| Willard |
| copyright 2003 |
| I'm actually reviewing a movie currently in theaters? I'm turning into Roger Ebert. All that's left is for me to gain 100 pounds, get a big gay red pair of Orville Reddenbacher eyeglasses, marry a black woman and start liking piece of shit movies like Last Tango in Paris. On with the review. Crispin Glover is a weird motherfucker. He really is a goofy son of a bitch, so even though it seems he's acting way over the top, you get the feeling he's not acting at all. He's definitely got some sort of disorder, synapses aren't firing or whatever, and it makes more sense for him to be in a rubber room than acting in front of a camera. Willard gets shit on the whole movie by his boss, but how sympathetic am I supposed to be? He shows up to work half an hour late every day. He deserves to get yelled at. The boss is R. Lee Ermey from Full Metal Jacket. It was good seeing him throw out some more vulgarities in an authority role. If Crispin Glover is the definition for social misfit weirdo, then Ermey is the definition for over the top, but in a good way. Anyway, he will get his comeuppance from Willard's army of rats. The other supporting character is the hot brunette from Mulholland Drive. Unfortunately in this film, she doesn't have a lesbian sex scene. But she develops a crush on our goth kid protagonist, which leads me to believe she's a real freak in bed. Why else would she want to hook up with a tall, skinny, creepy looking goon that can't speak a sentence without saying "um" fourteen times? Does she like him because he gets yelled at the entire movie? She gets off on knowing she could dominate him? It's too bad there was no scene on a beach so Crispin could get sand kicked in his face by a bully. She would've gotten out the flavored condoms and body oils and taken him right there. The movie isn't especially terrible. It just doesn't work. As a horror film, it isn't the least bit scary. There is not one genuine moment of horror in the film. The rats don't really do much damage to anyone until the final minutes, and by then it isn't worth it. If rats slashing your tires or eating your drywall scares you, by all means, check out this movie. There is one scene where they kill a cat, but it is played for laughs with Michael Jackson's "Ben" in the background. As a comedy, the movie occasionally works. There are plenty of funny moments, whether it be a rat stuck on a glue trap, the enormous muskrat they used to play Ben, the aformentioned cat death, or Crispin Glover blowing a snot bomb. But the humor isn't satisfying all on it's own. The film is very stylish and well directed, like a Tim Burton movie, but doesn't deliver on enough fronts for one to walk away satisfied. The film really is best as a study of the insanity of Crispin Glover. Despite me slamming him in the first paragraph of this review, he really is interesting to watch, kind of like an Amtrack derailment or an episode of Ricki Lake. Glover gives this movie a quirkiness that makes its badness almost acceptable. Unfortunately, 90 minutes of him talking to rats is a bit much. |
| 1 out of 5. Lower your expectations for the killer rats and focus on Crispin's oddball antics. Hmm, on second thought, just rent Back to the Future and watch Crispin say the best line in movie history, "Hey you, get your damn hands off her!" |
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