Synopsis
A mentally ill young woman finds her love in an eccentric man who models himself after Buster Keaton.
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Cast
- Johnny DeppSam
- Mary Stuart MastersonJuniper 'Joon' Pearl
- Aidan QuinnBenjamin 'Benny' Pearl
- Julianne MooreRuthie
- Oliver PlattEric
- CCH PounderDr. Garvey
- Dan HedayaThomas
- Joe GrifasiMike
- William H. MacyRandy Burch
- Liane CurtisClaudia
Recommendations
- 75
Chicago Sun-Times
Benny and Joon is a film that approaches its subjects so gingerly it almost seems afraid to touch them. The story wants to be about love, but is also about madness, and somehow it weaves the two together with a charm that would probably not be quite so easy in real life. - 75
Entertainment Weekly
Benny & Joon turns out to be a whimsical (and not very well paced) heart tugger in which two nice couples spend 98 ever-so-slightly flaky minutes figuring out that they’re perfect for each other. - 70
The New York Times
Benny and Joon is a dangerously fanciful story of cute eccentrics, characters whose quirks are the very essence of their appeal. Some of us experience a form of red alert at the very notion of adorable oddballs on screen, but Benny and Joon turns out to be remarkably benign in that regard. - 60
Los Angeles Times
This sentimental stew is not without its flavors, and the cast tries hard to be winsome and adorably distraught. - 60
Time Out London
Another one flies over the cuckoo's nest in this soft-hearted romantic three-hander. It's acted out in the secondary emotional register of the glass menagerie: whimsical, delicate, idiosyncratic, barmy. - 60
Empire
It would be easy to slam this flimsy romantic charmer for its cloying whimsicality, but at the core of its misfits-need-love-too storyline lies a warmhearted charm so captivating that only the most hardened cynic will fail to be enchanted. - 50
TV Guide Magazine
A gentle comedy about two misfits--a schizophrenic girl and a boy whom earlier generations would have called an odd duck--who find love, Benny & Joon means well but overdoses on whimsy. - 50
Austin Chronicle
Naïf meets waif in this touching yet unrealistic tale of love amongst society's write-offs. Between Masterson's schizophrenic Joon Pearl and Depp's oddball Sam, it's difficult to tell which one's the naïf and which is the waif.
