The Vicious Kind

Ben said the rule is we have to write at least a sentence about every movie we watch. You may want to change that rule, because as you guys will soon come to find out, I unfortunately watch a lot of terrible indie movies in a quest to find the really good ones. To be honest, my constant viewing of indies (crappy or otherwise) is just flat-out masochistic, really, because they always make me depressed and bitter. And now you guys get to enjoy my commentary on them. I can tell you're excited. I promise I'll try to consolidate into a roundup type of post in the future to help contain the pain.

That being said, tonight's indie of choice was The Vicious Kind. I don't know if you've seen it, since I haven't been able to catch up on your entire blog archives yet. I mostly chose it because Netflix thought I'd give it 4/5 stars, and also because it stars Adam Scott with a beard, and I had never seen him with a beard before. (Aren't you guys glad you invited a girl into the club?!)

I just really was not thrilled by it. The plot pretty much centers around this guy who got his heart broken a long time ago and is still unable to get over his ex -- which is fairly standard as far as indies go. (As a side note, I'm getting really tired of that storyline, in movies and in real life, which is why I haven't watched Harmony and Me yet -- did any of you guys see that one? However, I will say that 500 Days of Summer is an excellent example of that storyline at its best.) I don't think in the end they were able to decide what movie they wanted it to be, so they just went for everything. It was a mashup of some of the worst indie plotlines there are (and this is coming from a lover of the indie). Filial strife, crazy sex trysts (there were some steamy scenes, I will give them that), weird camera angles, flashbacks, revenge, mistaken identity, infidelity, cancer, death, drug and alcohol abuse, bowling... you name it, it was in the movie. It was like an indie designed by committee.

There were some shots and scenes I liked, especially the silent dream sequence, the shot at the end where the faces of the son and the dad were overlaid in the screen door, and the scene with the hooker in the hotel room. (Oh wait I'm sorry, did I not mention there was a hooker too? Yep.) I also liked that although there was a shotgun in the movie, the father and sons weren't going around shooting each other in the head, because it crossed my mind that having all the main characters die might have been just the insane Shakespearean twist the indie film committee had in mind.

Did you guys see it? If so, do you disagree with me? It's possible I might just be tired, or jaded after having seen about 1800 indie movies recently. Or maybe I'm just missing something altogether. I get what they were trying to do, I just was not impressed with the execution.

Right now I'm just glad to have a first real post over with so I can cut the suspense and find out if you guys are going to just kick me out immediately or if you'll wait til my 100th review of an indie movie. Looking forward to getting caught up on your blogs!