Stay @ Amazon

German-Swiss director Marc Foster followed two highly popular and critically acclaimed films, Monster’s Ball and Finding Neverland, with Stay, a glossy thriller and psychological mindfuck. The film bombed at the box office and was widely panned by critics. Regardless, it boasts a large number of fans and sports a very high FCQ of 47.22 among users of Criticker (that’s Film Contentious Quotient, and means almost equal numbers of people loved and hated the film, with very few who felt indifferent — details on the math here),

Stay is Forster’s attempt at one of those labyrinthine “is it real or isn’t it” plots which can work really well in movies (Mulholland Drive) or not (Vanilla Sky). Here, a psychiatrist tries to prevent a new patient’s announced suicide, embarking on a surreal journey which touches on life, reality and the afterlife. Whether the film is any good is up for debate, but what’s not is the pedigree of the cast (Ewan McGregor, Naomi Watts and Ryan Gosling star), nor the beauty of Forster’s directorial style.

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Here are a couple battling opinions from Criticker users.

lpelliott: “This movie is brilliant. It’s pretty abstract but if you really think about it you can figure it out, I did and I found it immensely rewarding. Beautiful and haunting.”

fowp: “A waste of time – one of those post-Memento ‘is it all a dream?’ type messes. ”

Last week’s poll is closed, and you’ve given the green light to I Heart Huckabees, by a fairly narrow margin. That film is officially “great”. Officially.

And here’s our up-to-date list of the top 10 most contentious films at Criticker … with today’s new entry!

1. Eyes Wide Shut – FCQ 59.96 – Poll Result: GREAT!
2. I Am Sam – FCQ 52.65 – Poll Result: TERRIBLE!
3. Dumb & Dumber – FCQ 52.11 – Poll Result: GREAT!
4. King Kong – FCQ 51.2 – Poll Result: GREAT!
5. Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest – FCQ 50.46 – Poll Result: TERRIBLE!
6. Saw – FCQ 49.49 – Poll Result: TIE!
7. Brotherhood of the Wolf – FCQ 49.1 – Poll Result: GREAT!
8. I Heart Huckabees – FCQ 48.31 – Poll Result: GREAT!
9. Stay – FCQ 47.1 – Poll Result: Pending…
10. Transformers – FCQ 46.93 – Poll Result: TERRIBLE!