated by his colleagues and nobody has ever asked an opinion to him or invited him to a happy-hour. Every now and then Bob imagines shooting five loath coworkers or blowing up ADD's building. When his next cubicle colleague has a breakdown and shoots his colleagues, Bob kills him with five shots and becomes a popular local hero. His boss Gene Shelby (William H. Macy) moves him from his cubicle to an office in the last floor and makes him the VP of Creative Thinking as the substitute for Vanessa Parks (Elisha Cuthbert), who has become quadriplegic with one bullet in her spine. Bob visits Vanessa in the hospital and after the initial rejection, she asks him to help her to commit suicide. However, they become close and Bob falls in love for Vanessa. But the mistreatment in the past and lack of confidence of the quiet Bob haunt him, driving him to an insanity process.
"He Was a Quiet Man" is an impressively dark and morbid character study of a paranoid man after years of humiliation and loneliness. Most of the characters in the office are usually found in most companies, from the sweet woman that uses sex to climb positions to the apple-polisher; the abusive to the abused worker. Therefore, there is a total credibility in the universe of the employees of ADD. The underrated Christian Slater gives a fantastic performance with the quiet and ignored Bob Maconel and his character is very well developed, slightly recalling Michael Douglas in "Falling Down". The extremely dark humor may be unpleasant to some viewers but I found this movie a gem to be discovered. My vote is eight.
Title (Brazil): "A Fúria" ("The Rage")
"He Was a Quiet Man" is an impressively dark and morbid character study of a paranoid man after years of humiliation and loneliness. Most of the characters in the office are usually found in most companies, from the sweet woman that uses sex to climb positions to the apple-polisher; the abusive to the abused worker. Therefore, there is a total credibility in the universe of the employees of ADD. The underrated Christian Slater gives a fantastic performance with the quiet and ignored Bob Maconel and his character is very well developed, slightly recalling Michael Douglas in "Falling Down". The extremely dark humor may be unpleasant to some viewers but I found this movie a gem to be discovered. My vote is eight.
Title (Brazil): "A Fúria" ("The Rage")