Diner (1982)

My Review

“Diner” is a comedy-drama film about five friends who reunite at a local diner periodically to talk about what is going on in their lives. This is reportedly a semi-autobiographical story from director-screenwriter Barry Levinson’s life, in his big screen debut. However, the film in reality is self-indulgent, tedious, and just downright boring.

Levinson encouraged the cast to improvise dialogue to create realistic conversation on screen. The only thing this accomplished was to give the movie a sloppy and unprofessional feel. The principal actors all looked bad: Steve Guttenberg, Daniel Stern, Mickey Rourke, Kevin Bacon, Tim Daly. Ditto for co-stars Ellen Barkin, Paul Reiser, Kathryn Dowling, Michael Tucker.

Save yourself some cinematic indigestion and skip a visit to “Diner,” a flop in theaters for producer Jerry Weintraub, United Artists, and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. It was filmed in Baltimore, Maryland, and received one Oscar nod for Best Screenplay.