Have I been on the Slutcam Marsha?

Everything's Gone Green

" Last night I jumped off Lions Gate Bridge 

and I drowned
but in the morning I came back to life

and I crawled onto the shore
and back to the office
and started my job
again and again and again....... "

Ryan Arlen is having a bad day. 

Very bad. 

One of those exceptional, million to one bummers that simultaneously screws with every aspect of your life in horrible and imaginative ways....   

The downfall of Ryan Arlen is gloriously entertaining. It might seem cruel to enjoy watching a good persons life dissolve in pitiful, cringe-worthy circumstances. But, the way I see it, is that cruelty is OK so long as it's happening to someone else. So in this instance, it's wholly acceptable.

Anyway,

Everything’s Gone Green focuses on this depressed and befuddled anti-hero, as he (oddly) calmly negotiates a steeplechase of extremely weird, troublesome circumstances and attempts to reconstruct his life after things unravel so hilariously. The whole movie has a kind of careless feel, a strange nihilistic undertone runs throughout. Everything feels slightly understated, partly because of the afflicted circumstance of the central character but mainly (I discovered) because the film is drenched with the essence of writer Douglas Coupland. 

After watching one scene in particular, where Ryan chastises his new boss for organising an office cruise. I was so taken with the script that I went out and bought Couplands Generation X. He's a good writer, and it's his combination of bleakness and dead pan wit that makes the movie what it is. 

And what it is is good. 

If you like offbeat independent films, check this one out. 

 

Eugene's Old Wisdom

Wristcutters: - A Love Story 

(Avoid the Trailer - It'll Mess with the Movie) 

"...I mean, she did say she'd be right back. 

Then again, Eugene's old wisdom is when a girl says that, she never does actually come back..."

You'd think a dusty, bleak, baking-desert purgatory, where nobody can smile and all the inhabitants have committed suicide isn't exactly the most obvious setting for an uplifting roadtrip movie. Some crackpot freaks might think it's perfect, but I'd say most people aren't too thrilled at the prospect of gawking at a trio of depressed outcasts roaming semi-hell for an hour or so. 

Most people however, would be mistaken. 

Unearthing and watching Wristcutters, a good 5 years after it's release was just an indescribably cool find. Immediately you're caught up in this curious barren retrograde scene, where entropy's taken it's toll and almost everything's broken or stuck together with gaffa. Strangely, this downbeat world has shitloads of charm and this weird kind of supernatural 'mystique glaze' which intrigues throughout. 

Eugene, Zia and Mikal are the main characters, played by Shea Whigham, Patrick Fugit and Shannyn Sossamon. All three are wayward and lost for some reason or another, but end up thrown together on a disorganised, bumbling quest to track down Desiree, Zia's recently offed-herself ex. Tom Waits makes an excellent and typically croaky appearance as the mysterious Kneller, a commune leader with a few secrets under his belt...

Mixing up downtempo storytelling and borderline insanity is a tricky move to pull off, but Wristcutters works it out gloriously. Any film which brews together the following ingredients: -

Romance +

Blackholes +

Suicidal Families +

Inuit Throatsingers +

Minor Miracles +

Spraypainted Flowers +

Inventive storytelling and genuinely touching scenes is hitting all the right notes for me.

ANYONE WHO READS THIS IS UNDER ORDERS TO WATCH AND ENJOY THE FILM

GET IT HERE £4