I saw a preview of Reservation Road last night, starring Joaquin Phoenix and Mark Ruffalo (an almost-Boomer, born in 1967). It has inspired me to create a brand new category here: Really Bad Movies.
A creative work that plays the Dead Child Card has to be very careful not to cross the line to sentimental drivel. This one does just that. Phoenix plays the weirdly-bearded Ethan Learner, father of Josh, who is killed by a hit-and-run driver, and falls into a maddened need for revenge. The driver, played by Ruffalo, has a son the same exact age, and spends most of the movie feeling Deeply Guilty and being Almost Ready to confess. There are way too many scenes in which Phoenix opens a door, followed by Ruffalo entering a room. Or Ruffalo getting into a car, and Phoenix driving away. They lead parallel lives, see??? But it's unmoving and insulting in the way it simply expects us to care what happens. See, we don't automatically care, just because there's a Dead Child involved. I found myself focusing on the decor of the house--could a professor really afford this spiffy, suburban castle in Connecticut? And the cop tells the killer to put his rental car in the garage, because the bird poop "will corrode the finish." Which makes me realize that's what's happening to my car when I leave it in the driveway, and. .. . . Oh, wait, I'm watching a movie, better pay attention.
Also, the movie includes my least favorite line: "You were always there for us." Didn't this director hear about my ban on the use of this phrase ever again in the history of movies and television? The sloppiness extends to illogical scenes, too. Ruffalo tells his son they'll get some pies, referring to the pizza which seems to be all they eat, but in the next scene they are using chopsticks to eat mushy stuff off a paper plate. Maybe it's Chinese pizza.
Finally, Joaquin Phoenix, who still seems to be channelling Johnny Cash here, only without the singing, has the most twisted, bizarre chest ever seen on the big screen. Am I the only one who noticed that his torso looks as if it has been squished, crushed, and then re-assembled by a five-year-old? It's ultra creepy, but not in a good way.
When I see a movie this bad, I always want to run out and see another, better one, instantly. But I'll just have to wait until Sunday, when I'm seeing a preview of The Kite Runner. Rumor has it that the director, several actors, and the author of the book, Khaled Hosseini, will be there.
