Film ReviewsMoonwalkersMay 5, 2016 Anchorage Press
|
|
If viewers disarm themselves of expectations but keep in mind references to decades past, then Moonwalkers will provide entertainment and few LOL moments. Ben Chessell's Moonwalkers is an absurd comedy that pokes fun at the conspiracy theories (or facts?) of the 1969 Apollo 11 moon landing mission. The movie stars Ron Perlman as a CIA agent suffering from PTSD who is tasked with cutting a secret deal with Stanley Kubrick to shoot a fake moon landing just in case the real moon landing doesn't happen. As one would expect, this hardly goes smoothly.
Moonwalkers has a very talented cast, starting, of course, with Perlman who has made all kinds of movies, and TV series from the late '70s on, including the avant-garde City of Lost Children, Hellboy and many more. His corpulent physique and larger than life physiognomy make him a recognizable and unmistakable actor. The CIA agent character fits him like glove, showing off his largess and understated elegance; even when he's shooting someone point blank in the face or punching someone to a pulp, he never loses composure. As the agent struggles with anxiety attacks and hallucinations of victims of the Vietnam War, he loses focus on his film target and thus gets conned by a washed-out band manager, Johnny (Rupert Grint) and his high-as-a-kite sidekick, Leon (Robert Sheehan). The thin plot line unravels from that point and turns into a buddy movie after all.
There are a handful of interesting thoughts that occur to one either about, or because of, Moonwalkers . The aesthetics of popular culture that shift from decade to decade are among these, as is contemporary culture's obsession with resurrecting the previous decades. Is it the "mainstream" is not as mainstream as it used to be when individuals relied on a predominant highway of information? Today mainstream is diffused and fluctuates as it is filtered by a wide array of media. Sure TV is still a main arbiter of information-but it's no longer dominated by the handful of major networks, now there are hundreds of channels to choose from. When one scans the internet horizon, the number of information outlets grows exponentially. What does that do to the concept of "mainstream?" Perhaps when thinking about mainstream culture in the 21st century, one discovers that there is no "there" there. That may explain the need for contemporary art, music, fashion, and in this case film and television to search for a connection to the past, when there was a "there" there, if nothing else, in retrospect. Think of the wave of nostalgic films and TV shows that have obsessed over the collective groovy past; That '70's Show, American Hustle and The Virgin Suicides to name a few. Even the '80s and '90s are retro now. Moonwalkers idealizes the late '60s-early '70s and tries very hard to make it sexy fun. The opening credits are fantastic, like a modern walkabout though The Yellow Submarine. The music is exceptional and reason alone to watch this film.
A phenomenon that has emerged in movie history is that of B films. All B films are bad films, but not all bad films are B films. B films persist despite their low budget, bad lines, or shitty quality; they persist because something about them appeals to viewers, it's that je ne sais quoi that keeps viewers coming back. The thing with B movies is that they can't really be made as B movies-it seems that they just happen. The problem with Moonwalkers is that it appears that Chessell was trying really hard to make a funny B movie and sometimes his efforts feel forced. At other times, however, there are moments so contrived that they actually work and they're just outright funny and absurd. There is a sensibility in Moonwalkers similar to that of This is Spinal Tap-if the latter were on acid-but in addition to that, Moonwalkers is doused in pulp violence so extreme that it can't be taken seriously, which is a good thing.
Moonwalkers shows at Bear Tooth on Monday, May 9 at 8 p.m.
Moonwalkers has a very talented cast, starting, of course, with Perlman who has made all kinds of movies, and TV series from the late '70s on, including the avant-garde City of Lost Children, Hellboy and many more. His corpulent physique and larger than life physiognomy make him a recognizable and unmistakable actor. The CIA agent character fits him like glove, showing off his largess and understated elegance; even when he's shooting someone point blank in the face or punching someone to a pulp, he never loses composure. As the agent struggles with anxiety attacks and hallucinations of victims of the Vietnam War, he loses focus on his film target and thus gets conned by a washed-out band manager, Johnny (Rupert Grint) and his high-as-a-kite sidekick, Leon (Robert Sheehan). The thin plot line unravels from that point and turns into a buddy movie after all.
There are a handful of interesting thoughts that occur to one either about, or because of, Moonwalkers . The aesthetics of popular culture that shift from decade to decade are among these, as is contemporary culture's obsession with resurrecting the previous decades. Is it the "mainstream" is not as mainstream as it used to be when individuals relied on a predominant highway of information? Today mainstream is diffused and fluctuates as it is filtered by a wide array of media. Sure TV is still a main arbiter of information-but it's no longer dominated by the handful of major networks, now there are hundreds of channels to choose from. When one scans the internet horizon, the number of information outlets grows exponentially. What does that do to the concept of "mainstream?" Perhaps when thinking about mainstream culture in the 21st century, one discovers that there is no "there" there. That may explain the need for contemporary art, music, fashion, and in this case film and television to search for a connection to the past, when there was a "there" there, if nothing else, in retrospect. Think of the wave of nostalgic films and TV shows that have obsessed over the collective groovy past; That '70's Show, American Hustle and The Virgin Suicides to name a few. Even the '80s and '90s are retro now. Moonwalkers idealizes the late '60s-early '70s and tries very hard to make it sexy fun. The opening credits are fantastic, like a modern walkabout though The Yellow Submarine. The music is exceptional and reason alone to watch this film.
A phenomenon that has emerged in movie history is that of B films. All B films are bad films, but not all bad films are B films. B films persist despite their low budget, bad lines, or shitty quality; they persist because something about them appeals to viewers, it's that je ne sais quoi that keeps viewers coming back. The thing with B movies is that they can't really be made as B movies-it seems that they just happen. The problem with Moonwalkers is that it appears that Chessell was trying really hard to make a funny B movie and sometimes his efforts feel forced. At other times, however, there are moments so contrived that they actually work and they're just outright funny and absurd. There is a sensibility in Moonwalkers similar to that of This is Spinal Tap-if the latter were on acid-but in addition to that, Moonwalkers is doused in pulp violence so extreme that it can't be taken seriously, which is a good thing.
Moonwalkers shows at Bear Tooth on Monday, May 9 at 8 p.m.