Southland Tales Reviews

This movie tried to say so much and i think in the end it brought the whole movie to a crashing halt. Good idea by a young director with a good future.

A film that leaves you in awe. In awe of the amount of wasted talent combined in this pretentious, confusing and unfunny dystopian tale. Director Kelly delivered a surprise cult hit with Donny Darko and revisits the themes of time travel and the end of the world here. He packs it into an overly long story with political satire, too many unlikable characters and a plot that's almost impossible to follow. It's trying to be smart, funny and David Lynch-esque but isn't really any of that. During the last half an hour things are slowly starting to make a little more sense but the finale, overblown with Christian symbolism, makes it hard to care after the horrible first half of the movie. Unbelievable, how many great names signed up to be part of this terrible attempt in creating art. Kelly still knows how to use songs and to film musical numbers but as for the rest is concerned, one has to wonder what the hell he was thinking. Watch at your own risk.

A strange film set in the future with a confusing plot with deals with alternative energy, politics, world war 3 and the 4th dimension!! A bit long it has some good moments but a few lows as well. Overall just a bit odd.

Ya gotta give credit to Richard Kelly. The man definitely has some interesting, unique, and different ideas, and he's definitely got an unmatched sense of creativity and wicked sense of style. His ambition is something to be praised. He makes some interesting movies, but unfortunately, accessibility is something he doesn't excel at. Donnie Darko was a challenge, but it didn't seem so bad trying to get a handle on things. This on the other hand, is probably understandable eventually, but it's too much to want to try to give it a chance and to figure out what the fuck is going on. Now, apparently this is supposed ot be an update or take on the the Book Of Revelation, as well as being filled with a ton of other references to things as varied a the works of Philip K. Dick, Marx, and a host of others. The problem is, this film is an incoherent, rambling, pretty pretentious, mess. If there is a narrative, it's not all that apparent. The look of things is cool, and, as I said, the ideas are interesting, but yeah, nothing makes sense. Following this movie is impossibl.. I am not sure if the casting is a bad thing or a good thing. I like a good number of the people in the cast, but I'm not sure if having most of the cast being the result of stunt is such a good idea. I will admit though, it was very entertaining, and amusing even if baffling and unbelievable to have Timberlake do a song and dance number. I should give this a lower grade, but I won't. Even with all my (valid) bitching about the many issues with the writing, there's some cool stuff going on here: the aforementioned song and dance number, the car commercial with copulating cars, and the fact that Kelly makes the films he wants, even if only he truly knows what the fuck is going on. My only hope is that in the future, Kelly keeps making these bold and brain exercising films, but that he learns how to make things a little esier on the average person. It wouldn't kill him to learn how to make things more coherent and accessible without losing the trippiness of things.

Total Nonsense

Sure, the film "Southland Tales" is flawed and can be incoherent without having read the prequel graphic novels, but with the film (and the graphic novels) Richard Kelly shows what our world, will, could and does look like. this is destined to be one of the top 5 misunderstood films of all time. it combines science-fiction, dark comedy, drama and a touch of musical and performance art to make a stinging satire on the United States, government, the war in Iraq, pop culture, religion and the environment. a tour de force in ever way.

It has taken me two goes to actually sit through this one. I still could not claim to fully understand it, and it is full of pretty unlikeable characters, but the ride is fun if you can switch your brain off and accept that you're going to be confused!
Good cast here too, including Sarah Michelle Gellar as an airheaded and tacky porn star, Mandy Moore and yes, bloody Justin Timberlake (although to be fair he is not too bad in this, and in fact did not recognise him right away).
I still vastly prefer both Donnie Darko and The Box to this, but I'm glad I was able to sit through it finally and some of it does come together at the end, although still not entirely sure the pay off is worth the 2 and a half hours!

I don't even know where to begin with trashy piece of shit. Southland Tales is a great example how director can lose his own head into his own ass completely. Usually i think that it is a wonderful thing to see directors write and produce their own films. I honestly think that it is a way to express something more of their very own by that way. But in here it all goes wrong from start till the end. Southland Tales is a film based on stupid and childish ideas. It is like a wet dream written by 9-year old school-boy with the fascination to the science fiction. The further Kelly takes his story, the more ridicilous it comes. I am advising you to stay away from this mess. It is just plain bad.

Boxer Santaros: My character... he realizes that the apocalyptic crime rate is because of global deceleration. The rotation of the earth is slowing down at a rate of point zero, zero, zero, zero, zero, zero, zero six miles per hour each day disrupting the chemical equilibrium in the human brain causing very irrational criminal behavior.

Director Richard Kelly follows up his insanely popular among cult audiences debut feature Donnie Darko, to bring audiences another ambitious project that is sure to find a cult audience as well.

Initially panned hard at the Cannes Film Festival, and later among the majority of critics after it finally got a theatrical release, the movie is a large mess of characters and plot, some of which develops, the rest just drifts away. I walked away from this movie understanding what had happened in terms of the development of its story, but not really interested in what it meant or what the underlying themes were.

Its still watchable however, not really terrible in any way, just too jumbled.

The story surrounds a three day period set in Los Angeles in an alternate futuristic reality in the year 2008. A kidnapped Actor with political ties, Boxer Santoros played by Dwayne Johnson, finds himself with amnesia, currently hooking up with a porn star/reality TV host Krysta Now, Sarah Michelle Geller.

Krysta Now: Join us for an in-depth discussion of the penetrating issues facing society today. Issues like abortion, terrorism, crime, poverty, social reform, quantum teleportation, teen horniness and war.

They are involved with a extremist group that are using an ex cop and his twin brother, both Sean William Scott, to help sabotage the work of a political candidate.

The world all of these characters live in is currently going through a number of energy and fuel crisis along with facing WWIII issues, and plenty of other issues that are set up.

There is a lot going on, all of which is narrated by a character played by Justin Timberlake. The cast is one of the strangest assembled since Mars Attacks, featuring a number of random actors as well as former and current SNL stars.

Announcer on PA: Ladies and Gentlemen, this is the way the world ends. Not with a whimper, but with a bang. But there is hope. In the end we can be reassured by one undeniable truth. Nobody rocks the cock like Krysta Now. And I mean nobody.

The movie plays out like a dark comedy/sci-fi/satire using quotations from the Book of Revelations, and making references to a number of other weird movies including Brazil, 12 Monkeys, Dr. Strangelove, and the film noir Kiss Me Deadly of all movies. Basically this movie is very weird.

Of the actors, some of them seem to get what they're doing, others just seem out of place. The Rock, who I usually enjoy, doesn't have his natural charisma to help him here. Gellar actually fares pretty well given her part. Scott seems to be the most familiar with what he needs to be doing, making him the most effective.

As far as the supporting cast goes, older folks like John Laroquette and Nora Dunn seem to get it as well, but others like Wallace Shawn, Cheri Oteri, and especially John Lovitz are just wrong here.

In terms of Kelly's style, its a pretty decent film. There is the same familiar cleverness present in Donnie Darko, providing for a bleak but watchable tone, although it moves very slowly at times, which is especially apparent for a 2 hr and 20 m movie. The soundtrack is pretty good, scored by Moby.

Overall, I was not disappointed with this movie because I wasn't expecting much. It certainly wasn't frustratingly bad, its just messy.

On repeated viewings, I find my same opinions hold up, but for some reason, I had a desire to come back to this movie. It has a certain level of ambition that is hard to explain. The film is watchable in a very strange way that makes me enjoy the film, despite still not gathering much of a personal idea of what the film wants to say. Some elements become clear, but its still damn weird. However, I find it indescribably enjoyable.

Boxer Santaros: I'm a pimp... and pimps don't commit suicide.

If the re-release/director's cut of Donnie Darko didn't convince you that Richard Kelly was a flash in the pan, Southland Tales should seal the argument. I will give Kelly that he put together a fine soundtrack and the grandiose and truly random casting was almost... inspired at a few points (hell, a few of the actors even did good jobs) but that same randomness (the Killers video with Justin Timberlake for instance) along with the tidal wave of half-baked and unresolved concepts were Southland Tales' downfall. If about 45 minutes were shaved off and a third of the nonsense was dropped this could've been a great movie. Instead it was about 2 1/2 disjointed hours of my I'd really like back...

This mediocre movie starts off with some interesting WW3 senarios and then spirals into a poorly done non sensical mess. The director tried to go artsy towards the end but I'm pretty sure he just remade a mash up of Highlander 2 and Time Cop. Oh and lets not forget the line "Pimps don't commit suicide".

A good friend of mine recommended that I should read the graphic novel before seeing this. Well, as it was 200+ pages long and didn't really look all that appealing to me, I didn't think it would be worth it just to be able to understand the overall plot of the movie version. And even if I had done so, I don't think it would have made much improvement on my film-going experience. Because this was, to my great disappointment, not much more than a puzzle way too pretentious for its own good.

I don't mind intelligent movies that require some thinking, but what I don't appreciate is weirdness for weirdness sake. I mean, I loved Donnie Darko, despite its weirdness. But what DD also had was a coherent plot that was tied to reality and also made sense within its own universe. Not only that, but it was incredibly well-directed, powerful and intriguing, which is something I can hardly say about Southland Tales, even though I wish it were so. I just expected so much more from the director who brought us one of the true masterpieces of the decade.

So what's the final verdict? Well, despite its many flaws, I did enjoy some of its visual features and aspects, which (in a strictly artistic and esthetic sense) compelled me to at least give it a passing grade, namely 2½ stars, which to me is the equivalent of a skippable, yet overall okay movie. But keep in mind that I'm being generous here.

Could be the most interesting and textured film I've seen in years. Endlessly confusing but never un-interesting.

My boss was right about this movie, but I suppose I had to see it for myself. It was really really disappointing, especially since I heard it likened to The Nines and directed by the guy who made Donnie Darko. It's hard to put my finger on exactly what's wrong with this movie. Too many characters not enough plot? Too much plot not enough explanation? Too many actors and not enough acting? Too many ideas and not enough follow-through? This movie really is a bit of a mess, and I think its biggest drawback is how little it cares to make itself understood by the audience. Incoherent and incomprehensible,

Odd. The only two things that rocked in this movie, besides "The Rock" of course, was Timberlake's hallucination sequence and "The Star Spangled-Banner".

God knows what happened here. With all the rumours of alternative cuts it seems that even Kelly himself had trouble assembling a halfway decent film. It doesn't even know how to begin, chucking out some expositional crap and even un shot storyboards to explain what the hell is going on. The bizarre thing here is that this film is needlessly complex. It isn't some kind of surreal mediation such as the work of Lynch, there IS a plot and a fairly interesting one at that. The film ruins this with needless wacky crazy bonkers ideas and scenarios. Timberlake seems he has been lured in for some explanation as a tacky voice over. The acting isn't bad. It's rather good, and Mandy Moore is always great to see, but the characters are dumb, boring and cannot be sympathised or connected with. The film is one dying a long and painful death but is kept beating by life supports. It should of had the plug pulled long ago.

What the hell was that?

I despise movies like this and filmmakers like Richard Kelly. This is a self-involved, pretentious, confusing, bizarre, boring, and tedious two and a half hour David Lynch-wannabe shitfest with no plot, and no insight into the themes and views of America that it aims to present. The entire ensemble cast themselves look lost, and you can see they're trying to do the best they can with such incomprehensible, unwitty, and poorly written material. That Southland Tales is Kelly's follow-up to Donnie Darko makes it even more disappointing. With that film, it was confusing, but it had a great aesthetic to it and its complexity felt necessary. Here, it seems he's just making a fucked up movie for the sake of making one. At least this film will be remembered for having scored the lowest reception points ever at the Cannes Film Festival, a disgrace that Kelly better keep in mind before he begins work on his next project. I still stand by the brilliance of Donnie Darko, and acknowledge that every good filmmaker has made serious missteps. Hopefully, Kelly will make good films in the future, but I can't fathom the possibility of him making a film worse than this.

Good indie movie, but quite strange story based on the graphic novel since Donnie Darko from director Richard Kelly who has been hotly anticipated. This story has it's a mind bending blend of cop thriller, action movie, post apocalypse science fiction fantasy and, predominantly, a biting satire on American politics.
Sarah Michelle Gellar does a wonderful performance as a porn star (too bad, no nudity scenes for her, but her sexy looking - whoo!), The Rock is so funny, as an amnesiac Hollywood action hero, in his acting when he found out someone getting killed that makes him muttering. And more famous cast including Seann William Scott (as the role of cloned cop), Christopher Lambert, Miranada Richardson, John Larroquatte, Justin Timberlake, Bai Ling, Kevin Smith appear in this satire movie.

The making of documentary reveals alot about where this movie goes all wrong: only the director professed to have a clue what was going on. Unsurprisingly the actors look as lost as the viewers. Self indulgent mess .... what a shame.