Movie Review: SELF/LESS

I remember when I was young, my father, a sort of rogue ecologist who learned everything he knew about rivers and their ecosystems secondhand, told me about these species of bottom feeders that lived in streams all over the Missouri and Mississippi river basins. I don’t remember what species they were but the thing about them was that they only flourished in polluted bodies of water. They didn’t flourish because of the pollution necessarily so much as their natural predators, killed off by the pollution, ceased to keep them in check and so their population would explode. Despite their usefulness as a gauge for the health of a stream, they were generally unwelcome.

I think I’ve come to regard Ben Kingsley in the same manner. It all started with a film called Suspect Zero (though really, it must’ve really started with House of Sand and Fog because that preceded Thunderbirds and what a one-two punch those were). Also known by it’s Dutch title, SUSPECT ZER∅. Yes, it turns out the Dutch distributors decided if they film itself was going to be a huge rip off of Se7en why not go all the way and add their own number to the title (cleverly enough, it’s not only an alternate representation of literally “zero,” it’s also an actual Dutch letter, though one that doesn’t belong in the English word “zero” and happens to also be a mathematical symbol for an “empty set” TAKE THAT, SE7EN!) I can’t say Kingsley was bad in Suspect Zero, but that’s mainly because the film he was starring in was so uninspired, the unexpected intensity he brought to a terribly written role was a welcome distraction. From that point on, he was in a stunning series of train wrecks, including A Sound Of Thunder, BloodRayne and Shutter Island. Oh, and also The Love Guru. The lesson here; be wary of any film whose title contains mathematical symbols.

Weirdly, director Tarsem Singh (fka Tarsem) has had a similarly disgraceful fall from grace, timed several years after Kingsley’s; his feature film debut The Cell is a halfway cult-classic, fusing the grim bloodlust of Se7en with the eye-drenching surrealism of a Buñuel film, and he followed that up with the critically acclaimed The Fall. It took him four years to release a follow-up, nearly a decade in Hollywood time, and Immortals was an absolute bomb, attempting to ride the then wave of Greek mythological action sparked by 300 and stoked by Clash of the Titans but being thoroughly bucked (though really, what a stupid idea, trying to ride that evil mutant of a trend), despite an all star cast, including the-Brit-who-would-be-Superman Henry Cavill (seriously, if you ever want to see how truly terrible Cavill’s acting can be, watch Immortals. Except don’t.)

Now, in 2015, we get Tarsem Singh directing Ben Kingsley. Plus, uhhhhhhh, Ryan Reynolds??!! Reynolds is, as we Dungeons & Dragons nerds would say, a chaotic neutral character. Unlike Kingsley, Reynolds can elevate a film, but he has to belong to it, in the same way a bullfrog belongs in a pond. And nowhere else. And Reynolds’s bullfrog has, unfortunately, a strong case of wanderlust; he certainly didn’t belong in THE NIN9S (seriously I’m not making this up, it’s how the film is spelled in the official poster) or Definitely, Maybe. So, yeah.

The film’s written by the Pastor brothers, best known for the underrated Carriers, but something tells me their script must have gotten into the hands of Reynolds; one of the film’s gobsmackingly predictable plot twists (of which there are no less than three) lands the protagonist(s) in St Louis, of all places. Or rural St Louis? Wherever that part of the film takes place, it’s clearly NOT St Louis, not even the county. And the turn of events that lead us there are painfully telegraphed; from the moment the scientist responsible for the Kingsley-to-Reynolds brain-switch dismisses the protagonist’s concerns about the origin of his new body with an obviously thin and implausible not-explanation, the audience knows said body has a questionable history. At a certain point, it’s hard not to wonder if the story was ripped straight from an obscure episode of The Outer Limits, complete with annoyingly caricatured villain. Even more grievous is the naked theme of rich man’s sacrificial heroism, so saccharine it left me with a bad taste in my mouth.

As usual, Tarsem Singh has a singular command of his visuals and the few scenes are action are well executed, so it’s certainly a pretty film to look at. But there’s literally nothing going on between the ears with Self/less; in fact, it almost feels aggressively stupid, talking down the audience via that aforementioned villain who monologues unreservedly. Even the denouement has to be carried via a video with in the film, and that seems like the perfect way to symbolize Self/less; a video explaining the whole movie, neatly wrapping the whole thing up with a bow on top. Except Self/less feels more like getting a gift card in lieu of an actual present; it goes through the motions but doesn’t contain any depth, thought or effort.