I watched Kevin Smith's most recent horror-comedy hybrid
"Tusk" and if I had to boil it down to three words, I'd have to
carefully choose bizarre, awkward, and unnerving. I've always considered myself a Kevin Smith
fan and decided to ignore the low ratings and negative reviews. I'm still trying to figure out whether or not
I liked it. Justin Long plays Wallace,
the ill-fated protagonist who finds himself taken prisoner by Howard Howe,
played by Michael Parks, a solitary lunatic with an unhealthy obsession with a
walrus he encountered as a younger man.
As a result he seeks to transform his unfortunate houseguest into a
walrus by surgically stitching him into a realistic body suit. The story is grotesquely tragic as we watch a
seemingly innocent human being getting broken down and rebuild into a lesser
and pathetic creature. "Tusk"
is dismal and disturbing at some points, but awkward at others. According to the basic rules of storytelling,
I understand where my sympathies should lie, but it kind of becomes ambiguous
as we learn more about both the Wallace and Howard.
(Beware of spoilers from this point on)
Through a series of expository flashbacks Wallace is
revealed to be an asshole to his somewhat gullible girlfriend (played by
Genesis Rodriguez) while Howard narrates his own sordid history to his
victim/personal science project. Should
I feel sorry for Wallace for becoming ensnared in a horrifically
life-threatening situation or Howard for living a live of abuse and
degradation? Haley Joel Osment co-stars
as Teddy, Wallace's best friend who is set up as a lying and conniving
backstabber trying to sleep with Wallace's girlfriend while he's away in search
of an intriguing interview for their podcast.
In reality, he's the understanding best friend who comforts a paranoid
and self-depricating young woman whose boyfriend is allegedly cheating with
podcast groupies. Johnny Depp plays the
only character you can really be sure is on the straight and narrow as Guy Lepointe,
a detective on the trail of a malicious killer who leaves dismembered and
mutilated bodies all over Canada.
Arguably, Depp's performance is the only source of comedic relief
breaking up the dismal horror sequences.
The premise of the story is far-fetched and absurd. The idea of a man being surgically turned
into a walrus is laughable and even lends itself to wacky hijinks worthy of
Kevin Smith's style of writing. The
movie begins light and fluffy but takes an abrupt turn for the worst when the
story ceases to be humorous and becomes a caricature of a Hitchcock film.
In case you’re wondering, that caricature crack isn’t
intended to be an insult. I thought the
story was well written. The comedic
interjections worked to break up the monotony and the bizarre circumstance of a
man being transformed into a walrus. If anything, it’s the ridiculousness of
that concept that hurts the story, even though I thing Justin Long and Haley
Joel Osment are equally irritating and incredibly miscast. They really don’t act; rather they simply do
what the director tells them to do in order to get through the scene. Michael Parks and Johnny Depp, on the other
hand, are very entertaining as the demented old psychopath and the eccentric
French-Canadian prefect of police.
They’re characters make the movie worth watching for their performances
alone, thought they feel like they should be featured in completely different
movies.
I know I didn’t hate “Tusk”, but I’m also not sure that I
liked it. It’s hardtop pin down in
either realm of horror or comedy, mostly due to the absurdity of turning a man
into a walrus.
“Tusk” is intended to be the first of a series by Kevin
Smith entitled the “True North Trilogy” featuring the return of Depp’s
character and following two teenaged girls with super powers and a rampaging
killer moose.
I’ll probably watch the next two films in the series just to
satisfy my curiosity of what Kevin Smith has up his sleeve next. I mean, he’s Kevin Smith for Christ’s
sake. Many of the reviews about “Tusk”
maybe unfavorable but at least he’s stepping outside the realm of conventional
storytelling to give us something out there and semi-original.
I’m not saying you’ll like “Tusk” but I am saying you should
give it a shot. It’s new, different, and
unique. I haven’t seen a movie this out
there since I’ve seen (INSERT ANY DAVID LYNCH MOVIE HERE).
