Red and Stuck (2008)
The lure of Red is seeing Brian Cox appear in more than ten-fifteen percent of the picture. Cox doesn’t do much with his voice or body here that’s much different from the government sleazies of his more widely seen pictures, but, as the star, there’s simply more of him: more of his resigned-hushed charisma, more of his stocky, dignified, generally miserable, oddly powerful frame. Watching the other actors in Red, Tom Sizemore, Robert Englund, Amanda Plummer, and several younger faces, whose work here would be laughed out of the message boards of Bloody Disgusting, I wondered what they must have thought of Cox as he worked on Avery Ludlow – a lonely retiree desperate for the slightest indication of remorse for the viciously pointless murder of his one companion – the dog of the title. Cox is acting in a movie that was never made; his co-stars are par for the picture you actually find yourself sitting through. This disconnection in quality has an unusual, unintentionally beneficial effect – we see Cox, ignored, restless, his intelligence giving way to something more primal – and we feel uneasy for him in the way we should feel for this man who lost what expectation for happiness he had left. We see Cox slumming, and we grow protective of him, particularly because the performance is so confident; so pared down and beautiful.
The rest of the picture, well, it has two moments that seize on what probably drew its creators to it: the murder of the dog (though the filmmakers muck that up by getting to it before we’ve befriended Red ourselves) and a long speech by Cox, in a rip on the Indianapolis scene from Jaws, telling of how he lost his wife. These moments have the sickening chaos of banality turning inside out – the point of a good horror picture. The rest of Red is a mixed-up revenge picture without the revenge, another wannabe deconstruction that can’t get past the rigidity of the formula. The violence, which is meant to be flat so as to deny us the hypocritical catharsis of most anti-revenge pictures, is indistinguishable from the tedium of the rest of the movie. One wonders how much of a hand the co-director Lucky McKee, of the also mixed up-but-promising horror pictures May and The Woods, as well as the unwatchable Roman, had in this mess. Can someone please give the man a budget and a timeline greater than two weekends and wait and see? McKee at his best promises something rare in even good horror pictures – empathy. The problem, though, may be that the qualities of McKee’s pictures aren’t meant to co-exist – he may not have the deranged, rebellious wit of a born horror filmmaker – he still wants the kids in P.E. to like him. McKee’s searching makes his clichés go limp when they should pop – as in the best parts of Rob Zombie’s movies.
I’m tempted to wish more money and encouragement in Stuart Gordon’s direction, but he seems to be doing fine without me, and that might only ruin him anyway - the equivalent of an interesting supporting actor going franchise-boring as soon as he wins an Oscar nomination. I can’t think of a director off the top of my head whose violence is more durable -Gordon’s biggest picture is the justifiably well-regarded Re-Animator, but he’s since continued to knock out increasingly sleek-vicious-funny horror pictures of a particularly sensual-satirically funky key. Dagon, occasionally crippled by inadequate funding, still has mood and an unsettling scene of violation – a perverse spoof of emasculation that paved the way for Edmond, Gordon’s film of Mamet’s play that trumps Mamet’s obviousness with unsettlingly plain, tickled, matter-of-factness; the picture, as pure Mamet as Mamet can get, could also almost be a spoof of Mamet in equal measure, and therein lies the appeal of Gordon’s touch – a flair for chameleon genre pictures that are deconstructionists in one light, revelers in the other. Gordon’s new picture, Stuck, seemingly as simple and straightforward as its title, also flirts with riding into the final frontier, the last taboo, of the American horror picture – economic collapse – but Gordon, no surprise, doesn’t play to the “common man” cheap seats. The picture nudges us, screws with us, indulges in sharp-daft hyperbole (most notably in an indulgent fuck-fest that’s a wink at the so-called sex in most mainstream movies) and then goes brutal. Every mood is given its fair due.
Stuck would work if Gordon’s sensibility was the only thing to enjoy, his pictures have trumped weak performances in the past, but that, bracingly, isn’t the case here. Mena Suvari and Stephen Rea, as folks caught in a bizarre chamber power play, are perfectly in tune. Gordon brought something out of Suvari in her brief turn in Edmond – she was commandingly off, and sexy, in a part similar to the one she overdid a few years prior in American Beauty. Divorced from the banalities of aspiring stardom, Suvari tapped into something that had the potential to make her star – provided the right part came along. Stuck moves Suvari in the right direction, but real horror movies aren’t marketed these days. Too bad. In Stuck, Suvari expands on all of her promising bits in Edmond – she’s a rare thing for our generation in these two films – an attractive, funny, controlled, menacing, flake. Rea is as strong as I’ve seen – playing a pleasant, average, bent-over guy without telling us he’s overly pleased with his character’s normalcy – which allows us to come to him, legitimizing the gore. The gore is (intentionally) the only thing that hits you over the head in Stuck, by the end you’ve realized you’ve seen something full and playful and disturbing, something gleefully lacking in the need to pronounce its credentials. Stuck has something that the younger horror filmmakers, in their obsessions to remake old movies at the expense of everything else, lack – a relatable, casual, downtown worldview – a simple heartbreak – the kind of dependable disappointment that drives you to four beers and a shot after work, to celebrate Wednesday as “hump” day. Stuck has something to do with what nails us down every day, and why we’ll fight for our privilege to have five more minutes of it.
November 6th, 2008 at 5:30 pm
Indeed Chuck Indeed! I couldn’t agree with you more on your treatment of RED, which is a cliche-ridden, revenge drama with typical supporting performances and a fair amount of “tedium” as you claim. I felt the violence went over the top in a few instances, like the scene where Cox brings the dead dog to the boy’s home, precipitating the film’s climax. But so much seems to be telegraphed in advance. And I agree with you that the esteemed Mr. Cox carries this film, and he delivers a solid, if uncharacteristically subdued performance. I gave this film 2 and a half of 5. I suspect you used ratings you would be in that ballpark. Still, it is oddly entertaining in a “guilty pleasure sort of way.” Superb review as always, I hung on every word.
As far as STUCK, I liked it a little less than you, but I’ll admit you connected it well to contemporary life and pinpointing its simultaneous playfulness and disturbing qualities. I will concede the film’s ability to entertain, even while I felt it was exploitative as well.
Great piece again, especially those perceptive final sentences.