Southland Tales
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Movie Reviews of Southland Tales
Movie Review: Horrible Mess
Summary: 1 Stars
As pretentious and messy as the film is, what's even worse is how boring it is. The cast is dead. The scenes move at a glacial pace. The attempted jokes land like bricks. It's an utterly unpleasant experience. Also, Kelly can bring up as many philosophical and political buzzwords as possible, but that doesn't mean he actually has anything to say about any of it. Very shallow and pointless film.Movie Review: Southland Tales = Bad
Summary: 2 Stars
Richard Kelly is an amazing writer and director, Donnie Darko is on of my favorite movies. He does some great films, but Southland Tales is just not one of them, I just thought the movie was confusing and kind of slow. Also I was expecting a great finish to the movie similar to Donnie Darko, but the ending was lame and just boring. All in all, I would say that this is one of Richard Kelly's worst films. It was ok to watch once but I do not see myself ever watching it again.Movie Review: A WONDERFULLY ELECTRIC MISUNDERSTOOD MASTERPIECE
Summary: 5 Stars
I'm just gonna go right out and say it. Richard Kelly's visionary epic "Southland Tales" is one of the best movies of 2007 and one of the most unique films ever created. However, to my (and yours as well) dismay, any attempt to synopsize this film would be an almost impossible task.
What Richard Kelly achieves with "Southland Tales" however, is unprecedented. He basically shows audiences what movies are really all about. They are a universe unto themselves. And the writer and director of that movie is the God of this universe and can do anything he or she pleases. And that's exactly what Kelly does. He uses the film to speak his mind about the things that people of this country and of this world stand for and believe in. He satirizes politics and our government, our involvement in the Iraq war, our obsession over movie stars and Hollywood in general. And he pokes fun at our religious beliefs as well, at our fears and wants of destruction and mayhem all at the same time.
He creates scenes filled with action, with drama, with comedy, with despair, scenes filled with music and dance, with dreams and nightmares, with science fiction and our perception of reality. If only people could let go of their obsession with common sense and realism, and appreciate it for what it is-a unique blend of fantasy and art that has never been achieved before. Yes, it is a film that is truly "out there", so much so, that it doesn't even come close to being anything audiences have seen before or will see again anytime soon. But therein lies the biggest appeal of the film, the fact that Richard Kelly had the guts to make a movie no one else wants to or can make.
The ending is a bit ridiculous, I must say, in its outrageously prophetic view of the apocalypse and coming of the messiah, but everything that comes before it is almost too amazing for words. The backlash that "Southland Tales" has received is unwarranted but certainly welcome. This film reminds me of the failure that "Blade Runner" once was, when it was released in the 80s, and how Kelly's first feature, "Donnie Darko" was a box office bomb in its initial run as well. Today though, both pictures are considered to be cult classics, and two of the best sci-fi films of our time.
The key to enjoying "Southland Tales" is not taking it too seriously. With character names like Boxer, Krysta, Serpentine, Nana Mae, Zora, Soberin, Starla, how can you? The movie takes place in present day, but looks like a despotic futuristic world, one in which nothing is coherent and everything is on the brink of obliteration. But that's what makes it so special. It's unlike every other film out there, and I'd go so far as to say that Richard Kelly thinks more outside of the box than any other filmmaker since the likes of Francis Ford Coppola and Stanley Kubrick.
Kelly decides to ignore all conscious reason of what's possible and what's not. It's as if the film speaks to you, saying "everything is possible in the future". "People can be called Zora and Boxer, and other absurd names that are usually only given to household pets." Or the film might speak out to you and say "religion is a joke. The presidential election is a joke. Hollywood is a joke. YOU are a joke. And so I will continue to make a big joke out of all of that and more and you're not going to like it at first because it's the truth, but one day you will, and one day you will appreciate everything I have to say".
I'm sure that if people can eliminate their pre-conceived notions of what a movie is supposed to be structured like, and what's it not supposed to be structured like, then audiences and critics alike would enjoy this film and the ambition of its director. Richard Kelly, I applaud you, and one day, everyone will too. And Darko fans, rest assured, and I'm only telling you this because I know you've been through this once already, but the infamy this film acquires today will lead it to its immortality tomorrow.
Movie Review: Unequivocally, one of the worst films of 2007.
Summary: 1 Stars
If I am not mistaken this was released to some theatres the last section of 2007, rolling over to 2008, maybe I am wrong, maybe I am right, it doesn't really matter as that is an altogether dog with different fleas. 2006 showed us that films, such as Running With Scissors, World Trade Center, Turistas, Failure to Launch, and The DaVinci Code can be saturated with epic talent, huge directors and best selling adapted novels, but even with those often saving graces, yuck is still yuck. In 2007, which was an EPIC year for film, finding disasters were hard to find, save Evening and Mr. Brooks. Here then we have probably the worst film of 2007, or pretty darn close.
A reviewer below somewhere in the depth of word salad, said this: "Fans of the director's earlier work (Donnie Darko) will not be disappointed. This movie stands out as a film with edge that many viewers will not fully comprehend (myself included) but can certainly appreciate."
Well friend, speak for yourself, as I was thoroughly disappointed. I was at the 24:50 mark in the film, and just rolled over in the corner of my L couch, and sank my head into the pillows. I heard the sound of cars in the distance, somewhere rolling along the suburbian freeway, and someone on a bike went by, hearing that all too familiar sound of a baseball card attached to the spoke by a wash hanger.
Well Kelly you really bit the big one on this mess. Woooo Hooo. 'Donnie Darko' is amongst my friends and I top 20 movies of all time; it is, and was a cult phenom and is a shining achievement of brilliant filmmaking. Southland Tales is not edgy, it is not dark, it is a farce of untimely wit and parody set amongst a really trying to hard to be futuristic screenplay with a cast of some of the lesser of Hollywood's talent. (Lovitz, Laraquette, S.W.Scott, enough said?) Hence, perhaps Kelly new from jumpstreet how satirical and ludicrous this was going to be. The Rock and Sarah Michelle Gellar are just two names you do not under any circumstances attach to a film, if you want to take it seriously, much less a Kelly mind trip.
The opening scene aside with the boy with the camcorder and the atom bomb dropping, the rest (and I did roll back over eventually) is pure, total excrement. Endless, rambling banter and sad, twisted,non-humorous endeavors make the next hour even more painful. Perhaps I can look forward to Hellboy 2, Saw 5, The Mummy 3, Harry Potter 6, The Smurfs Movie, X-Files 2, Madagascar 2, or Get Smart: The Movie, and ordinarly I wouldn't think about seeing any of that nonsense. It is not surprising this has an audience, as the worlds population according to the CIA in 2007 est. was 6602224175. Someone's gotta like it.
Movie Review: Imagine
Summary: 2 Stars
(This review is from the "cut" 144 minutes version)
Some think that director Kelly is misunderstood. I think that "Southland Tales" is a pretty straightforward movie, coherent and easy to follow. It is simply a bad film. I don't see difficult to imagine all kinds of possible scenarios for the end of the world, especially in the Bush age, but the hard thing to do is to apply the fine brush, the little touches that make those scenarios believable, a world in their own. Kelly throws everything that pops in his mind, but is all post-modern pap, the kind of act that pertain to some artsy films from the 1980s (and badly done at that). Change the music for a full blown Hollywood-type orchestra, reshoot some escenes, shoot some more, and you could have a respectable summer extravaganza, with the same script but differently filmed. This is one of those strange cases where fifteen million dollars more (and somebody else to helm) could have done all the difference. In fact, I would advise Kelly to join forces with Gattaca's Andrew Niccol and work only pitching ideas to other directors, because the basic ones they have are good, the problem is when they try to film them.