An American businessman and an English one (played by the stunningly handsome Cox himself) go on a journey through Liverpool, looking for food. But, wait! They end up traveling half the globe, not noticing that they've been in Holland, Japan, China, etc. In the end they end up on the set of Clint Eastwood's spaghetti Westerns, where they meet the third businessmen. The three of them are symbolically represented by the Three Kings, which the "hand of God" then removes in the last scene. Meaning
what?... That Cox is a shoddy director? Whatever.
I am so tired of these talentless wannabe "film-makers" trying desperately to devise and present new ways to be "original" about how they deliver their unoriginal same old "messages" about humanity, the problems of the modern man, what have you. It takes ability and talent to do that, and Alex Cox lacks both in abundance.
The movie is only 77 minutes long. I underline "only", though. In Cox's movie universe 77 minutes can appear like 300 years. So perhaps Cox IS some kind of a genius who can bend space and time to his liking. However, would that excuse torturing us poor, misguided viewers like this? I was misguided alright: dumb even, to even consider that renting a Cox film (don't laugh at this unintentional word-play) could prove beneficial to me in any way.
The movie is HELLISHLY dull. The two main characters talk about absolutely nothing the whole time. Now, Cox's DVD commentary explains that this was done on purpose to show how lost, lonely, pathetic (what have you) the two are. The only problem with this, Mr.Cox, is that you are BORING THE VIEWERS out of their minds! And that is the worst trait a movie can have.
It was a such a trial sitting through the movie. I had to alternately switch to the audio commentary, in which another two boring fools Cox and Davies (the writer) pathetically prattled, and then went back to the other two dull morons, the two businessmen in the movie. I just kept jumping back-and-forth, and most of the time it was a dead heat, really: who is duller, the creators or the characters? Tough one to answer. The choice: to watch two characters saying nothing in a movie about almost nothing, or to listen to two self-deluded, arrogant, self-indulging wannabe "artistes" jabber about the dull movie.
Davies, the woman who wrote this dull, pretentious piece of trash, was also responsible for the supremely dull "Fear & Loathing In Las Vegas", which means that she already had experience in boring audiences around the world with pointless crap. Still, I mean give credit where credit's due: the woman has a knack, a TALENT, for dull, pretentious, left-wing screenplays.
Left-wing. Yes, well, obviously that is the primary characteristic she shares with Alex Cox, who's yet another frustrated baby-boomer who thinks that time should have stood still in 1969. Screw that. Western society had shot itself in the foot in that year, it was a horribly embarrassing year by any standard. So, basically, Cox is just like Terry Gilliam, the director of "Fear and Loathing" an "aging liberal douche bag" (a quote from "South Park") who worships 1969, drugs, Marx, those damn awful Beatniks, and anything that is even remotely anti-Capitalist.
If you listen to the Cox/Davies commentary, you'll hear arrogance just oozing out of them. Half of their commentary is politically loaded. Cox whines about the "New Socialism", which he sees as exemplified by Tony Blair, and which he defines as "Capitalism mixed in with some more Capitalism". That pretty much says it all about his intellect and grasp for reality. For Cox and Davies, Capitalism is the One Great Evil, the scourge of humanity. Never mind the fact that it is CAPITALIST companies that finance the bulk of his lousy anti-Capitalist movies. What a hypocrite. I love these rich, over-saturated, always-complaining Marxists who can NEVER seem to get over the fact that their beloved Communism failed in just about every country always carrying with it millions of corpses as a souvenir (and warning) to the next generations.
Cox even mentions the bombing of Serbia at one point. I am from Serbia, and I wasn't interested in his naïve critique of NATO, Clinton and Blair. Certainly, there is criticism to be made there, but I don't want to hear it from a Marxist. After all, Milosevic and his wife were Marxists, and they had caused the bombing in the first place. Could it be that Cox was opposed to the bombing more because it was directed against a commie regime? Would he have minded if they had bombarded Pinochet's Chile? That raging hypocrite knows the answer to that one.
It's no surprise that this sniveling ex-Blairite even uses Marxist terminology in his audio commentary. Vile.
Sorry about not delving more on the movie itself. But perhaps when Cox one day delivers a movie that doesn't BORE ME LIKE HELL I will not switch to the commentary. Like that'll ever happen
This is the man who brought us such "classics" as "Sid And Nancy" and "Repo Man". Cox even refers to himself as a "rock'n'roll film-maker" which is so pathetic, revealing not only (yet more) self-delusion but a whole new trait: unabashed immodesty. However, the pits was Cox trying to be funny with "silly voices" during the commentary. It was just as funny as the movie, namely zilch.
Which brings me to the question of genre. This is supposed to be a comedy! Trust me, whether you're right-wing or left-wing or apolitical, dumb or smart, black or white, you won't find ANYTHING funny or amusing here. It's just DULL. Cox says that the appearance of the desert "always gets a laugh among cinema-goers". He is a liar. The only people who ever laughed watching this malarkey are Davies and Cox in the commentary. Sad, really
6 out of 28 found this helpful.
Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink