(THIS HAS SPOILERS, SO IF YOU HAVEN’T SEEN THE MOVIE YET MAYBE DON’T READ THIS).
I would never say, “cinema is dead.” But I do think it is pretty clear at this point: the “cinema” being offered to me presently is not the cinema I grew up with. And I am not alone: filmmakers like Scorsese have commented on how images are being taken less seriously nowadays. Earlier this year I saw James Gray give a Q&A and he spoke similarly on dissatisfaction in the cinema and not knowing what to go see anymore, “What’s for me?”
It’s really hard for me to not be cynical about movies when I look at the local showtimes and 99% of the time it’s nothing I have interest in. I mean, a 3-hour superhero movie? A sequel to a superhero movie I didn’t even see? Why should I care about a movie like Shazam? When did the North American public become unable to digest a movie that does not have superpowers in it? Where are the original, small human movies about a man and a woman struggling with a divorce or something? Most movies being released now have become this gross, corporate thing for the most part. As a lover of film, it really feels like all year you’re just waiting for September-December for the so called “good” movies to come out.
Sure, there are lots of interesting things still being made, but you really have to fight for them. For me personally, to see an actual good movie requires me to travel an hour or more to the one theatre the movie is playing at, pay for expensive parking if I can find it, and then drive back home. Great work exists, but it is certainly not as accessible to me as something terrible and readily available I don’t actually want to see. And don’t get me started on festivals like TIFF; they pride themselves on inclusivity and gender equality, etc, but actually acquiring tickets to the festival feels like it’s becoming increasingly harder every year if you don’t have a certain amount of money to play around with. It seems like the people who are the most interested in seeing diverse films are incidentally often shut out the most as well.
That brings me to Harmony Korine. From what I’ve read, Korine seems to be in agreement with this cynical view on the state of cinema. In his 1998 letter to the Dogme 95 group, he wrote (sic), “it has been a great paradox in my life because the cinema being a place altogether wholly wheren i have unearthed great truths and beuty, it has also as of late fallen face forward in the mud and been disgraced by a lack of conscientious progression both technically but more importantly there has been a black veil over it’s poetic truth.” (This letter can be found in the monograph book on his work, Harmony Korine). In other interviews, Korine’s sentiments have mostly echoed this train of thought as well. In a recent interview with another filmmaker who makes work I love, Caveh Zahedi, Korine expressed feelings of disillusionment with cinema yet again; 21 years after that letter to Dogme 95 his feelings have not faltered at all, they’ve actually gotten worse.
All of that (necessary) preamble FINALLY brings me to THE BEACH BUM. The film can obviously be taken at face value and be viewed as this horrendous attempt at making a comedy (and for the most part has been by many reviewers). Whether you find any of it funny or charming or not, the film is a brilliantly subversive take on the American comedy film, and American mythology in general. Much like Korine’s SPRING BREAKERS, in which he used elements of pop culture to make an unexpectedly darker film (e.g., casting people like Selena Gomez, Vanessa Hudgens to toy with expectations), THE BEACH BUM is about subversion and deconstruction. Korine isn’t just presenting a bunch of nonsense to us for no reason; it’s a comment on what he has called in promo for the film “cosmic America.” THE BEACH BUM is definitely goofy, but it’s also an exploration of the American dream, and if it’s even an attainable thing that exists anymore, or if it ever did.
At one point in the film, Martin Lawrence’s character gets attacked by sharks because he mistakes them for dolphins. How many times have we seen that type of scene in American comedy films before? That scene in Saving Silverman in which Steve Zahn’s character gets attacked by a raccoon comes to mind. The Lawrence scene feels like it’s not really about the actual humour of the moment (although it can totally be about that too: it’s pretty amusing), it’s kind of a parody on the types of movies we’ve seen before, and what that means in a movie like this. In a way, by serving the general American moviegoing public exactly what a movie like this would normally have - a dumb scene in which we can all see what is coming - he is fighting fire with fire. He found a way to make the stereotypical comedy in precisely his manner: there will be the goofy, dumb comedic scenes you expect, but it will also be filtered through Korine’s specific viewpoint/ideology/moral ambiguity. The film is the perfect exercise in blending high culture and low culture in a manner only an artistic prankster like Harmony Korine can. The movie resembles a mid-90s Adam Sandler vehicle…if that movie were made by a guy who doesn’t really like that type of movie.
In a Q&A for THE BEACH BUM, Jonah Hill commented on the fact that we’re all lucky to have something like this in 2019. A subversive, arthouse, stoner comedy shot on 35mm film by a legit awesome European cinematographer, led by an Oscar winning actor is totally uncommon in this era. You can call me an idiot for seeing so much in a movie that appears to be quite dumb on the surface, but there’s a lot to be said about a movie that has made me think while simultaneously feeling almost non-stop joy.
Since 2016 there’s been an awful lot of pessimism in the world, and the phrase “Trump-era” has been used a lot in reviews of things. THE BEACH BUM is the PERFECT response to that: it’s an uplifting, breath of fresh air. It’s kinda funny that there’s a scene in which the song “Is That All There Is?” is used extensively; it has been reported as being Trump’s favourite song. I’m probably just reaching, it’s a happy accident, and Korine maybe didn’t intend this, but it’s a clear example of two very opposing Americans and how they approach life differently using that one song: Moondog would probably call Trump a “limp dick.” If there is an appropriate time to use “Trump-era film” as a descriptor, this is it.
Something Korine does very well that not many other films can do is illustrate hedonism in a pure, uncynical manner. For example, another movie that stars Matthew McConaughey is WOLF OF WALL STREET. That’s a movie that does not paint hedonism in an uplifting way: maybe it’s fun in the beginning, but by the end when Jordan Belfort is punching Naomi in the stomach you’d have to be a complete asshole to like him. Moondog, on the other hand has a sort of selfless hedonism, if that makes sense.
I have seen this movie twice theatrically, and I hope to see it again a third time…and that’s more than I can say about any of THE BEACH BUM’s contemporaries right now.
