Film: Kaboom
Year of production: 2010
UK Release date: 10th June 2011
Distributor: Artificial Eye
Certificate: TBC
Running time: 86 mins
Director: Gregg Araki
Starring: Thomas Dekker, Haley Bennett, Chris Zylka, Roxane Mesquida, Juno Temple
Genre: Comedy/Horror/Mystery/Sci-Fi
Format: DVD
Country of Production: USA/France
Language: English
Review by: Anna Attallah
Written and directed by veteran of the New Queer Cinema scene Gregg Araki, this LSD infused slice of science fiction won the first ever Queer Palm award at the 2010 Cannes Film Festival. Having made his name tackling shocking subjects (from drugs, kinky sex and Neo-Nazis in his Teenage Apocalypse Trilogy to child sexual abuse in the critically acclaimed Mysterious Skin), Araki now branches out into underground cults and conspiracy theories in the psychedelic college comedy Kaboom.
Smith (Thomas Dekker) is a typical college student – or, more precisely, what a typical college student wishes they were: a person whose degree constitutes zero studying and a hundred percent hard partying. His days are spent lusting after his surfer roommate, Thor, and hanging out with his sardonic best friend, Stella (Haley Bennett). So far so ordinary, until Smith receives a postcard stating he is “the chosen one” and people from his dreams disconcertingly start popping up in his waking life.
These include Stella’s lesbian love interest, Lorelei (Roxanne Mesquida), a witch with rejection issues (don’t ask), and an ethereal redhead who introduces herself by vomiting on Smith’s shoes at a party. After ingesting a drug-laced cookie, Smith heads off to have technicolour sex with a voracious man-eater named London (Juno Temple). When she kicks him out of her room, he and the mysterious red-headed girl are chased by strange men in animal masks through the college grounds. The girl is brutally stabbed in the head, but when Smith wakes up alone, he isn’t sure if this escapade was real or simply a very bad trip.
It transpires that the red-headed girl is named Madeleine and she is involved with a secret underground cult called the ‘New Order’. Unbeknownst to Smith, his involvement with this cult is a lot closer to home than he realises. It is only when his friends and family start disappearing that Smith discovers time is running out not just for himself, but for the whole world...
It is clear that this is a film which is going through a serious identity crisis. Is it an irreverent comedy tackling teenage angst, a journey of sexual discovery, a horror film, or a tense thriller? Araki seems to have given up on trying to weave these different styles together and instead has just thrown them all at the screen and hoped for the best, resulting in a film that seems far too amateurish for someone who is directing their tenth feature. Although Araki’s sense of fun and unpretentious attitude shine through, it’s hard not to get the feeling that he is trying to do a Donnie Darko, but falling short.
Firstly, there are the endless “Am I awake or am I dreaming?” sequences which are meant to blur fact and fiction, but, in the end, only serve to make the viewer switch off, as inevitably the scene they are watching usually ends in Smith gasping and spluttering as he wakes. The chaotic conspiracy theory sub-plot also suffers from a lack of development; it is simply tacked on at the end in a slap-dash manner which seems to leave the characters just as confused as the audience. The mystery of Madeleine and Smith’s involvement in the cult is revealed seemingly in the space of twenty minutes, where Smith can barely keep up with the speed of events he is being forced to explain and the camera jerkily jumps from one unlikely link to the other.
The disordered structure isn’t helped by the fact that Araki uses every horror cliché in the book, with enough “he’s-behind-you!” moments to rival the number of scenes where characters start awake. In one scene in particular, Stella is forced to defend herself when her one time lover, Lorelei, turns murderous. The fact that Lorelei is a witch with supernatural powers gives endless scope for paranormal creepiness, but their exchange simply descends into a bland parody of the Wizard Of Oz, with Lorelei being defeated by water from the bathroom tap. Araki does occasionally produce some genuine tension, particularly when Smith is running for his life from the animal-masked members of the New Order, but hardcore horror fans will barely raise an eyebrow at most throughout.
Despite some dubious material, the cast take it all in their stride, with Thomas Dekker giving a sincere performance which captures the vulnerability of adolescence. Juno Temple is also worth a mention as she navigates her way through countless X-rated on-screen orgasms as if she’s been doing it all her life, confidently playing a part that would have been too out-there for many other young actresses to handle.
Apart from a great cast, Araki has also chosen the perfect soundtrack to compliment this off-beat adventure, with songs from popular Indie bands such as the Yeah Yeah Yeahs and The xx to angsty favourites Placebo.
Although his efforts to charm the teenage audience he represented back in the 1990s seem forced, it is when he is in full college comedy mode that Araki is at his best, with some genuinely funny dialogue and sharp observations of college existence mostly courtesy of Hayley Bennett’s expert deadpan delivery. Nevertheless, you can’t help coming away wishing he’d ditched the senseless pseudo science fiction and stuck to his strengths.
Kaboom is refreshingly raw; a neon coloured foray into sex and sci-fi which doesn’t take itself too seriously. The script sparkles with some snappy one-liners and there is plenty of good-looking flesh on show, but even this cannot save the film from a clumsy plot which goes into chaotic overdrive as the sex gets increasingly weirder, the explanations get increasingly improbable, and the film collapses under its own ridiculousness. AA
really good review
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