DVD REVIEW

Southland Tales

Sony Pictures Home Entertainment || R || Mar 18, 2008

Synopsis

Set during the election season of 2008, Southland Tales proposes a series of apparently linked events: the reappearance of a vanished movie star (Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson), now an amnesiac; the bizarre doubling of a policeman (Seann William Scott in two roles); the development of an energy source from ocean waves; and the presence of an Iraq War veteran (Justin Timberlake) who seems to be watching everything, and narrating some of it.


Critique

After the cult success of Donnie Darko, it was only natural to look upon the release of Southland Tales with some anticipation.  The film promised to be a satirical look at the America of the near future (which, after the delay in the film’s release, turns out to be the America of today).  The film has some good ideas, but they just are not executed.

There is too much exposition, too much telling and not enough showing.  Supposedly the voice over by Justin Timberlake’s character was added after the film’s debut at Cannes in 2006, but it only makes the film’s failings all the more obvious.  It would be easy to say that the film should have been reshot, but who knows that that would have helped.  Southland Tales is altogether too much and not enough.

One of the biggest mistakes was asking The Rock to act.  Don’t get me wrong, he has something that he does, and he does it well, and it’s cool to see him paired up with Seann William Scott again, but when you take him out of his niche, as this film does, he doesn’t look too good.  The Rock is a personality, a presence, but he’s not much of an actor.

The film might have a different tone if The Rock were the biggest name on the screen, but the casting of the film is so bloated with familiar faces that it distracts from the film.  Donnie Darko showed us Patrick Swayze in a role that was against type, and it worked.  In Southland Tales, Richard Kelly has taken that kind of stunt casting to its most extreme point, with nearly every character played by someone familiar, and nearly all them play against type.  Jon Lovitz as a corrupt cop (one of way too many SNL veterans in the film), The Rock, Sarah Michelle Gellar as a porn queen, and so on.  It’s not that the actors aren’t good; they do well with what they have, but the parade never ends, and it takes one out of the film quickly.  

More than the casting, the dialogue sounds more recited than spoken, as though every line were made up of quotes, epigrams, epitaphs, and too many statements aimed straight at the audience.  “’Flow my tears,’ the policeman said,” says corrupt cop Jon Lovitz after gunning someone down, in but one of too many clumsy Philip K. Dick references.  There are too many references to too many things in general, and this movie never lets the viewer forget that it is a movie, something that undercuts what might otherwise be some powerful moments.  

Southland Tales isn’t all bad.  Jumbled, pretentious mess that it is, there are a few points that make it more interesting than many films on the horizon.  The best thing about the film is the general tone.  The film feels like a waking fever dream, which works since so much about life in America lately feels like a seven year waking nightmare.  It took a long time for Southland to finally make it to theaters, and one has to wonder if it might not have been more powerful two years ago.

Unfortunately, the film we have feels forced and deliberately weird, not organic in any way.  Kelly seems to be developing in the wrong direction, his sophomore effort an amateurish, embarrassing failure.  Perhaps he simply overreached himself.  His vision of the end of the world – sponsored by Red Stripe beer and the Panasonic Toughbook – is, to paraphrase a quote he overuses in the film, too much of a whimper to even hint at the bang at which he was obviously aiming.


Video

Southland Tales is presented in a 2.40:1 aspect ratio.  The transfer is sharp, and the film’s color scale is rendered perfectly.  The black and white levels are solid, and the vivid, wide ranging color palate is sharply rendered.  This is a great example of what happens when a great look happens to a bad film.


Audio

This DVD is presented in 5.1 Dolby Surround.  The levels are perfectly balanced, and all levels come through sharply.  From the dialogue to the quiet moments to the film’s musical number, this presentation is sharp.


Special Features

USIDent TV: Surveilling the Southland Featurette: a behind-the-scenes look at the making of the film.  We have on-set footage and interviews with the cast and crew.

This Is the Way the World Ends Animated Short: the end of the world, through the prism of this movie.


Final Thoughts

Southland Tales is a disjointed, pretentious, failure of a film.  There are flickers of interesting ideas, but the film is too much of a mess to do anything with them, and we are left with a meaningless jumble.  The cast and filmmakers are clearly trying to give us something different, but they try too hard.

VERDICT: RENT IT

 

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Review posted on Apr 24, 2008 | Share this article | Top of Page

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