tabuno
05-15-2013, 02:36 PM
Director Don Coscarelli attempts to bring together several disparate movie elements that are difficult to blend successfully, including an overarching narrative of flashbacks that ultimately result in two definitive storylines, then incorporating various unusual out of this world experiences that supposedly the audience isn’t normally prepared for as well as a heavy dose of punk humor and younger generation nonchalance that is somewhat out of sink with the older set. This science fiction loaded conglomeration both surprises and at times shocks the audience with its out of the box visuals and plot points that veer significantly away from the mainstream story narrative. The lead character, Dave played by Chase Williamson, isn’t always the most endearing figure, who sometimes breaks the mold of the All-American hero, with his sometimes biting personality or over the top bewilderment. The script itself seems to be, at times, on hyper-amphetamine rush which in turns leads to some forced, manipulative dialogue thrown in for pseudo-intellectual-psycho-babble.
The action takes place with Dave being interviewed by a hack journalistic Paul Giamatti where a story unfolds about a mysterious live substance that once injected allows a person to experience pre-cognitive and other-worldly phenomena along with a plot to take over this world. The audience is offered up a Donnie Darko (2001) universe that departs from the more straightforward, linear storytelling that is much less mentally exhausting as in the classic, fascinating sci-fi fantasy of the totally immersive strange external and internal worlds of Brazil (1985) or Being John Malkovich (1999). In a way, John Dies At The End is both more conservative and boldly usually than Time Bandits (1981) that fling its protagonist from every more diverse worlds of time, but also more typical and straightforward settings and subplots. The visuals and the texture of this movie echoes emotive, visceral elements of A Scanner Darkly (2006), From Beyond (1986). Yet the movie doesn’t quite gel together in a rhythm and loftiness and dry humor as Slaughterhouse-Five (1972).
John Dies At The End could be considered a somewhat better executed technically Galaxy of Terror (1981), a darker sci fi movie that finds a group of spacer investigators encountering a mind-twisting horror on a far away planet that interestingly attempted to play it more straight than this movie. Other more mainstream sci-fi fantasy comparisons perhaps of somewhat better quality are Big Trouble in Little China (1986) with Kurt Russell playing the comic dumb hero and The Golden Child (1986) with Eddie Murphy playing an investigator in search of a mystical child in a comedy adventure. The most direct equivalent movie experiences that have achieved some cult status are David Cronenberg’s eXistenZ (1999) and The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension starring Peter Weller (1984) along with the more current noted director Terry Gilliam’s The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (2009), Heath Ledger’s last movie and from what I’ve read about Enter the Void (2009).
The action takes place with Dave being interviewed by a hack journalistic Paul Giamatti where a story unfolds about a mysterious live substance that once injected allows a person to experience pre-cognitive and other-worldly phenomena along with a plot to take over this world. The audience is offered up a Donnie Darko (2001) universe that departs from the more straightforward, linear storytelling that is much less mentally exhausting as in the classic, fascinating sci-fi fantasy of the totally immersive strange external and internal worlds of Brazil (1985) or Being John Malkovich (1999). In a way, John Dies At The End is both more conservative and boldly usually than Time Bandits (1981) that fling its protagonist from every more diverse worlds of time, but also more typical and straightforward settings and subplots. The visuals and the texture of this movie echoes emotive, visceral elements of A Scanner Darkly (2006), From Beyond (1986). Yet the movie doesn’t quite gel together in a rhythm and loftiness and dry humor as Slaughterhouse-Five (1972).
John Dies At The End could be considered a somewhat better executed technically Galaxy of Terror (1981), a darker sci fi movie that finds a group of spacer investigators encountering a mind-twisting horror on a far away planet that interestingly attempted to play it more straight than this movie. Other more mainstream sci-fi fantasy comparisons perhaps of somewhat better quality are Big Trouble in Little China (1986) with Kurt Russell playing the comic dumb hero and The Golden Child (1986) with Eddie Murphy playing an investigator in search of a mystical child in a comedy adventure. The most direct equivalent movie experiences that have achieved some cult status are David Cronenberg’s eXistenZ (1999) and The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension starring Peter Weller (1984) along with the more current noted director Terry Gilliam’s The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (2009), Heath Ledger’s last movie and from what I’ve read about Enter the Void (2009).