Killing time is something we all do. Be it looking at our social media profiles aimlessly or watching countless hours of TV after a long hard day of work. At some point, we all find ourselves killing time. It could be said that we are killing time just waiting for the next big moment in our lives. Or that we are killing time waiting for the inevitable.
Some have critiqued Harmony Korine’s directorial debut Gummo as being a juvenile empty headed film made by a bratty kid looking to shock for shock’s sake. However, in my opinion, it is perhaps one of the greatest filmic representations of “killing time” that I’ve ever seen.
One of the best examples of this is the chair wrestling scene. A scene in which a group of delinquents wrestle with chairs for no other reason than they can. The thing that always struck me the most about this scene is a brief moment towards the end of it. Where everyone in the room has that shared collective look of “That was fun! What do we do now?” A question asked by us all at least once in our lives.
Set in a fictional tornado ravaged Xenia, Ohio (although shot in Nashville, TN); Korine uses the tornado as a structural means to scatter an array of images, sounds and scenes. Most of the film centers around two young boys named Solomon and Tummler as they wander around town on their BMX’s killing cats to sell to the local Chinese Restaurant. Through their escapades we meet the various residents of a shattered community. Emerging from this potpourri is a tale of a town trapped in purgatory. A town left to rot leaving its remaining inhabitants to wander aimlessly from one antic to another just killing time.
As Korine’s camera drifts aimlessly throughout the town following these kids, we witness decay and poverty to its full extent. His camera enters in and out of various locations and rotting homes. Each littered with piles of junk hoarded inside. In a junkyard, we find two young boys dressed in Cowboy Hats blasting cap guns as they curse up a blue streak that would make even the kids of South Park blush.
One of the film's more memorable scenes witnesses a boy no older than 9 or 10 years old remove a picture frame from the wall of his living room to reveal a hoard of cockroaches smattering. Yet another iconic scene involves Solomon eating his Spaghetti dinner while taking a bath in a tub of filthy water thanks to the unmaintained plumbing.
It’s like looking at a third world country, only this is in the heart of America and shot with a diamond cutters eye by master cinematographer Jean Yves Escoffier. Rumor has it that the film crew was so entirely disgusted by their surroundings that they refused to enter these premises without hazard suits. Much to Korine and Escoffiers disgust at the disrespect shown by said crew to the real-life residents of these homes.
The closest the film comes to giving a consistent perspective is that of Tummler. One of the two main characters presented in the film and played by non-actor Nick Sutton. Despite his ragged and mulleted appearance, what shines through most is his marvelous persona. Throughout the film he is constantly delivering lines of poetry. In one scene, he delivers a scatterbrained stand up comedic performance to amuse his pimp friend that is genuinely quite funny. But on the same token, he slaughters innocent neighborhood cats to the blast beats of black metal all for a quick profit.
His family is a shattered one. His mother dearly departed. In the one scene we meet his father, he appears attentive but entirely lost in his surroundings. His gay brother has long since escaped Xenia for a new life in the big city as a cross dresser. The girl we can presume is a lover in his life is also revealed to have breast cancer. And his only friend shown in the film (Solomon) is at least 5 years younger than him. In one small segment of the film, Tummler openly confesses to suicidal thoughts directly into a VHS camera, but much like everyone else in Xenia, he continues to dwell aimlessly.
In the film's fiinale, we find Tummler and Solomon pumping a load of BBs into the frail lifeless body of a dead cat as the cold rain pours down. These images are accompanied by Roy Orbison’s powerful classic Crying which only helps to further intensity the mood. The torment and disgust on Tummler’s face says it all. This is perhaps a rare moment of self realization as to just how far he has sunk in life. It’s a raw powerful moment delivered perfectly by someone who had never acted before in his life. And it’s moments like these that make Gummo linger on.
What strikes me most about Tummler is that beneath his ragged appearances lies something of a bright and sensitive kid. Perhaps in a better world he would channel his artistic qualities into something productive. But unfortunately, all he really has is destruction as he too falls wayside by his ravaged surroundings. Thus his anger and frustration is seemingly vented upon the innocent cats he slaughters all in order to make a quick buck.
Gummo is a film less concerned with plot and has more interest in themes. Themes including violence, homicide, vandalism, mental illness, poverty, profanity, homophobia, sexual abuse, sexism, suicide, grief, prostitution, and animal cruelty. And yet, it never actually makes any real comment on said themes, but instead leaves it to the audience to decipher their own meaning. There is no question that some of the inhabitants of this fictional Xenia are far from moral citizens, but the question remains? Is Harmony ridiculing them or is he sympathizing with their aimless plight? Like all great art, only the viewer can decide for themselves.
For my money, I believe it’s a mixture of both. He has a great interest, respect, a shred of love for some and disgust for others portrayed in this film. In its own way, it’s a perfect cinematic encapsulation of humanity at its best. Terribly flawed and ugly but sometimes potentially beautiful and fascinating.
Coming from a Skateboarding background and as is evident throughout his body of work, Harmony is obsessed with exposing the back alleys and the ditches in life that most would prefer to overlook. His camera is a cracked mirror reflection of life as he sees it. It’s nonsense at its most pure and fascinating. As the great Werner Herzog once said about Harmony; “he is the last of the foot soldiers in the Army.”
Much like the forgotten Marx brother the film takes its namesake from, the people of this fictional Xenia are the overlooked and forgotten scraps of a decaying America. Their existence is one of pure anarchy. It’s a society that thrives on instant gratification. But nonetheless, it’s an existence that is both beautiful and nihilistically ugly in equal measures. Within these moments of absurdity and horror lies a real tragic beauty. Gummo borders somewhere between shocking reality and almost dreamlike surrealism.
As such, the lost souls of Xenia exist in their own purgatory. Wandering aimlessly and satisfied only by instant gratification. And so they shall remain like this until the day comes when they either meet their maker or enter that great void.
Come to think of it, I can’t think of anything more reflective of the human condition as a whole.
-Daniel M
0 comments:
Post a Comment