The wide spread between good and bad reviews for this film tells you it is not for every taste. However, I'd suggest discarding the ones below 6 stars, because there is plenty to see here. Some disparaged a supposed lack of plot, but the story arc is fascinating and engaging, concerning as it does the ebbing of the main character's self-confidence, all of it delusional. He had achieved minor fame/notoriety as an L. A. porn star known as Mikey Saber, but 20 years of non-stop sex on- and off-camera has taken a heavy toll on his studliness. We first meet him stepping off a bus in the dumpy little Texas town where he grew up. He is looking for a fresh start, but in a dump where he is remembered only as a never-do-well by other never-do-wells.
Mikey gets knocked down an inch at a time, but he is such a rotten chunk of human crud that we expect him to get flattened like roadkill by something worse than bad job interviews. This happens well into the film, and it is a stunner. Even when he unexpectedly escapes punishment for something horrible that he has caused to happen, you know it's not going to end well, The final freeze-frame wordlessly fulfills that expectation, creating the kind of untidy, unsettling ending that we associate with the very best short story-writing.
Performances are excellent-to-astounding, creating gritty, unlikable characters just like the ones we would expect to meet in a dead-end town in West Texas. Simon Rex in the lead role is excellent and well directed. Although his Mikey Saber character emotes with bravura, over the two-hour course of the film, you can feel what it is like to have your life force drained from you one drop at a time.
Mikey gets knocked down an inch at a time, but he is such a rotten chunk of human crud that we expect him to get flattened like roadkill by something worse than bad job interviews. This happens well into the film, and it is a stunner. Even when he unexpectedly escapes punishment for something horrible that he has caused to happen, you know it's not going to end well, The final freeze-frame wordlessly fulfills that expectation, creating the kind of untidy, unsettling ending that we associate with the very best short story-writing.
Performances are excellent-to-astounding, creating gritty, unlikable characters just like the ones we would expect to meet in a dead-end town in West Texas. Simon Rex in the lead role is excellent and well directed. Although his Mikey Saber character emotes with bravura, over the two-hour course of the film, you can feel what it is like to have your life force drained from you one drop at a time.