2011 9
Red State
Kevin Smith’s new effort is one of the most controversial and talked- about films of the year already- and it hasn’t even been widely released yet. It signifies a turn from comedy to horror / suspense (something that he’s never attempted before) and a radical (and rather confusing) method of marketing. Basically, in the Sundance Film Festival Premere, Smith offered to organise an auction and sell the distribution rights to the highest bidder, but then decided to self- distribute the movie instead- a move that was considered by many to be a cheap publicity stunt.
And then there’s the subject matter. Red State starts with three horny teenagers from the country, who arrange to have a threesome with an unknown woman through an online sex site. They drive to her trailer, drink some beer, pass out and wake up in cages. Turns out that the woman (Melissa Leo) is in fact part of the fundamentalist Five Points Church, whose pastor, Abin Cooper (Michael Parks) believes in eternal damnation for homosexuals and other deviants. The preacher dude lives with his flock and their children in a fortified church / militia compound, with plenty of guns and ammo and they are in the habit of executing sinners during their sermons. Pretty soon, the situation escalates, as ATF agents (led by John Goodman) show up with orders to shoot first and ask questions later. The boys are screwed.
I am a big Kevin Smith fan. At his best (eg. Chasing Amy), he makes movies that are vibrant, honest and hilarious. Red State however, is an ambitious disaster that fails on several levels.
It’s pretty obvious from the premise, that the story is “ripped from the headlines”. Abin Cooper and The Church of Five Points are a more extreme version of pastor Fred Phelps and his despicable followers in The Westboro Baptist Church- the bunch of religious zealots who protest funerals of homosexuals, teach their children that GOD HATES FAGS and preach that America is going to Hell. I was worried that Smith would make them into charicatures. In fact, mostly due to a fantastic performance by Leo and the great Michael Parks (who makes Cooper a charismatic- if completely bugfuck insane leader), Smith avoids that cliche. In fact, the real- life scumbags of the Westboro Church usually come across as a lot more cartoonish in the media.
Where the movie starts to fall apart though, is with the inclusion of the authorities and the Waco- style siege that follows. John Goodman is fantastic (and the only sympathetic character here), but the plot quickly veers off into implaussibility. The ATF superiors come across as mustache- twirling villains who give orders to kill everyone in the compound (including the children), pretty much immediatelly. I really don’t want to sound like a pawn of the establishment or anything here, but this is fucking stupid. In a post- Waco world, you would expect the cops to come up with- I dunno- a negotiator, before trying to execute everyone.
At the end of the state, Red State isn’t really a horror film. In fact, it isn’t particularly gory. It uses the tropes of Hostel and the like to give Smith a soapbox for his views on church and state. However, he does it so clumsily that the film buckles from the weight of all the preaching. Ironically, I agree with most of Smith’s points, but I found Red State to be dull and almost condescending, in a way that Dogma for example, wasn’t.
PS: Oh and what is it with all the computer- generated bullet holes in films these days? When someone gets shot in the movies, I want to see BLOOD, not unconvinsing red pixels.
(-Dimitris Kontogiannis-)
About the Author: CnB
on “Red State”