11/14/06 Edmond

Edmond (2005), directed by Stuart Gordon

watched solo; DVD rental (Red Box) @ home

Do you ever mistakenly pick up a movie, or perhaps go to the theater to catch one, without truly realizing what it is you've just done? Say, you wanted to rent a film like "Dirty Dancing" with the logic that with a title like that (and you have no earthly idea about the plot at all...Ok, everyone must by now, but put yourself in 1987 and Patrick Swayze had yet to break hearts, unless you count "The Outsiders" or "Red Dawn"...Wolverines!) you were bound to learn a thing or two about the lambada from a yoga instructor or perhaps a naughty movie with some tittlating innuendo that the guys were gonna watch at the bachelor party. Well, were you so unfortunately mistaken! you had the pleasure of sitting through that ultimately cheesy and screaming-girl-fanatic inducing turd of a romantic drama...puke! Man, I can't even stomach the description of it. hey, nobody puts baby in the corner, and nobody is immune to choosing a movie that they thought they knew something about, only to have the truth sink in and their hopes & dreams crushed. I rented this one, seeing the name of David Mamet attached (thinking he was the director, and I love most of his directed/written films including "Glengarry Glen Ross," "The Untouchables," "The Spanish Prisoner," and "Oleanna" to name a few)...figuring it would be another one of his hard-hitting and gritty human dialogues that would be compelling and unnerving at the same time. It also had a cast of talented people, in what would seem to be a unique meshing of ensemble performances...including the titular William H. Macy, Julia Stiles, Joe Mantegna, Mena Suvari, and Bokeem Woodbine. What I got was a very distraught and disturbing tale of urban violence and commonplace horror that caught me off guard, but never really did much to prove to me it was a hard-hitting piece of work. Directed by the creative shock-horror guy Gordon ("Re-Animator"), the story is based off of the Mamet play, where unassuming businessman Edmond (Macy) heeds the ruminations of a fortune teller's Tarot card readings and begins to change his boring life. What he does next is taking that hazy advice to the extreme. Wanting nothing more than to experience the seedy underbelly of society and try in vain to "feel" something in his hollow existence...Edmond sabotages his marriage by walking out on his wife, then takes to the mean streets of the city to find solace in apathy. He visits bars, strip clubs, pawn shops, subways, low-budget theaters, churches and diners for someone to connect with an abandon (yet talk incessantly about his past). In this process, he begins to lose his identity and become a monster of his former self...resorting to racial slurs, outbursts, sexual deviancy and the ultimate violent act of murderous mayhem (in the form of Stiles' artsy but understanding waitress character) in getting his point across. All of his dark and twisted undertakings lead him on a downward spiral of epic proportions, and land him in his final place of jail...where once again he is forced into hellish confinement, sexual questioning and tempering of his violent nature. It's a very twisted tale, one that spirals around constantly, but never gets to the point. It's just a glorified way to watch violence in a steadily building manner. Granted, this artistic approach to a horror film where the lead character is at his wits' end and willing to take vigilante violence into his own philosophizing hands could have been done better...maybe "Falling Down" with Michael Douglas, but on an acid trip bender.

2 out of 5 stars