U-TURN
A film review by Steve Rhodes
Copyright 1997 Steve Rhodes
RATING (0 TO ****): ** 1/2
Oliver Stone, one of our most visceral directors, rarely makes anything but engaging films. He received Oscars for his hard-hitting PLATOON and BORN ON THE FOURTH OF JULY, but even his films like JFK, which are nothing less than balderdash, are fascinating and involving pieces of filmmaking. And when Stone tests our tolerance for violence, as in NATURAL BORN KILLERS, he can enrage an audience. Like him or hate him or both, his pictures are always in your face.
U-TURN can be argued to be one of Stone's most shocking films since it is shockingly mediocre. People are likely to leave the theater neither engaged nor enraged.
Although Stone may not operate on the edge in U-TURN, his Academy Award winning cinematographer Robert Richardson does. Every frame is oversaturated with grainy colors, and the images frequently jump as if filmed with a strobe light. His obsession with panning and zooming will have you ready to cry uncle before the end of the first reel. Combined with the choppy, overediting by Hank Corwin and Thomas J. Nordberg, the film takes on the nightmarish appearance of someone dying of a caffeine overdose.
The script by John Ridley, which is based on his book "Stray Dogs," relies on a stream of quirky characters to create his version of a black comedy. With Stone as the director, half of Hollywood shows up to take part. Liv Tyler, for example, has a cameo part that requires her to walk into a bus station to buy a ticket. Now, that's a part I could do.
The star of the film, and the only one worth seeing is Sean Penn. In recent times Penn's talent has become increasing evident. Here, as in this year's SHE'S SO LOVELY, he steals the show.
Penn, playing a not very successful gambler and crook named Bobby Cooper, arrives in a dusty, Godforsaken town in the middle of the Arizona desert. His car has a broken radiator hose, and the only mechanic is a dishonest simpleton named Darrell. Billy Bob Thornton plays Darrell with a face caked in grease like a cartoon character who just walked into an explosion and with teeth that looks like he's been eating dirt. Darrell flashes Bobby a smile that says "I am about to take you for everything you have since I'm your only hope of getting out of this hellhole." Penn later tells Bobby he is just "an ignorant, inbred, tumbleweed hick." But, Bobby saves his best insult for last. "Darrell," he asks. "40,000 people die every day. Why aren't you one of them?"
When Penn wanders into town to get a bite to eat, he meets a blind, part Indian, Vietnam veteran, overacted as almost a self-parody by Jon Voight. The blind man is the local philosopher whose aphorisms include, "Everything is everything." Is Voight really this far gone? Why does this once excellent actor only takes roles that are caricatures?
In this town, which would make a ghost town look appealing, Bobby runs into its only shining light, Jennifer Lopez in her sexiest part yet as Grace McKenna. After asking him up to her place to shower, her grizzled husband Jake, played by an almost unrecognizable Nick Nolte, walks in on them. Jake turns out to be a man with a highly malleable conscience. Or as he puts it, "a man with no ethics is a free man."
The rest of the show involves contradictory murder plots and ends in a typical Stone bloodbath. Along the way, we get to meet a host of other characters including Powers Boothe as the shifty-eyed sheriff, Claire Danes as the oversexed, local girl wanting to have Bobby's love child, Joaquin Phoenix as her violent boyfriend, Julie Hagerty as a cliched waitress named Flo and many others.
Penn saves the film, but just barely. His attempt to find sanity in this Twilight Zone of a town manages to rise above the rest of the all-too-cute material. A week after you have seen the show, only the film's bold, but repetitiously tiring cinematographic techniques will remain in your memory. Nothing else about the film is unusual enough to be remembered, and that is the tragedy. Has Stone gone soft?
U-TURN runs 2:05. It is rated R for gore, sex, brief nudity, and profanity. The film would be fine for older teenagers. For Penn's performance I give the film a mild recommendation and ** 1/2.
**** = A must see film. *** = Excellent show. Look for it. ** = Average movie. Kind of enjoyable. * = Poor show. Don't waste your money. 0 = Totally and painfully unbearable picture.
REVIEW WRITTEN ON: October 1, 1997
Opinions expressed are mine and not meant to reflect my employer's.
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