The Brown Bunny (2003)
Thursday, August 10th, 2006
Written & Directed by: Vincent Gallo
Cast: Vincent Gallo, Chloë Sevigny, Cheryl Tiegs, Elizabeth Blake, Anna Vareschi, Mary Morasky
Runtime: 93 min.
Rating: Not Rated
Trailer
Vincent Gallo wants to take full responsibility for The Brown Bunny and he, like Orson Welles before him, wants you to know it. As the opening credits make explicitly clear, Vincent Gallo wrote, directed, produced, edited and shot this film, which screened at the Cannes Film Festival in 2003 to a cacophony of boos and jeers, including Roger Ebert’s quip that it was the worst film ever entered into competition at Cannes. You have to admire a person for sticking himself out there, especially when the climax of the film presents the main character, Bud Clay (played by - who else? - Vincent Gallo) literally exposing himself to the camera in an egregious full frontal scene of fellatio. Gallo reminds me of those film school brats (you know who they are) who feel the need to illuminate the profound absurdities of life, only to end up making half-baked movies about hookers who overdose or johns who kill hookers before overdosing. Thankfully, The Brown Bunny does not directly concern itself with hookers. However, what it lacks in prostitutes, it more than makes up for in an abundance of amateurish material masquerading as art.
Despite its relatively short running time, it is evident early on The Brown Bunny will be a chore to get through. Shot through a shaky, handheld camera, the opening scene has Bud hurtling around a racetrack during the final stages of a motorcycle race. After losing the race, Bud packs his bike into a rickety ‘70’s era van and heads to California to find Daisy (Chloë Sevigny) a woman he presumably left behind and still loves. Ostensibly, a road movie, the bulk of the film takes place inside the van, with Bud as its driver and only passenger. Forced to watch Bud drive and stare out the window at the passing scenery - which is barely visible thanks to the murky and washed out colors the cinematography offers up – Gallo assumes his technique and storytelling abilities are so adept that it’s unnecessary for him to present a strong and logical narrative drive.
The second act – if it can be categorized in that way at all - has Bud stopping several times along his journey in a desperate need to connect. He picks up a young gas station attendant name Violet (Anna Vareschi) and offers her a ride to California before leaving without her at the last minute; he casually makes out with an older woman, Lilly (Cheryl Tiegs), before abruptly leaving her; and finally, he picks up a young prostitute named Rose (Elizabeth Blake) and takes her out to lunch before dropping her off at the side of the road. The fact that all the women are named after flowers might say something about Bud’s innate femininity, or his need to find someone, anyone, who will fulfill a hole left by Daisy’s absence.
Obviously, Gallo wants the audience to understand that Bud is troubled over Daisy by endlessly cutting to close-ups of Bud emoting loneliness and loss, and interspersing flashbacks of Daisy and Bud kissing. However, this only works during shots that are adequately framed and focused, which for The Brown Bunny is a rarity. For some reason Gallo insists on not only throwing out film logic and audience participation, but he needlessly throws out basic film grammar as well, severely trying our patience with material that is bland to begin with. There is only so much time an audience can stare at the side of a car door while our main character goes to the bathroom. When they do work, the close-ups are one of the few interesting aspects of Gallo’s direction, adding an added emotional connection to a film that is bereft of any real dramatic weight. This works in large part because of Gallo’s face, which is at once repulsive and strangely engaging.
The journey finally ends when Bud arrives in Los Angeles and reunites with Daisy in a hotel room. It is here, during the final third of the film, and after the aforementioned sexual display of hubris, that The Brown Bunny actually amounts to something other than a glorified narcissistic exercise. A shocking revelation is learned which brings new light to everything that happened before. Bud and Daisy are surprisingly moving as emotionally scarred lovers, and it is during these scenes that Gallo’s fly-on-the-wall approach to directing actually connects emotionally. It is a shame then that the entire film up to that point is so painfully dull that it ultimately overwhelms the emotional climax. Gallo would have been better served offering up The Brown Bunny as an entry into a short film festival somewhere, leaving two-thirds of the film by the wayside and maintaining the ending as is, because let’s be honest, Vincent Gallo is no Orson Welles.
Richard X
© Cinephile Magazine, 2006
