When irony wears thin...
Another Movie review from a film I watched on the bus, rented from those robots at Lovefilm.com:
Teenage Caveman
No not the original Roger Corman classic B-movie starring Robert Vaughan, but the 2002 remake directed by Larry Clark (yes, he of Kids, Bully, Ken Park (in)fame). With the tagline “THE FUTURE SUCKS”, how could I avoid this piece of cinematic gold?!?! The film itself, is not a strict remake, its clear from the opening scenes that the filmmakers have brought forward the shock twist-ending of the original that the world we’ve been following is not a prehistoric one, but in fact a post-apocalyptic one. This is obvious from the opening shots, littered with debris from the twentieth century.
The central characters in this film are a group of teenagers living in a puritanical, corrupt tribal system hidden away in the caves. The group act like normal teenagers, curious about the outside world, curious about drinking, reading and fucking, all things frowned on by the authority figures of the tribe. Eventually when one of the group kills his own father for abusing his girlfriend, the group are cast out and wonder the ravaged desert planet. Eventually they come upon an abandoned city. Knocked out by a fierce storm the group wake to find themselves to clothed in clean, modern (i.e. our era) underwear. They are now guests of Neil and Judith, two genetically modified “teens” who have lived in the city since before the war, 120 years ago. The pair introduce the group to the pleasures of drink, drugs and sex, but it all comes at a deadly price.
This film had the potential to ask some interesting questions and explore some of the same subtextual territory as Clark’s other films, teenage self-harm/self-destruction, but in sci-fi genre trappings. And if you work really, really hard you can find some of those ideas, beneath the twenty minute drug/sex orgy (believe me, its not as exciting as it sounds). The idea that the Teenage Caveman of the title is not the rag-swathed teens seen living in the caves, but the 120 year old teenager trying to keep the spirit of the twentieth century alive, is expressed in the character’s dialogue, “We’re the fucking dinosaurs, man, we’re extinct.”
But on the surface, the film reeks. Overacting vs. non-acting models, rubbish sfx and the aforementioned sex+drug marathons, which the film focuses on, damage any chance this film at being redeemed.
Teenage Caveman
No not the original Roger Corman classic B-movie starring Robert Vaughan, but the 2002 remake directed by Larry Clark (yes, he of Kids, Bully, Ken Park (in)fame). With the tagline “THE FUTURE SUCKS”, how could I avoid this piece of cinematic gold?!?! The film itself, is not a strict remake, its clear from the opening scenes that the filmmakers have brought forward the shock twist-ending of the original that the world we’ve been following is not a prehistoric one, but in fact a post-apocalyptic one. This is obvious from the opening shots, littered with debris from the twentieth century.
The central characters in this film are a group of teenagers living in a puritanical, corrupt tribal system hidden away in the caves. The group act like normal teenagers, curious about the outside world, curious about drinking, reading and fucking, all things frowned on by the authority figures of the tribe. Eventually when one of the group kills his own father for abusing his girlfriend, the group are cast out and wonder the ravaged desert planet. Eventually they come upon an abandoned city. Knocked out by a fierce storm the group wake to find themselves to clothed in clean, modern (i.e. our era) underwear. They are now guests of Neil and Judith, two genetically modified “teens” who have lived in the city since before the war, 120 years ago. The pair introduce the group to the pleasures of drink, drugs and sex, but it all comes at a deadly price.
This film had the potential to ask some interesting questions and explore some of the same subtextual territory as Clark’s other films, teenage self-harm/self-destruction, but in sci-fi genre trappings. And if you work really, really hard you can find some of those ideas, beneath the twenty minute drug/sex orgy (believe me, its not as exciting as it sounds). The idea that the Teenage Caveman of the title is not the rag-swathed teens seen living in the caves, but the 120 year old teenager trying to keep the spirit of the twentieth century alive, is expressed in the character’s dialogue, “We’re the fucking dinosaurs, man, we’re extinct.”
But on the surface, the film reeks. Overacting vs. non-acting models, rubbish sfx and the aforementioned sex+drug marathons, which the film focuses on, damage any chance this film at being redeemed.
posted by James Plumb at 4:28 pm
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2:54 pm
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