Flakes

This is a movie that tries to be poppy and indie at the same time. There are lots of movies that do this, and they rarely hit the mark. There's enough quirkiness to keep you watching it, but not enough to really make you remember that you actually did watch it the day after. As amusing as the concept is of guys who buy black market cereal is, there's only so much you can do with the concept, and it ends up with a story line about a nice girl with a jerk boyfriend who really doesn't have the ambition to record his mediocre songs. It is nice to see New Orleans, and to see Christopher Lloyd dusting off his Jim-from-taxi persona one more time. It's the kind of movie you could recommend to your parents when they're trying to figure out how to set up their Netflix queue, unless they don't like swearing, that is. In the end, they probably should have just scrapped the whole idea of being edgy, and gone for the poppy movie thing.

Just saw this at the SXSW film festival and found it pretty damn fun. The dialog is kludgey in spots, and I'm not sure they sold the romantic relationship between the two leads well enough, but there are some funny, clever moments with the main story about the competing cereal bars, and the concept itself I thought was fun. Christopher Lloyd has a few nice moments here and there. Deschanel is a blast as always. A curious thing to note, but I liked the set design/art direction quite a bit. Gave the competing venues a real personality of their own. There's still no word on distribution, but I'm hopeful that a good reception at SXSW will give it some momentum in that direction.

Top 3 Reasons Not to See Flakes

1: Zooey Deschanel. She plays a terribly dressed, self-absorbed ditzy hipster named Miss Pussy Katz who runs around saying things like "you can't nurture your soul and accumulate at the same time" and ruins everyone's lives with her self-righteous drivel. For the first time, Zooey Deschanel loses that endearing balance between obnoxious and endearing and goes full on obnoxious. Don't watch it unless you're willing to run the risk of hating Zooey Deschanel forever.

2: The plot. A guy (Aaron Stanford) works at a cereal bar (it's just what it sounds like). Another guy opens a less dirty version of the cereal store across the street. They call each other names for 45 minutes, then hand out a bunch of flyers and make DIY t-shirts. Then the movie is over. Seriously. That was the whole movie. It grossed a whopping $311 dollars in its opening week.

3: Hipsters. There is nothing more obnoxious than listening to a bunch of post-teens waxing self righteous the "best" years of Cap'n Crunch and the bouquet and mouth feel of Fruity Pebbles like baby wine snobs. Except when they eventually switch topics to rip on "suits" and "consumerism". The dialogue does its best to remind us why we hate hipsters in the first place: because they're really just hateful little future conservatives dabbling in corporate sponsored "counter culture"...it's like Urban Outfitters started making people.

Flakes is more dry and boring than any bowl of cereal could ever be. I've enjoyed many a hipster indie movie, but all the quirky characters in the world can't save a movie that's dull and devoid of any entertainment value, whatsoever.

I think the movie was attempting an Empire Records-type vibe, where you're introduced to a few off-beat characters, and then grow to care about their lives over the course of the movie. That certainly didn't happen. Every character was annoyingly "different", and the viewer is never given any reasons to grow attached to them. They never become anything more than arbitrarily alternative caricatures. I normally love Zooey Deschanel (she's the reason I watched the movie), but she's just as un-appealing in this as everyone else. This may sound harsh, but Flakes was a complete failure. Don't waste your time with it.

I thought this movie was pretty good. Yes, It may be trying a bit hard and the acting may not be top rate but at least it has some originality to it which is more than I can say for most movies out there. Yes it is cheezy and far fetched but it leaves you with a good feeling in the end. Who knows why someone would open up a cereal restaurant across the street from another but who knows why TV executives throw the best shows on at the same time or why there are 3 million Starbucks or 7-11s half of which are on the same block.

This is a fun movie, Not great but good all in all. I wish I could give it an extra star to combat the negative reviews but I can not. Solid 6, and in my opinion worth watching if you have nothing better to do.

Cheers, -=db=-