Merry & Messed Up: “Go”
Posted on 23. Dec, 2009 by Jef in Film, Merry & Messed Up
Your ecstasy face isn't any prettier
It’s almost here! Christmas. I’m not going to lie, I’m actually quite excited. Maybe it’s the alcohol, but I’m feeling okay about this. No wait, I was wrong. It’s the ruffies. Dammit, I ate the ruffies again!
The 11th Day of Christmas: “Go”
With time, Doug Liman’s Go has shed a couple of its annoyances, and its pleasures have become clearer and that much more enjoyable. The obvious aping of Pulp Fiction doesn’t seem as uninspired as it did ten years ago — Tarantino’s style has had time to mutate cinematic vocabulary in general — and Go now feels more like post-Tarantino than it does Tarantino-lite. Also, the offensive obviousness of the rave-chic angle has softened, and it is more favourable, watching the flick, to be looking back at the craze with nostalgia than it was to watch the movie in ’99 when we were like ugh.
Sarah Polley shines as Ronna, a too-smart-for-her-own-good grocery store clerk who is about to get evicted from her apartment on Christmas eve. In order to make rent, Ronna makes a bunch of bad choices that involve her co-worker/drug dealer who takes off to Las Vegas for the holidays, buying real ecstasy, selling fake ecstasy, a Christmas rave, and a fateful car driven by Scott Wolf. Liman weaves the stories together from different points of view, and what we’re left with is a very bad hangover and the need to slow down.
Breckin Meyer’s white-guy-who-acts-black is still a horrible joke, but on the bright side, wow I forgot that Katie Holmes — before the scientologists drank her milkshake — was ever this cute and genuinely charming. Joey! At the time I might have paid more attention to Liman’s light and sound show, his contrast between the quick cuts and blaring songs and the slow-paced sameness of the characters’ day jobs. Now though, I’m delighted by the casting choices and performances (Scott Wolf and Jay Mohr as a gay couple in a drug sting; Taye Diggs as a cheesy douche who thinks he looks good in an ugly jacket) and the bleakness of the black comedy. For a film that’s so concerned with being fast, it sure has a decent sense of timing.
I find it weird that this is a Christmas movie at all, because really it’s a New Year’s movie. But the erroneous setting is part of its charm — maybe Go does it just so a giant green Santa can hang over a warehouse of tripped-out teenagers; maybe it does it just so someone can say “ho ho homeless”; and also, maybe screenwriter John August just loved the flip line “So, what are we doing for New Year’s?” It doesn’t matter. If you’re like me and you find Christmas movies to be thudding, scraping, shuffling bores, Go is energetic and fun, and yes definitely both merry and messed up. Like, MESSED UP. You know? Like drugs. I made a pun about drugs.
Merry & Messed Up: Because Wall Mart is open all night tonight, and that’s just wrong.
Simon
Dec 24th, 2009
I’ve always enjoyed this movie. Partly because I used to go to raves (we all have phases of life we regret) and because Sarah Polley went to my high school and I find her endearing in a supporting-your-community kind of way.
Also, your analogy with Tarantino-lite being contextual to the time period and now strangely enjoyable is exactly how I feel about Our Lady Peace these days.