I love when movies mix genres. I love it in, say, Barton Fink or Rosemary's Baby. I love when a story seems to be going in one specific direction, then takes a sharp turn to reveal a whole other game being played, as in a picture like Psycho. It is the hardest thing to do in cinema, but I cite these examples because the artists behind them were GENIUSES.
Kevin Smith, a wonderful public speaker and genuinely fun guy, has yet to master the basics of movie making. For him to attempt to try and swim in this deep end of storytelling is, if you are polite, noble, but as a paying moviegoer it is risible.
Red State begins with three coarse high schoolers looking to get laid based on an Internet "sure thing." Actually, no, that isn't how the movie starts. The movie starts with one of a series of facile speeches ripped straight from a community college civics textbook. Indeed, this first one is actually in a schoolroom! Here we learn that we must support free speech, even if the Fred Phelps-ish anti-gay preacher that lives one town over is horrible.
Guess what? That hookup the three vulgar, unfunny boys are gonna' make happens to live IN THAT SAME TOWN!
I suppose these kids were too busy trying to score and they never saw Hostel or Frontier(s) because they wind up drugged, kidnapped, tied up and . . .SUBJECTED TO MORE SPEECHES.
For what, I swear, is over ten minutes we get to hear well-hammed fire and brimstone bible-thumping from Michael Parks' Pastor Cooper. Then, some violence. After some inelegant jump cutting and the same drop-frame shooting style you see in every horror pic and/or Acura commercial, our story switches to John Goodman.
He works for the ATF and we learn that Cooper's church is about to go down. We learn this by hearing. . .ANOTHER SPEECH.
For pages and pages Smith decides to tell not show, as Goodman monologues. Luckily, he's got a bluetooth earpiece, so he doesn't look completely crazy.
The ATF raids the compound and a Waco-like situation is in play. Goodman receives brutal orders and the thesis of the film is made loud and frickin' clear. Extremism, in defense of liberty, IS a vice - and the United States Government is an addict.
Woah. Heavy? No. Because the movie is hollow and false.
Michael Parks is creepy, but it is a cartoon. Dozens of periphery characters float in, voice a platitude, then disappear. One or two of them are recognizable (Kevin Pollack has, I believe, three lines) which is just enough to shake you out of any spell the movie provides.
There's a big action climax, then plenty more talking to draw out the denouement.
If you can't tell by my tone, I'm not a fan. However, I hesitate to call it a complete failure. Beneath the jackhammered dialogue are some interesting concepts. Smith will always be a good idea man. There are simply too many problems with table stakes like original, likable or believable characters or realistic plotting to give this one a pass.
Smith conquered Sundance all week, though. He made it near-impossible for press to get into the screening, organized protests and used the pulpit to announce his decision to self-distribute his film. He used the media well, but for me he made an error bringing Red State to Sundance. To see it back to back with terrific films like Project Nim, Meek's Cutoff, Win Win, My Idiot Brother, Shut Up Little Man and The Salesman just made Smith's film even limper.
