FILM REVIEW: BAD WORDS

Guy Trilby (Jason Bateman) in Bad Words.

That Guy is fucking fucked up and shit

By John Esther

Floccinaucinihilipilification. A conglomeration of five Latin roots, floccinaucinihilipilification, a noun, is the longest non-technical word in the English language. As we learn from one angry mother (Rachael Harris) in the movie, Bad Words, it refers to something of little or worthless value. She applies the word to Guy Trilby (Jason Bateman, who also directs), the movie's protagonist. It certainly is an apropos description of the protagonist, but not the film itself, which has its merits. 

(On another track, the movie, Need for Speed, is a floccinaucinihilipilification.)

A 40-year-old genius, the bad Guy has decided to exploit a legal loophole in The Gold Quill national spelling bee, allowing him to be contestant. Thus, he will be competing against studious preteens for much needed prized money. This means the smart kids will be intimated, zealous parents will be outraged and the media will want to know the motivation behind Guy's actions.

But Guy could care less about whose feelings he hurts or what inquiring minds want to know. He is on a mission. If that means scarring a few precocious psyches in the process, so be it. In hindsight Guy may question his methods, but in the present, emotion gets the better of his intellect. He is going to win this wordy thing contest with a "Fuck you, motherfucker!" 

Meanwhile, the director of The National Quill, Dr. Bernice Deagan (Allison Janney) must find a way to eliminate Guy from the contest. Her reputation and the reputation of the competition are at stake.

Going against the grain of both Guy's destructive ways and the world that would like to pummel Guy into oblivion are Guy's sometimes sexual partner, the journalist Jenny (Kathryn Hahn actually looking like a journalist and not a movie star playing a journalist) and Chaitanya (Rohan Chand), a sweet-natured fellow contestant with a very stern father (Anjul Nigam). Jenny and Chaitanya try to befriend the misanthrope, although he insults them repeatedly, but it may, ultimately, be useless. Guy is one angry and cruel guy.

Jenny (Kathryn Hahn) in Bad Words.

 

Hardly a Spellbound-ing narrative, Bad Words does have its charms. There are some intelligent observations, as well as a soupcon of funny fecal, flatulent and fornication jokes. There are also some dumb ones, like one involving a lobster in the toilet or one about Bernice and a strap-on dildo.

A slightly superior theme in Bad Words is the underlying one about the importance of parents being involved in the lives of their children. Children may grow up, but that does not mean they will become mature or socially functioning adults. Abandon them at your own peril.

Now that is hardly the case with the parents of the contestants in Bad Words. These parents are trying to protect the interests of their darling spelling bee children. Sure many of these parents are stroking his or her own egos -- and Guy takes aim at some of those parents -- but there is also a pathos involved when you see the desperation of a parent wanting to see her or his kid win that vital prize money for college.

And if you have ever witnessed what it takes to win a spelling bee contest (see Spellbound), there is no doubt these kids train their brains to win.

Of course, Guy does not really care about the struggles of parenting or the pressures and labors these kids endure but, thanks to Andrew Dodge's script and the talented cast, enlightened viewers will.

 

FILM REVIEW: WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT KEVIN

Eva (Tilda Swinton) in We Need to Talk About Kevin.

The damned do not cry

By Don Simpson

Adapted from Lionel Shriver’s 2003 novel We Need to Talk About Kevin, writer-director Lynne Ramsay’s (Morvern Callar, Ratcatcher) film is about a miserable, budding young sociopath and his oh-so-oblivious parents. Told from Eva’s (Tilda Swinton) perspective, the fluidly non-linear narrative We Need to Talk About Kevin intertwines past and present, memory and inner-most thoughts.

If we were to reconstruct the narrative in a linear fashion, We Need to Talk About Kevin would begin with Eva’s happy marriage to Franklin (John C. Reilly). But then the spawn of Satan arrives and they name him Kevin (Rock Duer). From the moment Kevin exits Eva’s womb, the baby seems to hate her with fiery fervor. As Kevin develops into a young boy (Jasper Newell), the hatred continues to boil; he will not communicate with his mother and refuses to be potty trained. As a teenager (Ezra Miller), Kevin evolves into a fully fleshed-out sociopath as we witness his dead-eyed gaze, his utter contempt for others, and his apparent lack of guilt. Eva and Franklin idly observe as the demon spawn hones his archery skills. We can sense that Eva senses that something is wrong with Kevin, but she never tries to get help; Franklin, on the other hand, is embarrassingly clueless of the monster being raised under his roof.

Everything in Ramsay’s film is overtly orchestrated for the sole purpose of showcasing just how unruly Kevin is. We see scene after scene of Kevin acting out and are left with no other assumptions than he will develop into an evil teenager. (The non-linear narrative structure solidifies Kevin’s fate by revealing relatively early on that Kevin is presently in prison.) I kept hoping that this barrage of in-your-face clues were mere red herrings -- that Kevin would not turn out so bad after all. But Ramsay approaches We Need to Talk About Kevin as a heavy-handed diatribe about the ramifications of oblivious parenting. The title says it all, Eva and Franklin need to talk about Kevin and get him some help, but they never do. We Need to Talk About Kevin is about an accident waiting to happen; when said accident occurs, all we can do is sit back, wag our index fingers and shout “I told you so!”

Some people should just never have children — Eva and Franklin are caricatures of well-intentioned people who are just that, people who never should have had children. But then that line is a little bit blurry because their second child, Celia (Ashley Gerasimovich), seems like a perfectly sweet kid. The presence of Celia seems to suggest that the fault is not that of the parents, but that Kevin was born bad. Regardless, Eva and Franklin are totally responsible for not dealing with Kevin’s psychosis before he goes postal.

To date, there has not been a Tilda Swinton performance that has not sent near-crippling shivers down my spine.If any female actor of her generation can personify cold and creepy, it is her — and Swinton’s rapturous performance as Eva is no different. It might have been interesting to have someone in the role of Eva acting against their “type,” but I am certain that no one could have replicated Swinton’s performance. Also, all three Kevin’s are perfectly cast. Duer, Newell and Miller all look and act remarkably similar, lending the role of Kevin an uncanny sense of continuity over this 16-year timeline. (Another note of obvious casting decisions: Miller’s take on Kevin is remarkably similar to his dark and brooding portrayal of Elliot in Another Happy Day.)