\nSouthland Tales<\/i> is one of those movies that I don’t even know where to start “reviewing.” So I’m not going to even try. I’ll just say this: The movie was awesome and quite possibly made just for me.<\/p>\n
Other details worth noting in case you are curious about the movie:<\/p>\n
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It stars “The Rock,” “Buffy,” and JT.<\/li>\n
Not a small number of supporting roles are played by former Saturday Night Live<\/i> cast members: Cheri Oteri, Nora Dunn, Jon Lovitz, and Amy Poehler.<\/li>\n
Other actors worth noting: Bai Ling, John Larroquette, Mandy Moore, Holmes Osborne, Zelda Rubinstein, Will Sasso, and Seann William Scott.<\/li>\n
There were for sure cameos by Janeane Garofalo (!!!) and Kevin Smith and I THINK Eli Roth.<\/li>\n
The soundtrack included Moby, The Killers, Radiohead, Blur, and the Pixies.<\/li>\n
There are two “musical” numbers: Sarah Michelle Gellar singing “Teen Horniness Is Not a Crime” and Justin Timberlake “singing” (lip-synching) the Killers’ song “All These Things That I’ve Done.”<\/li>\n
Prior to Southland Tales<\/i>, the writer\/director Richard Kelly created Donnie Darko<\/i>.<\/li>\n
The movie seemed like a combination of the films: Magnolia<\/i> + Mulholland Drive<\/i> + Nowhere<\/i> + End of Days<\/i>.<\/li>\n
The movie’s story seemed like it was co-written by Philip K. Dick and Kurt Vonnegut.<\/li>\n
In fact, Rebekah Del Rio, who sings “Llorando” (“Crying” by Roy Orbison) in Mulholland Drive<\/i>, sings “The Star Spangled Banner” in Southland Tales<\/i>. (And if this isn’t an explicit direct homage to David Lynch than I’m not sure what would be…)<\/li>\n
The film is over 2 1\/2 hours long.<\/li>\n
Southland Tales<\/i> premiered at Cannes in 2006 and had a horrible reception… Despite this Sony Pictures bought it and Kelly re-edited it. (I’m already getting excited about a DVD\/Blu-Ray release with a director’s cut and\/or deleted scenes!!)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
In leiu of a fleshed-out plot review, here is a run-on sentence explanation: After nuclear attacks in the southwest US WWIII starts (against Iran, North Korea, Afghanistan, and Syria) and the PATRIOT Act becomes even more intense and I think all media is replaced by USIDENT (including USIDENTelevision) and there is a repubican senator from California running for president and his daughter is dating a movie star who is abducted and brainwashed and co-writes a movie screenplay with a porn star and becomes involved with a leftist neo-Marxist movement that is secretly funded by a German scientist who figures out a way to create an unlimited supply of energy that incidentally causes a rift in the forth dimension that ends up creating a present and future version of a soldier who fought in the Iraq war and was injured in Fallujah in a “friendly fire” incident involving Justin Timberlake who ends up becoming something of a drug lord. Oh and in the end the world ends with a bang, not a whimper because a messiah brings on the apocalypse.<\/p>\n
I loved the film but I’m not sure I would recommend it until you enjoy dystopic schizophrenic film experiences (I, for the record, do).<\/p>\n
UPDATE:<\/b> \nHere is Justin Timberlake “doing” the Killers’ “All These Things That I’ve Done”: \n
