This is a funny, crazy film. I loved[ftn] it.

I’d love to just post a review like that. But then I wouldn’t have the length to have a cute picture of Naomi Watts.[ftn] And so, I must continue.

Let me first discuss the word “oddball”. I don’t like it,[ftn] but it gets used by a lot of people and so becomes a handy label. This is what most critics might call an “oddball” movie. Personally, I prefer the words “interesting” and “surprising”, but some people are just funny. Anyhow, if you find yourself liking these sorts of films, this one is a near-perfect one. Often, in your more interesting film, the pacing suffers and things get a bit weary or overly worthy. Huckabees never fell flat for me — there’s always something amusing happening, and it never stays still for very long.

The story is a cross section between a environmental struggle[ftn] against the huge retail chain ‘Huckabees’, and the philosophical struggle between two groups of existential detectives. The director, David O. Russell, previously made the fantastic Three Kings — a movie that perfectly balanced the line between seriousness and wit. In Huckabees, there’s not as much call to be serious, and the film spends very little time being so.

Albert Markovski is an aspiring poet trying to lead an incensed community group against the destruction of local greenery to make way for a new Huckabees store. As the film opens, his biggest problem is a peculiar coincidence, which he goes to a pair of existential detectives to solve for him. Due in part to their interference, but also due to charismatic Huckabees executive Brad Stand, things get wildly out of control very quickly.

This gives everyone involved an opportunity to be very entertaining indeed. Dustin Hoffman gets to be an old, grinning hippy type. Lily Tomlin gets to do completely insane things while all the time keeping a completely straight face. Mark Wahlberg gets to go completely nuts at various people, including Nate Fisher from Six Feet Under. Jude Law gets to be smarmy and sarcastic. Naomi Watts gets to be glamorous… at first, and then tremendously funny. Isabelle Huppert gets to be sexy and nihilistic.[ftn] And Jason Schwartzman sits in the middle and does a fantastic job of being the straight-ish guy.[ftn]

I’m not going to say any more about the film. If you’ve seen the trailer,[ftn] you know just what to expect. The script is great, the acting is great, the direction is great, the special effects are great.[ftn] If you like… those films that everyone calls oddball, you’ll like this one.

Footnotes

1. Note that I say “I loved it” and not “I hearted it”. This is because I can speak English. If you catch anyone saying “I Heart Huckabees”, shoot them please.[ftn] You’ll need quite a few bullets from the looks of things.
2. If the subtle trend towards pictures of cute girls in reviews is concerning anyone, please note the parade of ugly people in Andy’s recent Lost review and stop complaining.
3. It’s like “quirky”. Ugh.
4. People with little tolerance for poetry, environmental issues and a few other “left” issues might find aspects of the film irritating. At times I did feel like my opinions on the matter were being taken for granted.
5. That’s probably the word. Tell me if I’ve got it wrong.
6. Albert comes from the Arthur Dent school of characterisation. Although he’s perhaps just a little crazier than Arthur.
7. Best trailer I’ve seen in ages. No big spoilers, perfect idea of what the film is about.[ftn]
8. I’m glad we’ve gotten to the stage where digital effects are being used by more than just the big science fiction epics.
9. And by the by — you wouldn’t believe what a hassle it was to be able to use the heart symbol for the title of this review. There’s extra code in the workings of Grapefruit just to deal with that symbol. So stay tuned for the next computer game turned fiction piece: I ♥ Cortana.
10. Unlike the Ladder 49 trailer which makes you feel like you’ve watched the entire damn film already.

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This entry was posted by the illustrious Tom Charman on Thursday, January 6th, 2005. It concerns such pressing issues as . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.