WILD THINGS
A Film Review by Fernando Vallejo
_________________________________________________________
RATING (OUT OF ****): * 1/2
The recent onslaught of film noir that has popped up in multiplexes, with everything ranging from "L.A. Confidential" to "Palmetto" to "The Big Lebowski," has proved to be an artistic commodity for veteran, talented directors. With this particular genre, directors are able to collate the sleazy underworld of the lower-class and the glamorous, opulent upper-class, while maintaining the noirish, ambiguous ambience, the staple of film noir.
"Wild Things" could be classified as a black comedy, a sultry film noir or a plain ol' erotic thriller, but the one category it doesn't qualify for is that of a quality motion picture. Overacted, overwrought and overlong, "Wild Things" is a confused mess, a movie that wants to have its cake and eat it too. With its incalculable twists, turns, more twists and more turns, it soon becomes a tedious exercise in pointlessness. In spite of game efforts by Kevin Bacon and Matt Dillon, who manage to sustain straight faces throughout the ordeal, "Wild Things" not once jells in its eroticism, unpredictability, character motivation, sense of the world, plot, etc. There's not one redeeming quality in the picture that is not technical.
Directed by John McNaughton ("Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer"), "Wild Things" follows Sam Lombardo (Matt Dillon), a hunkish, suburban Florida high school teacher who's the dream of every spruced up female in the community. Particularly one. Kelly Van Ryan (Denise Richards) adores him to such extent that she offers to wash his Jeep with a partner. Soon, her tiny shorts are soaked and tells the other girl to take a hike, enabling her to come into his house. Next thing, she cries rape. And the so-called "roller-coaster ride" ensues.
A second accuser comes front, Suzie Toller (Neve Campbell), a booze-drinkin', tattooed piece of trailer trash that charges Lombardo of sexually molesting her, virtually guaranteeing a trial where preposterous confessions, asinine occurrences and laughable courtroom procedures are bound to happen. Even Bill Murray gets into the act as Lombardo's zany lawyer. He wears a fake neck- brace, waves the finger at the other client and infuses the script with some Billy Murray. You can tell McNaughton knew he had nothing to lose assigning Murray to this role. As ridiculous as it sounds, he's the most sane character in the movie.
The community is astonished. Reporters flee to the scene. There's an 8.5-million settlement for a libel suit against Kelly's mother (Theresa Russell). There's the ambiguous cop (Kevin Bacon, who also executive produced) who sniffs something iffy in this concoction of deceit, murder and lust. We, the audience, sniff something not so lustful.
Like so many thrillers these days, including "The Usual Suspects" and "The Game," "Wild Things" eschews character for plot. McNaughton knows how to handle the camera, and he keeps the campy fillings of the script flowing with workmanlike ease, as if he knows the territory he's covering is a harmless appetizer to accompany "Henry," a furious, unsettling film directorial tour- de-force. George Clinton's score is a delight to behold. But it's the humans. The characters are mere devices for the "nasty" twists. What writer Stephen Peters does not grasp is this becomes tediously uninvolving, almost unbearable, if those who inhibit this twisted world are not interesting, don't feel real or we don't care for them. Not even the unintentionally funny moments work. The people in "Wild Things" are not so much people as they are caricatures.
Then there's the erotic content, which nearly earned the film an NC-17, for a sexless, badly edited, poorly lit menage-a-trois. And in what has to be one of the most flabbergastingly inept scenes that has graced this country, Kevin Bacon's member makes a cameo appearance with ten minutes to go. Ironically, the wildest elements of "Wild Things" are not wild at all.
(c) Fernando Vallejo 1998
IcyFascist@aol.com
The review above was posted to the
rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup (de.rec.film.kritiken for German reviews).
The Internet Movie Database accepts no responsibility for the contents of the
review and has no editorial control. Unless stated otherwise, the copyright
belongs to the author.
Please direct comments/criticisms of the review to relevant newsgroups.
Broken URLs inthe reviews are the responsibility of the author.
The formatting of the review is likely to differ from the original due
to ASCII to HTML conversion.
Related links: index of all rec.arts.movies.reviews reviews