Rating  - Dull, plodding, endless... oh, a joke! How nice.
This movie was funny to some extent in 1992. Viewed now, it is an endless chat fest where a character says something, and another character repeats the same thing, either in shock, surprise, or as a question. This type of "dialogue" is often found in scripts written by stars/directors or someone who is really incapable of writing natural dialogue.
The movie has tons of cultural references that may have seemed hysterical to an L.A. audience in the early 90s, but, again, viewed now is neither funny or interesting.
Our leads are Meryl Streep, who is gorgeous and has so much presence that it is unfortunate that she had to be in this film, and Albert Brooks, who was also the writer/director--but should have only been one of the three, not all.
The "courtroom scenes," which, at last count, we had to endure three times, go on and on and on. Brooks "spins" around his chair to look at his former life, and then spins back to look at the judges with all the verve and enthusiasm of Tony Perkins's dead mother in "Psycho."
Albert Brooks can be funny, no question about it. And this was a unique idea. But someone really needed to take a gardening shears to the script and to have cracked a whip on the set. The pacing is so deadly that I would have had to down a jar of Vivarin in order to maintain enough alertness to get through the whole thing.
Good idea; questionable execution, deadly pacing.
Rating  - My favorite all time movie
I along with my husband watch many movies, but this movie, "Defending Your Life" is my all time favorite. I guess it just struck a cord in me. The usual view of death has never been an amusing subject. In this movie death becomes the ultimate fantasy. Judgment City is portrayed as the most luxurious vacation resort you would ever want to visit. It's restaurants serve the best food imaginable. I have a favorite restaurant scene in the film that highlights Julia's (Meryl Strep's character's) fun easy going attitude toward eating. While spending time in transition waiting for the ultimate decision to be made, Julia(Meryl Strep)enjoys all the wonderful amenities the resort has to offer. Her joy is so infectious that Daniel Miller (Albert Brooks character) soon learns to love her as well as what life is meant to be. This movie is a unique classic. One you will want to store in your collection and view many times over.
Rating - There is only a one letter difference between Comic and Cosmic
Albert does it again in one of my all time favorite movies. Other reviewers gave a fine synopsis of the plot so I won't rehash it here other than to say don't miss the snowmobile and restaurant scenes (I had a friend who had an "incident" with a rented snowmobile in West Yellowstone while on a Yellowstone vacation and he burst out laughing when I played the snowmobile scene for him).
I saw the film when it was out and the DVD several times since. I am drawn to this movie because its premise of why we are here makes as much sense to me as any other view and the comic spin works on so many levels. I don't remember the original reviews other than the glowing one given by a San Diego Reader movie critic. I am not surprised that many mainstream critics did not "get" this movie, just like they did not "get" Joe vs The Volcano.
If you like Albert Brooks and if you want to see an interesting, comic take on the afterlife then this one you must check out.
P.S. I became a big fan of Rip Torn after seeing this movie, as did the producers of The Larry Sanders Show.
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