J. Kessels

Not often does a film these days what cinema supposed to do: Innovate the language of film or film narration. J. Kessels is a great, weird road movie, well acted, with remarkable memorable visuals and a touch of surrealism. It reminded me of the Big Lebowski, but also Der Amerikanischer Freund. It had a very dry comical touch and a funny reminiscing of the main character about a phantom of his childhood, a pinball playing girl with the looks of a young Brigitte Bardot. There are daydreams and twists, great lines about the meat industry, but especially great, old and cult country and western songs throughout the trip of this weird writer Thomese and his old pal' and favourite character J. Kessels, who is called Jesus here and there.

It is clear that De Bruyn and J. KESSELS envisaged a Dutch version of FEAR AND LOATHING IN LAS VEGAS (Terry Gilliam, 1998), with fat snacks instead of heavy drugs, but at least as much chaos and paranoia. Gilliams film was also based on a literary source and told about a crazy road trip by the author himself. But in the case of FEAR AND LOATHING, Hunter S. Thompson had more or less copied what he himself had experienced, Drug Visions et al. P.F. Thomése turned things around. He wrote himself in a made-up story and made it into a post-modern joke. In the book that joke works: the reader reads how the writer writes the story he reads. It is the Droste effect for the advanced. But now that the medium has been turned into film, that effect disappears. Without the rawness of FEAR AND LOATHING and without the stratification of Thoméses original joke, J. KESSELS is ultimately quite one-dimensional. Review from film magazine schokkend nieuws

J. Kessels is described as a dry-witted, surreal and absurdistic road movie. After having seen it, I find it a qualification that is quite fitting. However, I have to add that this is not a hallmark for quality or a recommendation per se.

In its current form, the movie seems a bit like a crossbreed between a Joel & Ethan Coen and an Alex van Warmerdam picture. These filmmakers are well-known for creating cinematic universes that are governed by their own absurd logic, as well as their love for extremely deadpan humor. I am not a fan of van Warmerdam, but I will always line up for a new Coen movie. But J. Kessels, unfortunately, doesn't even get close to one of their lesser films.

I can't help but think what Joel & Ethan would have done with this weird premise of an author who joins his own creation (or perhaps the man inspiring his writing) on a trip in the hopes of seeing his childhood crush again, because the current makers lack the qualities to make this crazy gimmick work. After a very original opening credits sequence, the story starts to wander aimlessly, with the characters getting from one bizarre situation to the next, but what is going on and how they get there is hardly ever clear. The script simply leaves out too many details, and some characters (especially Ruben van der Meer) use accents that make them nearly unintelligible (where are the subtitles when you need them?). The actors get to say absurd oneliners that are meant to be quotable, but the dialogue is too succint to make their conversations meaningful or the plot even vaguely clear.

This would be less of a problem if the individual scenes were actually funny at all, but most of the situations fall completely flat and have no comedic pay-off whatsoever. Only a couple of scenes got an uneasy smile from me, but the timing of the rest is way off and the actors play it way too straight. I had not expected much else from Fedja van de Huêt who always plays the straight man, but not using Frank Lammers to his full comedic potential is just a waste of talent.

What kept my attention, however, is the beautiful way that the movie is shot. The production design, cinematography and editing are all of high quality. A special mention for the dancing scene inside the brothel; I have no idea how the story got there, but it looked great and perfectly choreographed.

In short, I find this movie just being weird for the sake of weird, and as such, it is far from the inspired lunacy that we have come to know from the Coens or even Wes Anderson. If you want to see a Dutch movie with a bizarre story that works out fine, go and watch Black Out (look for tt2114358 here on IMDb). Although that film was more a Guy Ritchie-type crime-comedy, it perfectly combined a zany plot and outlandish characters with good humor and actors who are used to their strengths. Now can the Coen brothers please buy the rights of J. Kessels and work their magic over it?