|
Kaboom
| Released |
10 June 2011 |
| Director |
Gregg Araki |
Starring
|
Thomas Dekker, Haley Bennett, Chris Zylka, Roxane Mesquida, Juno Temple |
| Writer(s) |
Gregg Araki |
Producer(s)
|
Andrea Sperling, Gregg Araki, Pascal Caucheteux |
| Origin |
United States, France |
| Running Time |
86 minutes |
| Genre |
Comedy, horror, sci-fi |
| Rating |
TBC |
|
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Kablammo.
Winning the first Queer Palm at Cannes in 2010, Kaboom works as kind of bubblegum Brett Easton Ellis or campus based Philip K. Dick, with Araki cutting scenes by cumshot in a sexed up tale of apocalyptic prophecy. After a noticeable directorial departure (Mysterious Skin, Smiley Face), set in an overly saturated L.A, Kaboom marks a return to what have been termed as Gregg Araki's Teenage Apocalypse movies (Totally F*cked Up, Doom Generation, Nowhere). And with Araki going back to exploring pop culturally savvy b-movie mixtures of high and low art Kaboom treats us to a dorm-room film-noir with a side of sci-fi and all the ludic philosophical questions and identity politic pretensions such a bizarre combo might entail.
When he's not eating space cakes, partying or hanging out with his b.f.f Stella (Haley Bennett) film student Smith (Thomas Dekker) ponders studying an art that mightn't exist in any recognisable form in the next few years and avoids calls from his mother. Early signposting of Kaboom's surrealist attitude occurs with a telling cut from a famous scene in Dali and Buñuel's Un Chien Andalou, and yet, always adept at this kind of visual queue, this isn't anything new for Araki. See if you can spot Andre Bazin's treatise on film What is Cinema? in Totally F*cked Up or the 7/11 scene so heavily indebted to Battleship Potemkin that it must be homage in Doom Generation. This time college age rather than strictly teenage, Araki is still insistent on exploring sexuality, and the polymorphously perverse pervades, with Smith, in true 'queer' style, declaring 'undeclared' on any census to sexuality rather than bisexual, gay or straight. A question that, as an auteur, Araki was always quick to evade, but hey who likes being pigeon-holed?
As with the early avant gardists, Kaboom's main premise centres more around its status as a provocation and flip off to film, rather than any conventional narrative form, and its plot covers topics as diverse as abduction, shady Illuminati like organisations, sexy time, chosen ones and saving the world. However, the admirable postmodern mix up did, at times, seem a little insubstantial and I wondered if Kaboom really succeeded in its many, many intentions. Sure, it captured the intoxicating, heady journey of discovery that college brings in the aesthetic but the dialogue and characterisation lacked lustre. And, while, of course, a revisiting of the Teenage Apocalypse Trilogy was always going to be difficult outside a ‘90s context, I began to wonder if Araki had really considered just how much or if in an attempt to go back to his roots sacrificed what was so fresh about the originals? The very human heart behind the tart ironic taste of his previous offerings is completely absent in Kaboom and the teen zings straight from the zeitgeist this time just don't roll off the actors’ tongues in the same way or with the appropriate level of campness. Frankly, sometimes, I even thought the large assortment of (very pretty) actors seemed just glad (and surprised) to be in an Araki movie.
In essence, I found the very existence of Kaboom a little troubling, and for a voice that once was so startling, this time Araki has made a movie that is largely unfulfilling, and while undeniably fun, never really funny.
- Cormac O’Brien |
