Okay, not perhaps one of my favorites, but I saw this last night and I had to share. This is the second part of a trilogy by Crispin Hellion Glover (his "What Is It?" being the first in the series), though there is no need to have seen the first movie to enjoy this one. As with the better movies in the realm of the surreal and avant garde (think "Un Chien Andalou" and "Eraserhead"), this effort has a lot going for it, but is definitely not for everyone. Couldn't see my parents and much of the WWII generation running to the theaters for this (which is the case with much of the work of Luis Bunuel and David Lynch, so this is not necessarily a bad thing).
The story revolves around the latter days of the movie's author, Steven C. Stewart, a man born with cerebral palsy, who was stuck in a nursing home for many years beginning in his early 20s, because there was no one to care for him otherwise.
As Mr. Glover spoke with the audience -- thoroughly -- after the movie, he mentioned that Mr. Stewart was 62 at the time the movie was shot. Hence, Mr. Stewart's very autobiographical story is a long-held fantasy of his, wherein he is a wheelchair-bound nursing home patient, whose palsy-affected speech is quite hard to understand, and his love of women (more precisely, his love of good-looking women with long hair) goes almost entirely unfulfilled. That is until he meets a middle-aged woman (a mom with three children) who befriends him, as she is taken with his humor and charm.
After a few "dates," and after meeting the divorced-mom's kids -- two preteen boys and a teenage daughter -- Steven decides that she's the one. He soon asks her to marry him and the "fun" ensues.
Lots here: bendable straws, an ex-husband in a jumpsuit, nymphets, art-porn, lotsa deep-red carpeting, perceived-office-lesbianism, pent-up palsy-driven anger, wayward misguided police, David-Cronenberg-"Crash"-like women in thigh-high leg braces, and hairbrushes galore -- all this in a circa-1970s detective mystery movie-of-the-week.
The movie is on tour worldwide with Mr. Glover, who pre-movie performs about an hour-long reading from his books, including an "odd" slide show, which is most-interesting to say the least. Post-movie there is a lengthy Q&A that will satisfy the most-hardcore Crispin fans. After that he'll answer even more of your questions as he autographs your copy of one of his books, which you can buy at the venue.
Can't wait for Part III: It Is Mine.
