Bass Ackwards

Saw Bass Ackwards this weekend at the Waterfront Film Festival, but ended up leaving about 15 minutes before the movie was done due to boredom. I watch a lot of films and this is the first time I've walked out early.

There were way too many scenes of the Vw Microbus getting passed by semi-trucks on the highway. It was funny for the first few times and then just became insulting. I think a three year old would have understood the point that it was a slow and frustrating vehicle well before using the same gag about 10 or 15 times.

There were a couple entertaining moments he had with the service station guy "no speak English" and Linas' Christopher Walken impersonation.

for me this movie started out with a real story and characters you can believe in as real. then as the 'road trip' starts the main character becomes less and less believable and the story becomes more and more improbable.

and to add to the disbelief the people he meets along the way are just weird and goofy. the man he lets rest in the van - i don't believe Linas would just open the door to a complete stranger - and then they become best friends! and the store owner seems a bit mental and off. then proves himself to be a caring person - why would he go to the trouble to tell Linas, what was the incentive?

this flick just has too many holes and loose ends for me to like it. it is a movie wanting to be more but keeps scraping bottom on the speed bumps throughout the story.

I also related to the movie, have wanted to see it ever since Sundance, and YouTube's pay release window. I found it easy to get into the rhythm of the film. I liked the sweetness of it, that it took its time, and that it had none of the smugness and self-consciousness hipness of many indie, and most studio, films. I had the same reaction to it as I did to sex, lies and videotape 20 years ago, feeling like this was a film that was again pushing the boundaries of film-making, pushing the margins to more authenticity, naturalism, etc. It's similar, but different than other indie or road films. It feels post-slacker, post- irony, post hollow-culture-formula-action movies, post-judgmental us- against-them contemporary stuff. It also redefined hetero men as I find them today, less afraid to be sensitive, unclear about what roles are today, not as phonily macho and cool as portrayed in Hollywood films. I know more people like Linas than I do leading men in mainstream films. That probably goes for the characters he meets on the road, somewhat more like people in LA, than those who inhabit studio films. The film was somewhat lacking in plot, and I was slightly itchy, but only slightly. Mostly I fell into the rhythm of the film, happy to be with Linas on his road adventure, as he experienced himself and his solitaryness in a way that was quite relatable for all of us.

This movie reminded me the Taxi Driver Class of movies , this is a nonstop road-trip to real life without lies , it is an honest creation that passes from "why to me?" to "happened to us too".It jumps from the ego and falls to the person next to you.This is not an easy trip as it looks.The reward about understanding this, is "happiness" real happiness without lies the happiness of living.I really liked this film to say the truth there's been a long time to see such an honest film .Dont miss this it worths your time.People on this film worked hard to achieve the purpose and it is obvious not like other garbages that circulating on the market today.Also there's a question "Can i ?" and the answer is "Why not?".Think about it.

Bass Ackwards is a film that as of right now seems to be going under everybody's radar. I found it by chance while researching released films from this year that I have not yet seen, and man, am I glad I found it. At times it reminded me of Last year's Wendy and Lucy, but without the added drama I found came along with that film. Other times it reminded me of Sean Penn's Into the Wild as the story follows one man on the road always searching with an open heart.

What this film has however, that both these other excellent films do not is a soul that Hollywood rarely touches upon and an acutely fitted soundtrack reminiscent of Neil Young's score to Dead Man. All these things, plus a foreign language Christopher Walken impression make this little gem of a film shine like a newly unearthed diamond