Dismissing this as a stoner movie is lazy. Not because the film isn’t geared towards a particular audience—say, someone my age who watches the show religiously every weekend—but because any attempt at injecting purpose or intent into this manic, blurred world goes against the entire idea. Our heroes are an anthropomorphic fast-food menu—a sleeve of French fries, a milkshake, a ball of hairy meat—and they’re barely heroes at all. They are vulgar, violent, insecure, hedonistic, controlling, and stupid. In fact, the world in which they live is populated by only vulgar, violent, insecure, hedonistic, controlling, stupid individuals. There is the diapered spider, condemned to rap in Hell, who must return to earth as a poo-sucking fly and is promptly swatted. There is the Cybernetic Ghost of Christmas Past from the Future, a dog-like robot predisposed to telling pointless stories and humping almost anything. There is Carl, the dispensable neighbor who wears tight pants and loves porn. The entire plot, beginning with an escape from the Sphinx and continuing through a chance meeting with a very crass Abraham Lincoln—who, it should be noted, can disappear at will and is gunned down by trigger-happy CIA agents—mocks everything about big-budget action films. The flashbacks, the surprise twist, the character’s search for identity, the repeated use of Phil Collins’ “In the Air Tonight,” all surrounded by pixilated aliens, a rampant disco-powered exercise machine, and Neil Pert, should be a clear hint that, sometimes, a ten-foot talking bean burrito is just that.
by Adam Balz | Source: DTV
12 Sep 2007 9:46 AM | Submit Comment
