SLING BLADE
[Spoilers]
A film review by Jun Yan
Copyright 1997 Jun Yan
I still can't help the chuckles when I see the TV commercials for this movie. It portraits the main character Karl Childers as a "hero" and makes the movie appear like Forrest Gump, while it is exactly the opposite of Forrest Gump and a less expensive, but far more complex creation.
The film opens as a high school newspapers reporter interviews Karl Childers (played by Billy Bob Thornton), a mentally retarded man who has been kept in State mental institute for 25 years for killing his mother and her lover when they were having an affair. He was then 12 and slaughtered them in a rage with a sling blade. Here Thornton gives an expressionless yet intense performance with the strange speech patthern and facial composure that reveals nothing inside him except a few twitches of the eyebrow. The lighting was especially dim, which, I imagine, implies the dark nature of the whole film.
Soon after the interview Karl is released from the hospital and returns to the small town where he was born and raised. The film goes to great detail to describe his status unfit for the world outside of him. For some unexplained reason, Karl refuses to go back to his father, who has been living in the same town all these years. The point is raised and dismissed quickly. The good-hearted hospital administrator goes through the trouble to arrange a job at local mechanics for Karl. Karl also makes friend with a boy Frank (played by Lucas Black), who likes him so much that he persuades his mother to let Karl stay in their garage.
The fatherless Frank and Karl develop an unusual affection for each other. The similar intelligence make them friends and the difference in age kind of turns Karl into a father figure for Frank. The two have several scenes talking to each other about their past and present that are terribly touching and well-performed. The repetition is a little obvious here, but the mood created by the director and the dialogue make up for it.
Frank's trouble lies in his mother Linda (played by Natalie Canerday)'s boyfriend Doyle (played by country singer Dwight Yoakam), a "white trash" who is abusive and unstable. Doyle and Frank's conflict is obvious from the very beginning. The tension grows and leads to a "predictable" ending.
As the writer, director and actor of this film, Billy Bob Thornton has done a quite amazingly good job, but I have to say it's his writing that's the BEST. Everything seems quite obvious and predictable at first, but there is always an uneasiness underneath it, and the more I think of it, the more I realize it's not the case at all. First, the town looks like such a typical southern small town, in which everyone's nice and kind. Despite of Karl's homocidal past, the mechanical shop owner hires him immediately and even buys him lunch. Linda quickly allows Karl moving in even though she's a widow living with a child. The unalarming southern accent carefully plays on our bias trained by the stereotypes that the rural people are simple-minded and good-hearted. Quietly, the movie slips in messages that are not that pleasant. First it's Linda's boss (played wonderfully by John Ritter) who is a good man, but under a great deal of hostility because he's gay. Then, there is Doyle, who is obviously a very unlikable red-neck, who drinks, talks dirty, verbally abusive and treats children badly (that's a big sign for "villain"). For some strange reasons, Linda still stick with him even though she doesn't fit the pattern of "low self-esteem" at all.
The film reveals more and more disturbing facts as the story unfolds: Frank tells Karl that his father committed suicide because he lost his job and was ashamed of not able to provide for his family; the John Ritter character says to Karl that his family are "very mean and unkind people" and the way he says it makes me wonder; Doyle behaves violently after getting drunk on a party and a big fight breaks out among Linda, Doyle and Frank; the anger and violent tendency displayed by Frank is alarming and disturbing. But the most unusual scene is when Karl goes back to his old house and visits his father (played by Robert Duvall). We see a terribly deserted house in which the old man sits in the couch almost motionless amongst the garbage (I could almost smell the disgusting house) not much better than a corpes. Karl says, "I'm your boy." Yet, the father insists monotonously, "I ain't got no boy." Karl delivers perhaps the most revealing lines in the whole film: "I have studies the Bible a lot. The things Mama and you taught me ain't in there." (not exact words) On screen for only several minutes, Robert Duvall's character is probably the most pathetic creature on screen I've seen. Given extremely limited information, we can only glimpse into Karl's childhood with twisted parental guidance and great psychological damage. When he was about 6 years old, his mother had a premature baby boy. Because they didn't want it, Karl was told to throw it in the dumpster even though it was alive.
It was the horror reflected in the present state of Karl that takes me aback and makes me question just how normal is such a small town's life. Suddenly I'm reminded of something said by Shelock Holmes that even the filthiest gutter in big cities cannot hide evil as effectively as romote countryside. And no one in the film seems that normal anymore.
This movie has some characteristics of Billy Bob Thornton's style displayed previously in "One False Move" which he cowrote. One is the subtle emphasis on the characters' dark, secret past that affect their present life and the deep, complex nature of human psychology and motivation. Why does one choose to do what he does? The ultimate question here is: why does Karl kill Doyle? To prevent Doyle hurting Frank and Linda? To prevent Frank's rage turns the boy into another Karl? Does he think because he has killed before and is doomed to go to hell, he can kill again for the boy's benefit? There are also other questions just as puzzling and the writer gives no obvious answer: Why does Linda continue an obviously unhappy relationship with a guy like Doyle and even decides to marry him? Just how retarded is Karl? He carefully calculates the murder of Doyle and prepares it with the precision of a mad man, but certainly not a retarded man. What's the significance of religion to these people? Karl gets himself baptised, indicating his willingness to "be good," then why did he choose killing that he KNOWS will bring him to hell?
Another strength of this film is the characters. Like "One False Move" but even more ambiguously, he establishes complicated peripheral characters as well as the central one Karl. They seem to fit into certain formulas but then they really don't. Is Doyle the bad guy? He's not unaware of his offensive talk and behavior. He appears quite smart and manipulative with words. He establishes dominance skillfully with threats. He's also a coward easily bent under power. You can see clearly that he's constantly testing other people's limit to tolerate him and accept his control. Is he violent? He certainly appears to be with unstable mood and acts, but if you look carefully, he didn't really beat up anyone except pushing Linda once. However, the viewers always get the impression that he's dangerous, partly due to his unpredictability. Is Karl the good guy? He kills Doyle is such a cold-bloodly fashion that one has to question his sanity and morality. Maybe there is no answer to good and evil, only the unsolved mystery of human behavior.
Nothing is what you see and what it appears to be. This film is full of twists and turns and irony. Many cliches are presented in a familiar but slightly different way that produce a completely troubling response. The feelings are strange, yet strangly natural and genuine. It's a very dark and disturbing study of psychological issue while providing numerous comical scenes and dialogues. I'm totally at awe with Thornton's writing, which the more you dig, the more unexpected meanings you find. The casting is also rather weird, but very effective. The directing is successful in creating mood and style that affect the audience, while some parts can be improved. I have a feeling that Thornton did not intend to create a masterpiece and make it grand and perfect. The dialogue is unsurpassed by any film I saw last year.
Therefore, I strongly recommend it. I give it an A.
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