November 14th, 2018
Directed by: Kevin SmithWritten by: Kevin Smith
Starring: Justin Long, Michael Parks, Haley Joel Osment
Budget: $3,000,000
Quote: "Are you really mourning your loss of humanity? I don't understand. Who in the hell would want to be human? God Almighty... In all of my travels, I've only ever known a human to be an ocean of shit."
Trivia: According to Kevin Smith, most of the budget was used to obtain the rights to use the song "Tusk" by Fleetwood Mac.
Like a lot of nineties kids, I fell in love with Kevin Smith's comedy movies: Clerks, Mallrats, Chasing Amy. Something about them seemed to captured the feeling of the mid-nineties and I couldn't help but relate to the characters hilarious struggles to understand who they were and what their place was in the world. My admiration for Smith's comedy is one reason why I was so taken aback by how dark of a movie he was able to create. I knew Smith was capable of creating a serious movie (I had enjoyed his Red State) but didn't know that he could create such a disturbing picture. The movie starts out innocent enough with an expected kidnapping but then goes from zero to sixty in a matter of seconds. The visuals and special effects of turning Justin Long into a Walrus are much more disturbing than one might have thought (the idea sounds funny in theory but becomes a nightmare in practice). Michael Parks (Bill's pimp dad in Kill Bill Vol. 2), Haley Joel Osment, and even a surprise part by Johnny Depp add to the enjoyment of the film. The movie is part Stephen King's Misery and part David Cronenberg's The Fly and is guaranteed to cause either disgust or laughter, but probably both. Either way, Kevin Smith has created a true nightmare that will make it hard to ever look at Justin Long the same way again.
The movie focuses on two friends, Wallace (Justin Long) and Teddy (Haley Joel Osment), who host a podcast called the "Not-See Party" where they laugh at other people's humiliations and generally act like a couple of assholes. Wallace goes off to Canada to find a viral video star who accidentally cut his own leg off but while there finds out that the kid committed suicide. While bumming around Canada, Wallace finds a flyer for someone offering a free room with stories. Unable to pass up the opportunity, Wallace goes to his house where he does hear some great stories about World War II, where a walrus the guy named Mr. Tusk saves his life. Wallace passes out and awakens to find one of his legs amputated and tied up. From there, the guy goes through a few steps to turn Wallace into a walrus by mutilating his body, attaching other body parts and using his tibia bones as tusks. Meanwhile, Teddy and Wallace's girlfriend (whom he is banging) try to find Wallace eventually hiring the help of Detective Guy LaPointe (Johnny Depp). Wallace is conditioned to behave like a walrus and eventually realizes he will have to fight his captor who feels guilty for killing and eating the walrus who saved his life so many years ago...
Alright, let's get right down to it. The walrus suit. This is by far the focal point of the movie and what will be remembered. Using surprisingly well done practical effects, the suit actually looks like what a human/walrus crossbreed would look like. It straddles a thin line between vile and ridiculous making it both repulsive and, at times, hilarious. The suit is a patchwork of human skin with glimpses of other victims' faces stitched into it. The disgust and dark humor is built upon as Wallace's captor develops a bond and kinship with his creation.
Tusk, at its heart, is both a body horror and an isolation film. Earlier in the film, the movie benefits from the terror Wallace's captor is able to inflict on him. There is a gradual build up in his violence with the first drugging, then cutting off his limbs, before finally moving on to his final mutilation. Located in a remote cabin in Canada, the film effectively conveys the helpless feelings of someone incapacitated by another. Then the movie takes that sharp left turn and becomes a body horror as Justin Long's character gradually becomes the entity that his body has been transformed into. It is the emotional and psychological transformation that follows the physical that I found most disturbing to watch. I couldn't help but feel anxious watching Wallace's change and wondering what I would do in the situation? Maybe acceptance is the only recourse?
The movie is not without Smith's signature humor that helps to lighten the bleak film. Surprisingly, it is Johnny Depp's character that provides a lot of the comic relief. And despite the more graphic nature of the film, it is without a doubt a Kevin Smith movie. There is even a brief cameo of both Kevin Smith's and Johnny Depp's daughters as convenience story clerks (a nod to his earlier film Clerks). The two clerks will go on to play the main characters in a spinoff movie called Yoga Hosers which is to be the second in a Canadian trilogy being worked on by Kevin Smith. I had heard negative things about Yoga Hosers, but now I"m curious. Maybe I'll give it a shot soon.
...what's your thoughts?
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