John Dies At The End (2013)

You know, I've seen some weird stuff in movies. Some of them have been horrible. Some have been hilarious. And some have been just plain strange. Whenever I see something that leaves an impression on me, for good or bad, I'm usually glad I saw it. At the very least, I'll give a film credit for showing me something that I can say "Well, I've never seen that before" in regards to. Even if I didn't like the film, I still gives me something that I can pull out during a conversation in order for me to say something like "Oh yeah? I've seen a zombie eat its own intestines."

With "John Dies At The End," I find myself with a bit of a conundrum. On one hand, it was by far and away one of the most unique, surprising and unpredictable movies I've ever seen. For that reason alone I can say that I'm glad I saw it. This is hands down a movie going experience that's unlike anything else I've come across. And honestly, I would recommend anyone who likes interesting films to go and see it.

On the other hand, this movie is a train wreck. And the more I think back on it, the more and more I dislike "John Dies At The End." So much so that the entertainment I was admittedly getting out of the movie while watching it seems less and less important in retrospect. It's so frustrating to reflect on or dissect or make any kind of sense of it that it just makes me want to throw my hands up and decide it's not even worth it, because from a story telling standpoint this movie is an absolute catastrophe. And honestly, I can't recommend anyone seeing it.

It's all quite confusing.

The plot of "John Dies At The End" is so obfuscated and random that it gets to the point of being either just as pretentious and self-absorbed as any Terrence Malick wank-fest, or so unpretentious that it screams out at you "Of course this doesn't make sense. Why should it? Let's have fun." The ironic thing is that either way, the film reaches the same end-point. It still ends up collar-bone deep up its own rectum.

The concept of "John Dies At The End" is that there a drug (or alien life-form or something from another dimension or whatever it is) called 'Soy Sauce' that allows you to see through time. Or dimensions. Or be psychic. Or be able to exorcize ghosts. Or aliens. Or both. Or it allows you to travel to other dimensions. Or time. Or both. Or it kills you. Or it doesn't. Or it does both. Or all of the damn above.

Pretty much, yeah.

Anyway, our main character Dave (Chase Williamson) and the titular John (Rob Mayes) take this drug/alien/whatever and proceed to then freak out as all kinds of bizarre and unexplainable randomness starts happening to them. This includes a mustache prying itself off of someone's face to try and kill Dave, a freezer full of meat coming alive to form some kind of flesh golem, people exploding as alien spores burst out of them, John apparently dying only to come back for some unexplained reason, and Dave using a bratwurst as a phone. There's also this other world with an all-knowing, Lovecraftian monster that likes to eat people to gain their knowledge. I don't know. All of this is supposed to make sense. I think.

I know that all sounds amazing, but really, it's just weird for weird's sake.

Maybe I'm stupid, but that's seriously the best I can do to explain "John Dies At The End" because I am at a total loss to do more. The film suffers from the worst case of "Movie ADHD" I can recall seeing. But the odd thing is that in the moment you are watching it, each moment makes sense in of itself. "John Dies At The End" is less of a overarching cohesive narrative and more of a collection of ideas that twist and wind and blend into each other well enough to feel organic, but not enough to make anything close to a coherent story.

The problem is that due to the nature of Soy Sauce, chronology in "John Dies At The End" is pretty much a wash, as the film is somewhat tailored around the idea that time is essentially meaningless, and the film seems to go back and forth with no warning in regards to sequences of events. At least that's how it seemed to me. Add to the fact that most (?) of the film is told in flashbacks because Dave is telling someone a story, but it's near impossible to tell what's a flashback and what's in the future and what's happening right then and now, and there's never a clear sense of time or sequence of events. As a consequence the plot was also never clear. Again, I know that's fitting to the themes, but for me it's a little difficult to care about anything when I have no grasp on what's going on.

The best part of the film for me, and about the only thing that comes close to being a reasonably well-conveyed sequence is the interview that punctuates the film. Every once in a while we go back to Dave, who is telling his story to a journalist, Arnie (Paul Giamatti). Arnie is obviously skeptical of everything Dave is telling him, as it's nutter than a Payday bar, but as the story keeps going and Dave demonstrates his abilities, Arnie becomes a believer. All of this leads to an admittedly fantastic twist near the end of the movie, and if it had tied itself in to the plot of the film (had there actually been one) then it would have been doubly nice, especially since Giamatti tears it the hell up. But as it is his stuff ultimately ends up being pretty pointless.

Why can't Paul Giamatti be fantastic in a movie I like?

At least Giamatti got a lot of screen time. Two other actors I like were also in this, but end up being varying degrees of worthless. Doug Jones, also known as "That Guy in Full Body Makeup in Every Movie You've Ever Seen" got to actually show his face as this creepy looking dude who I think was supposed to be an alien. I'm not sure who/what he was, but he puts a giant slug type thing down Dave's shirt and says nonsensical stuff. I'm not sure why he's there. He's kind of like those aliens from "Galaxy Quest," only without a purpose for existing.

I'm also going to lay down a New Rule here and state for the record that if your movie has Clancy Brown in it, you use him, damn it. Clancy Brown is awesome, and he WILL be utilized to the best of his considerable talents! If a film isn't smart enough to give the guy who was The Freaking Kurgan more than 2 minutes of screen-time and a handful of throwaway lines that accomplishes nothing, than you need to have your film-making privileges suspended until you learn the value of a good cast.

I will say this in its defense, however. "John Dies At The End" is beautiful to look at. The colors are bright and vibrant, there's a great sense of style which makes the dreamlike states of mind of our characters both fascinating and somewhat horrifying to look at, and there is so much imagination and creativity going on in every frame that it's really something to behold. And despite my hangups it was never, ever boring. I was invested from beginning to end, which is a sizable accomplishment considering how aggravated I was at the narrative.

I cannot take away how pretty this movie is.

I'm sure that there's an audience for this movie. I can think of several of my good friends who would like it, and possibly love it. But I am not among them. And it's not that it's a bad film or even poorly made, because it's actually a gorgeous, brilliantly shot and put together film. After all it's by Don Coscarelli, the guy who directed "Bubba Ho-Tep." There's mad talent going on here, both in front of and behind the camera. But this is just too much crazy stuff at the expense of the plot, and that bugs me way too much. I appreciate the film's gusto and imagination and craftsmanship, but my limit for weird for weird's sake ends at "Aqua Teen Hunger Force." At least that's funny.

The trailer makes this look far too coherent.

THE BOTTOM LINE - "John Dies At The End" is a well-made, bizarre movie that is either going to blow you away with its imagination or infuriate you completely with its lunacy. For those of you who don't much care if anything makes sense. In the moment, it's mesmerizing. In hindsight, it's obnoxious. But hey, I've never seen anything quite like it. I just wish I knew what was going on.

Cosmopolis (2012)

It's a difficult thing to watch a director you like have a sudden moment of insanity. That's the only answer I have as to why David Cronenberg made "Cosmopolis." Clearly somewhere along the way, he lost his marbles. Or perhaps it's not as extreme as all that. Perhaps it was more that he was simply attempting something different and unique. In his defense that's what Cronenberg has been doing his whole career. In regards to that I suppose "Cosmopolis" would be a success. It is different. It is unique. And sometimes you fail miserably at trying something new. But that's how you learn. That's the process of creativity at work.

But man, the steaming pile of desiccated, reeking placenta left in the afterbirth of the creative process that is "Cosmopolis" is enough to make a person wish Cronenberg had left well enough alone. This movie is a big pile of pretentious excrement.

There is a rather severe disconnect going on in this film between what "Cosmopolis" thinks it is, and what it is in reality. What it thinks it is a scathing indictment of the rich, bundled up in their comfortable soundproof limos as they cruise over the backs of the peons beneath them in blissful, self-entitled ignorance. What it is in reality is the longest feeling 109 minutes of pretentious, incoherent babbling I've ever seen outside of a Terrence Malick film.

Although there is a merciful lack of wheat fields.

There is no real narrative. There are no real characters. There is no dialogue that makes any kind of sense. There are no performances that make us feel like we're looking at human beings. This is an absolute mess, and the only positive thing I can bring myself to say about it is that at least it has the decency to not be as long as an average Malick film. Sure feels like it, though.

"Cosmoplis" consists of billionaire Eric Packer (Robert Pattinson) sitting in a limo as he drives across town to get a haircut. According to the back of the DVD case, this qualifies as "an odyssey." I can already guarantee you this movie is giving itself far too much credit. As he is doing this, stuck in traffic the whole way, an assortment of characters pop in one after another to say weird things and then leave after 10 minutes of talking like a robot. Then Eric leaves the limo, does something random, meets someone else, usually has sex with them, another scene filled with rambling nonsense happens and then we go back to the limo to do it all over again. For nearly 2 hours. And then at one point Eric gets a pie in the face while a Frenchman will not shut up about it and camera flashes threaten to give me a seizure. All of this while SYMBOLISM with rats goes on in the background.

Could you please be a tad more overt? I don't think you've hit me over the head with it enough.

Now, I get what they're trying to do here. I'm not stupid. I understand symbolism. He's a rat who knows nothing of the plights of people not rich. Very original. But that stuff works best when it's subtle. Like Animal Mother's "Born to Kill/Peace Sign" helmet in "Full Metal Jacket" referencing "The Duality of Man" and all that crap. I get that. Although that could also just be something ironic that the character did. Sometimes it's hard to tell with symbolism, and I think a lot of times people inject far more into films than what was intended.

In the case of "Cosmopolis," it seems to have hit a symbolism singularity where it's so far over the top and obvious that it almost becomes subtle again, because your line of thinking reasons that no director in their right mind would do something do hackneyed. Especially a good one like Cronenberg. Add to that the fact that everything about "Cosmopolis" is so surreal that it comes across more like a fever dream to the strains of bad poetry, and you're not really sure if what you're seeing is actually supposed to mean anything anyway.

Oh I get it! They're separated like it's a confessional! That makes EVERYTHING make sense!

And you know, I could maybe handle some of that crap if the performances were decent. But the performances are across the board, the worst I've ever seen. Ever. I'm not even joking. Not one single person in this movie speaks like a human being. They deliver their lines like an alien or some other creature that learned the English language by reading E.E. Cummings poems, rambling off incomprehensible diatribes that seem more like a "flowery prowse" edition of Mad Libs.

Let me give you an example of this "deep" dialogue "Cosmopolis" seems to think is so insightful and powerful. Strap yourself in:

Eric Packer: There's a poem I read in which a rat becomes the unit of currency.
Michael Chin: Yes, that would be interesting.
Eric Packer: Yeah, that would impact the world economy.
Michael Chin: The name alone, better than the dong or the kwacha.
Eric Packer: The name says everything.
Michael Chin: Yes. The rat.
Eric Packer: Yes, the rat close lower today against the euro.
Michael Chin: Yes, there's going concern that the Russian rat will be devalued.
Eric Packer: White rats, think about that.
Michael Chin: Yes, pregnant rats.
Eric Packer: Major sell-offs of pregnant Russian rats.
Michael Chin: Britain converts the rat.
Eric Packer: Joins trend to universal currency.
Michael Chin: Yes, US is establishing the rat standard.
Eric Packer: Is every US dollar redeemable for rat?
Michael Chin: Dead rats!
Eric Packer: Yes, stockpiling of dead rats called global health menace. 

I'm sorry. Were you attempting to say anything in that vapid, rambling verbal diarrhea?

And while the terrible dialogue is all on the author of the book, Don DeLillo, the bizarre deliveries have got to be on Cronenberg's direction, because I've seen (some of) these actors do FAR better. Pattinson continues his streak of being simply not a very good actor. As per usual he's flat and uncharismatic, and I can't wait until the world is finally done with him. But having a Paul Giamatti performance is a good thing, and it's kind of wasted when you have no idea what he's talking about.
  

 Seriously. Go away. Take your eyebrows with you.

And it's absolutely insulting, at least to me, that a director with the pedigree of Cronenberg would subject us to this wretched, student film B.S. Is that really what it's come to? Does Cronenberg really think this crap that could be the final project of any random, pretentious, film school dropout would fly after giving us films like he's given us for 30 plus years? What in the blue hell is he thinking?

This is the guy who gave us "Eastern Promises." This is the guy who gave us "A History of Violence." This is the guy who gave us "The Fly." The is the guy who gave us "Videodrome," for crying out loud! Why, for the love of all that is Holy or Evil, is he giving us a piece of crap that is about as deep and meaningful as a sad clown flipping pancakes?!

I am not even kidding you. This is "Cosmopolis."

From the first frame of "Cosmopolis" to its sudden, utterly baffling ending, this is a film that screams out that it is smarter than you are. It screams out that it has something vital to say. It screams out to be taken seriously, and for critics and film snobs to heap praise upon it and shower it with awards because it's so utterly alienating and so gorged upon its own importance that the only possible explanation they can come up with is that it is a "thick and chewy" artistic masterpiece.

Well I, too, have an explanation for why it's "thick and chewy." It's because "Cosmopolis" is the most over-blown piece of garbage I've seen since "The Tree of Life," and it's a massive, greasy turd squeezed from the anus of the most amateur coffee-house beatnik failed poet which sustains itself on its own farts. How's that for an answer?

Hey, Cronenberg. Try making a f*#king movie next time.

THE BOTTOM LINE - This may very well be the worst film I've seen since "The Tree of Life." I wanted to stop it after 10 minutes, which felt like 30, but for some reason that I can't fathom, I muscled through it. I regret every second I wasted doing so. This film is punishment. This is something you'd use to win an easy $5 with by betting your buddy they can't sit through it.

Shoot 'Em Up (2007)

"Shoot 'Em Up" has been recommended to me for a few years now that I think about it, but for some reason I never got around to watching it, though I recall renting it once. Perhaps I just wasn't ready for the insanity I knew was headed my way because you really do have to be in a particular mood to watch something that is purely crazy for the sake of being crazy.

And yeah, "Shoot 'Em Up" certainly fits that bill. It's crazy. It's nuts. It's insane. It's so over the top that it would be most accurate to classify it as a comedy rather than an action movie. Of course, now that I think about it some action movies are two steps from comedy anyways. Look at "Commando," "Die Hard with A Vengeance" or "Machete" and tell me you're not supposed to laugh. I suppose that's kind of the point, and to be sure it's a lot of fun to watch a crazy action movie, which is certainly what "Shoot 'Em Up" is trying to be.

But you know what? After seeing it, when all is said and done, I'd rather watch "Crank" or "Escape From LA" or some other crazy action flick over "Shoot 'Em Up." I mean, yeah it was nuts, and yeah it had an absurd amount of action and a raging sense of humor about it, but I think it fell flat for two different reasons, and the second one I surprise even myself by saying.

First, I do not care much for Clive Owen. I find him uncharismatic and dull. He's what would happen if Daniel Craig was homeless for a couple months and somehow had the small amount of personality he had sucked out with a straw. He's just not charismatic at all, and he delivers his lines with all the gusto of a sack of onions. And this guy is supposed to be an action hero? Where's the panache? Where's the style? Where's the humor? Where's the badassery?

I just can't get behind a hero who looks like Ben Stiller.

The thing is that he seems dreadfully miscast. He just doesn't look like a tough guy. He doesn't look like someone who could jump through a plate glass window and put bullets between the eyes of 5 guys before he hit the ground. I'm sorry, I'm just not buying it. He looks like the catcher for a minor league baseball team, not a trained killer.

That and he can't pull off a one-liner to save his life.

There's also these really weird character traits they give Clive Owen, one where he gets really angry about random stuff and is always starting sentences with "You know what I hate?" Usually that means he's about to shoot somebody. Because you know, he's the good guy. There's also this running gag with him eating carrots. I don't get it. They do give him a one liner after he kills a guy with one, jamming it through the back of his throat and then saying "Eat your vegetables," but it comes off about as good as you'd expect it to. Schwarzenegger this guy ain't.

Ummm...symbolism?

The other thing that was kind of a weird thing to have a problem with was the fact that the story is at best nonexistent. Within the first minute and a half, Clive Owen is running through a warehouse shooting a bunch of guys he doesn't know. They don't know him, either. He was just there in the middle of something, so they send in like 50 guys out of nowhere to kill him. And while I would usually applaud an action movie for getting started really quick it's really hard to care about what's going on when you have absolutely no frame of reference.

In fact, despite the movie barely clocking in at 85 minutes, we are not given context to anything plot-related until nearly an hour into the film. Imagine if in "Die Hard" you didn't know there was a robbery going down until the beginning of the third act. It would have just been a guy without shoes running around an office building shooting people. That would have sucked.

There have been movies that have gotten off to a really fast start and been good, but they were either sequels, where you know these people already, like "The Expendables 2," or they gave you context really quick, like "Crank." In fact, let's take "Crank" as an example. That movie too was ridiculous action packed comedic madness, but in the first minute of the film, you know Jason Statham's character's name, what he does, who he pissed off, and what his predicament was. From that point on, it's action that doesn't stop, just like "Shoot 'Em Up," but we actually care because of trivial things like knowing what the hell is going on.

Shockingly, this has more context.

"Shoot 'Em Up" begins with Clive Owen sitting on a bench eating a carrot. A man runs past him trying to kill a pregnant lady, so he chases after them, kills the dude, and then starts shooting everyone else who starts flooding into the building to kill him. That's it. That's your setup. And you don't know anything about anything until the movie is almost over.

I can't believe I'm saying this, because even though it's really over the top and super charged, it really makes the action boring. I was actually bored by "Shoot 'Em Up," simply because I had no context, so I didn't care.

The one good thing about "Shoot 'Em Up" was Paul Giamatti as the hitman trying to kill Clive Owen. He's this really dumpy, unassuming guy with a bad comb-over, but he's probably the thing most people will remember before anything else about the movie. It was particularly funny watching him get more and more frustrated with not being able to take Clive Owen out, including a rather good line where he yells in exasperation, "My god. Do we suck or is this guy just that good?"

Ugh. I need an adult after just looking at that expression.

Also, Stephen McHattie shows up in a upper-echelon baddy role, but I'm not even sure where he fit into the whole picture since by that point, I really didn't care. Oh well. It was still nice to see him.

You know, I enjoy brain-dead action. I really do. But there's got to be some kind of reason for the explosions and bullets and blood splatter. Otherwise how am I supposed to care? At some level, I have to be somewhat invested so that I'll at least like the character. Or at least know what they're doing. Because without context or plot or reason, all you have is explosions. And that's why we have Michael Bay. And screw that.

THE BOTTOM LINE - I can see someone really enjoying "Shoot 'Em Up," but it wasn't for me. I just don't like Clive Owen, and I found it more like an experiment in showing purely action with no plot than an enjoyable movie watching experience. Maybe fans of gratuitous over the top silliness will like it, but really, there's plenty of movies that do it FAR better, like "Crank." If you're curious watch it, but if you skip this, you're not missing much.

The Ides of March (2011)

Oh man. Get ready for some typical Liberal Hollywood Propaganda! George Clooney and the rest of those flag-burning godless hippies are up to their old tricks again! I'm sure the movie will end with them having gay sex on the White House lawn after having nailed the Communist Manifesto to the front door and having used the Constitution as a moist towelette to wipe the blood from the baby sacrifices off their hands!

(The editors wish it to be known that the writers of the previous statement have been sacked)

Hey, when did Glenn Beck get access to my blog? And why is he writing film reviews? Crazy people, I tell you...

So "The Ides of March" was interesting to me because unlike other political dramas, there is only one political party. The movie takes place over the course of a couple days during the Democratic primary, and while the Republicans are mentioned, they aren't a part of the story. What it all boils down to is the two candidates running for the Democratic nomination are working to basically tear each other apart, using Ryan Gosling's character as a chess piece in a game he doesn't fully comprehend.

In a way, this is a more poignant story than if they had done the typical thing of having the two parties spatting back and forth. This is exactly the kind of in-fighting that has made people so weary of politics, especially after four years of the Republican party stonewalling progress in the name of being sore losers under the guise of false patriotism. In this way, it really makes the story that much more tragic, because these are members of the same party - they shouldn't be tearing each others throats out like that. It's really sad to watch.

And as far "liberal Hollywood propaganda" goes, George Clooney's character in "The Ides of March" turns out to be kind of a scumbag. So...not biased I guess? At least they're playing to the "all politicians are sleazeballs regardless of party" crowd. I'm a card-carrying member.

Has anyone else noticed that Ryan Gosling's eyes are really close together? I just thought I'd throw that out there.

 It's like having a staring contest with a perch...

"The Ides of March" was actually a pretty good movie. I'm not always on board with political dramas but every once in a while one comes along that really captures my interest. "Frost/Nixon" was one, as was Oliver Stone's "W." While I wouldn't call "The Ides of March" as good as those two films, it certainly manages to approach them in terms of entertainment value.

What really helps out is the cast, which surprised me because to be honest, after this and "Drive," I am so over Ryan Gosling, and I never really liked him much in the first place. I'm not a huge Clooney fan, either. That being said, they were both pretty good in it, although I still get annoyed by Gosling's mumbling, halfway stoned way of delivering his lines.

It's the supporting cast which really makes this movie work. Philip Seymor Hoffman was quite effective, if not slightly irritating as Gosling's boss, and Evan Rachel Wood portrayed a very human and vulnerable temp who has made some exceedingly bad mistakes to great effect. But for me, the real standout was Paul Giamatti as Hoffman's rival. He just oozes slimy sleazeball and totally deserves his status as the film's antagonist, but he never comes off as a villain.

I thought it was fascinating to have a villain who is really just doing his job - and doing it damn well. Yes, he manipulates Ryan Gosling. Yes, he wants his guy to win no matter the cost. And yes, lots of people get screwed over because of his actions. But in the end, the people who got screwed over, like Ryan Gosling, really brought it on themselves. They can't really blame Paul Giamatti's character for taking advantage of other people's mistakes. That's his job. It's like blaming a shark for eating a seal. It's what they do. And Ryan Gosling was the stupid seal who offered to floss the shark's teeth. What did you think was going to happen?

And by the end of the movie, Ryan Gosling is as big a "villain" as Paul Giamatti is. Or at least, he has reached the same level of sleazeball. It's basically about an idealistic man's evolution into a cynical, back-stabbing douche, which is exactly what all the political players around him are.

And who says Hollywood is biased?

THE BOTTOM LINE - This is a movie which has grown on me since watching it. I think the discussions to be had about the themes are probably more interesting than the movie itself, and it may have its head up its ass just a little, since it IS Clooney directing after all, but "The Ides of March" is by no means boring. Recommended.