"Where Movie Critics Get A Taste Of Their Own Medicine"
Subscribe To Weekly Newsletter!

THE BROWN BUNNY
by Peter Sobczynski

September 3, 2004

(out of 4 stars)

FILM CREDITS: Written and directed by Vincent Gallo. Starring Vincent Gallo, Chloe Sevigny and Cheryl Tiegs. Unrated.

Vincent Gallo’s "The Brown Bunny" has already received such negative press since its debut at the 2003 Cannes Film Festival-both for the presentation of an unfinished rough cut which was immediately deemed to be the worst film in the history of that festival by many commentators (in the same year that also featured "Dogville", mind you) and for the final scene in which Chloe Sevigny graphically performs oral sex on Gallo-that anyone offering words of praise runs the risk of being dismissed as just being contrarian for the sake of being contrarian. However, I assure you that when I say that "The Brown Bunny" is actually one of the better films to emerge this year, I am not doing so because I am trying to call attention to myself (in the way that some of the early critics seemed to be) but because Gallo’s film is one of the most fascinating and hypnotic films of the year, a stunning tone poem on grief, loss and romantic obsession unlike anything else you are likely to see in a theater anytime soon.

The plot is simple. Gallo plays Bud Clay, a motocross racer who is driving across the country to a race in California. Gradually, we begin to discover that the other purpose of the trip is to get some kind of closure to his relationship with former lover Daisy (Sevigny). Most of the largely-wordless film shows him driving across the land (good portions are shot through the dirty windshield of Bud’s van) with an occasional pit stop where he encounters a series of women-the unreal nature of their appearances, coupled with the fact that they also have names associated with flowers, suggests that may be in Bud’s mind as representatives of various aspects of Daisy. Finally, in a drab motel room in California, Bud and Daisy reunite and, after the now-notorious sexual behavior (which does not go on for as long as has been rumored), Bud is forced to confront both the incident that separated the two of them and his own feelings of guilt over what happened.

Clearly, narrative fireworks are not what Gallo has on his mind here. As he showed in his previous directorial effort, "Buffalo 66", he is more interested in creating a mood and examining the behavior (especially the emotional traumas) of his characters rather than putting them through the paces of a conventional story. To that extent, "The Brown Bunny" is a striking success; all of Gallo’s choices as a filmmaker-from the drably beautiful photography to the extended length of his takes to his soundtrack choices (both musical selections like a key Gordon Lightfoot cue to the equally striking silences) serve to reinforce the emotionally barren character of Bud. To do anything differently-to speed up the pace of the film or to make the visuals more conventionally attractive-would simply seem out of place and destroy that mood.

What may come as a surprise to viewers-especially those whose notion of Gallo is that of some crazy wild-man artiste thanks to his frequent gossip-column appearances and his famous post-Cannes war of words with Roger Ebert-is just how sincere and nakedly emotional Gallo’s film truly is. Take one of the early scenes, in which Bud goes into a convenience store and awkwardly talks with the counter girl. After he tells her he is heading to California, she says that she would love to go there sometime and he immediately invites her along. She demurs and he responds with one of the neediest uses of "Please?" ever seen in a film. The "please" is so unexpectedly awkward that it gets a laugh. However, he proceeds to repeat the word in his efforts to beg the girl to go with him and a strange thing begins to happen-it ceases to be funny and Bud’s need for human contact is so apparent (considering that he just met this relatively average-looking girl just a few moments before) that the scene becomes both uncomfortable to watch (it feels like if she continues to refuse, he is just going to crumble away) and strangely touching.

This nakedly emotional approach is also apparent during the unforgettable final scene with Sevigny. Many have written about the surface details and have speculated on the mechanics of the sexual material involved but few have mentioned the fact that the considerable impact of the scene comes not from the fact that it involves two reasonably familiar actors performing a seemingly pornographic scene in a non-porno context, but from the mood that Gallo and Sevigny create. Thanks to the cramped quarters of the motel room and the barely-heard snatches of dialogue muttered by them as they go about this personal act, the scene takes on an intimate context that is impossible to shake or ignore-for me, it felt less like a notorious, attention-getting movie moment (like the ear-slicing in "Reservoir Dogs") and more like walking past an open motel room door and seeing two strangers performing an act with psychological implications that I could only guess at. This is the aspect that makes the scene so memorable and I suspect that it was the reason why so many critics have objected to it-they simply are unable to handle a sex scene that is more about the behavior of the participants and less about the choreography of the body parts.

"The Brown Bunny" is not a film for everyone-it doesn’t play by the rules of conventional filmmaking and most will just write it off as psuedo-artistic nonsense in which nothing happens for 87 minutes. I can understand that point-of-view and I suspect that even Gallo would willing admit that most viewers will probably react that way. The best way to approach "The Brown Bunny" is to look at it as less of a movie and more of a piece of art. Like a painting or a sculpture, the film is an intensely personal work in which he is using film, as opposed to paint or clay, in order to express deeply held feelings and sentiments in the only way he knows how. Taken that way, "The Brown Bunny" should more easily reveal itself as a fascinating work that easily transcends the notoriety that surrounds it.

-- PETER SOBCZYNSKI

Copyright © 2004 Peter Sobczynski
All rights reserved.
Used with permission
Peter's Archives

While the views expressed by Peter Sobczynski do not necessarily reflect the views of Criticdoctor.com, the Critic Doctor will occasionally examine Mr. Sobczynski's film reviews to bring forth an honest examination of those views expressed.