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 Every
once in a while, there’s nothing like a challenging film to screw
with your brain, stimulate good conversation, and make you think
long and hard about it once your popcorn-induced nausea has finally
subsided. These are films that break so far from the traditional,
non-linear approach to storytelling that you may even have to
see them again to make sure that all the pieces of the puzzle
fit together.
That
was certainly the case with recent brain-busters like 2000’s ingenious
murder-mystery-in-reverse Memento, Spike Jonze’s bizarre
1999 head trip Being John Malkovich and his multi-layered
2002 follow-up Adaptation. Director Michel Gondry also
gave us a doozie in last March’s trippy love story Eternal
Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, which is turning out to be
one of the year’s best movies.
I
wish I could say the same thing about I Heart Huckabees.
This so-called “existential comedy” from director David O. Russell
(whose last film, the anti-war satire Three Kings, ranks
as one of the best films of the 90’s) is more pretentious than
provocative and not nearly as clever as it aims to be. It’s not
so much a puzzle as it is just plain puzzling, and despite the
presence of an impressive cast and some genuinely funny moments,
the film’s intellectual ambitions are far too overbearing for
it to resonate on an emotional level.
Sparked
by a series of nagging coincidences, environmentalist Albert Markovski
(Jason Schwartzman) begins to question the meaning of his life.
He seeks the help of Bernard (Dustin Hoffman) and Vivian (Lily
Tomlin), a married pair of detectives who help their clients by
probing the innermost core of their existence. During their investigation,
they also discover a slew of conflicts involving Brad (Jude Law),
a top-level executive at the Huckabees department store, Dawn
(Naomi Watts), the sexy blonde Huckabees spokeswoman, and Tommy
(Mark Wahlberg), a tough firefighter with a heart of gold. What
starts off as a not-so-simple question ends up in total chaos,
as all involved seek the solution to one of life’s biggest mysteries.
Where
Three Kings was a timely, provocative and groundbreaking
visual feast that ran a gamut of emotions, I Heart Huckabees
represents David O. Russell’s return to the smaller, quirky, offbeat
nature of his first two films, Spanking the Monkey and
Flirting with Disaster. But while Russell seems to be
attempting to blend his earlier style with that of modern-day
mavericks like Jonze, Gondry and Alexander Payne (Election,
About Schmidt), he over-reaches in a big way with an intellectual
assault that’s more off-putting than engaging. It’s one thing
to be challenged by the structure of a film, but it’s another
thing to be bombarded by incomprehensible dialogue that’s way
over your head.
Though
you have to wonder if they had any idea what they were saying,
Russell still manages to get some fine performances out of his
cast. Dustin Hoffman and Lily Tomlin are just as charming together
as you’d expect them to be, while Jude Law and Naomi Watts display
convincing American accents and demonstrate some range by venturing
into quirky comedy for the first time. Jason Schwartzman seems
right at home in an offbeat film like this, but Mark Wahlberg
steals the show as an uncompromising, yet environmentally sensitive
firefighter.
Where
Russell was right on target with Three Kings, he overshoots
his mark with I Heart Huckabees. That’s too bad, because
even though it asks big questions that everyone can relate to,
it goes about answering them in ways that few will understand.
And even though it’s bound to generate critical plaudits from
frauds who are afraid to admit that they didn’t quite get it,
this is one challenging, polarizing, puzzling movie that I have
no desire to see again and put together.
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