POP UP CINEMA BRIGHTON

** See Southland Tales in conjunction with Richard Kelly's debut film Donnie Darko which is screening on Thursday October 29th by getting the discounted Richard Kelly Double Ticket. For more on Donnie Darko go HERE **

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Director Richard Kelly's follow-up to his debut feature Donnie Darko is the entirely remarkable but largely misunderstood Southland Tales. A response to the post-9/11 world and its new absurd political realities, this sprawling Los Angeles near-future dystopian black comedy thriller was screened at the 2006 Cannes Film Festival to a disastrous reception. In a panic, the film was hastily re-edited, losing much of its core, and released to the public, only to be promptly dismissed.

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Just as Donnie Darko slowly established a reputation as a bona fide cult classic over time after its own forgettable cinema run, something similar is beginning to happen with Southland Tales. What was once seen as a misguided, messy take on Bush-era policies has slowly become a prophetic and ever-more-relevant social commentary.

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The story, set in 2008, sees the United States standing on the brink of social, economic, and environmental disaster, in the midst of a Fourth of July heatwave weekend. Action movie star Boxer Santaros (Dwayne Johnson) finds himself suffering from amnesia as his life intertwines with pornstar Krysta Now (Sarah Michelle Gellar), who is developing her own reality TV show tackling the big subjects of terrorism, crime, poverty, and, yes, teen horniness. Added to this mix is LAPD officer Roland Taverner (Seann William Scott), whose identity seems to have been split in two.

 

Beguiling and baffling, Southland Tales is the ultimate postmodern film, concerned with the direction of capitalism intersecting with right-wing politics, the surveillance state, celebrity, and influencer culture. Everything from live-streaming and faux-progressive tech barons to ineffectual left-wing activist groups is lampooned in a world populated by Kelly's ultra-deliberate casting choices, including then-pro-wrestler The Rock, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Stiffler from American Pie, alongside two pop stars (Mandy Moore and Justin Timberlake), as well as a host of brilliantly offbeat character actors and comedians including Nora Dunn (SNL), Christopher Lambert (Highlander), Bai Ling (The Crow), Jon Lovitz (SNL), Cheri Oteri (SNL), Amy Poehler (SNL), Miranda Richardson (Blackadder), Wallace Shawn (The Princess Bride), and well-known film director Kevin Smith (Clerks, Dogma, Mallrats).

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A maximalist satirical take on an ever-more-ludicrous USA, Southland Tales has finally come of age and is now ripe for rediscovery as we screen the original and uncompromised 'Cannes Cut'. The film calls to mind other political madcap masterpieces like Brazil, Dr. Strangelove, and even Alejandro Iñárritu's latest film Digger.

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A rip-roaring hybrid of Andy Warhol and Philip K. Dick sensibilities, with an almost hypnotic mix of grandeur, etherealness, and downright absurdist, Republican Party-fuelled phantasmagoria. Miss the Cannes Cut at your peril.