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The beefy Simpson has terrific on-screen charisma as the bewildered, inebriated Rob. In his birthday card, his wife wrote about how he is far too closed off for her to deal with, that she needs someone who can support her. But Rob refuses to accept their separation, promising to get help. He desperately wants to control these blackouts and be a better husband. The performance and the way it's photographed, mixed and scored create a vivid sense that he's in a war with himself.

While some of his most audacious filmmaking touches feel gimmicky, and the overall tone is bleak, Simpson makes Rob a sympathetic central figure who is struggling with something both inexplicable and oddly easy to identify with. This is a fascinating exploration of how much we rely on our memories, even though they are often inaccurate, influenced by emotions. As it goes along, it also grapples with mental health issues in ways that are terrifyingly dark, but also meaningful and urgent.

themes, language, violence

27.Feb.26

Battling them, the woolly Jimmy and Stiggs are hilariously short-tempered, arguing about pretty much anything that happens. Even though both actors go way over the top as these astonishingly foul-mouthed guys become increasingly inebriated, Begos and Mercer maintain a sparky likeability that spurs us to root for them. Jimmy has mind-spinning visions that seem to reveal the future. Stiggs is marginally more sensible until he falls off the wagon and joins Jimmy down this crazed rabbit hole.

Early on, Jimmy admits that he likes to hyperbolise everything. So things get exponentially yucky as this wildly destructive situation, completely contained within Jimmy's apartment, spirals outrageously out of control, leading to an insanely nasty final sequence, again shot through a first-person lens. There's some emotional subtext in the way this unhinged experience begins to pit two friends against each other. But it's also clear that this essentially nonsensical movie was made simply to create the yuckiest, scariest movie imaginable.

themes, language, violence, sexuality

16.Feb.26

Of course, conversations take unexpected turns and Jimmy falls off the wagon, which gives Dyer the opportunity to drunkenly chomp on the scenery, shifting from a bracingly control-freak to someone intensely desperate. More interesting are darker, introspective moments when he ponders what's happening to him. But it's a problem that Jimmy is so profoundly unsympathetic, a narcissist incapable of seeing anyone else's perspective. Each of the deals he negotiates is all about him, as is his badly strained relationship with his daughter.

The story's moral messages aren't terribly subtle, with Jimmy depicted as a man who has sold his soul for success. And with his career coming apart at the seams, he finally begins to wonder if perhaps there's something more important to life than money. No, not really, but the script at least lets him start to think that there might be. This is a fairly brutal depiction of the cold, hard world of sports management. And the screenwriter can't quite fool us with a cathartic moment here and there.

themes, language

12.Feb.26