Movie review in today's Oregonian...
The no-budget indie comedy "Splinterheads" is notable for being unfunny, excruciating and intellectually dishonest about romance in almost the exact same way as the year's worst big-budget studio comedy, "I Love You, Beth Cooper."
Like "Cooper," "Splinterheads" is about a personality-free nebbish who does absolutely nothing to earn the attention of a woman who's hot, horrible and underwritten. Justin (Thomas Middleditch) lives with his mom (Lea Thompson) and works as a landscaper for his best friend (Jason Rogel). "I think maybe my thing is that I don't have a thing, if that's a thing," he says by way of a personal manifesto. It is the closest this movie will come to wit.
Justin meets an implausibly cute tattooed carnival worker named Galaxy (Rachael Taylor) after she steals his money. Rather than having Galaxy arrested or even asking for his money back, Justin just spends the rest of the movie limply bumbling after her -- at the near-empty carnival, at a swimming hole, on hikes -- as she indulges her "quirky" habit of geocaching ("quirk" being a substitute for coherent characterization in this flick).
Writer/director Brant Sersen helmed a mild mockumentary called "Blackballed: The Bobby Dukes Story" back in 2004 -- but that movie was at least propped up by an improvising cast of Upright Citizens Brigade alumni. "Splinterheads" has no such advantage. The leads have no chemistry; the hard-to-distinguish supporting cast of carnies and loveable eccentrics say nothing of interest; the staging is dull; not a single gag lands; and Justin and Galaxy's one get-to-know-you conversation is never heard because it’s buried in a road-tip music montage. And don't even get me started on the creepy bit where Justin pimps out his mom to her cop ex-boyfriend (Christopher McDonald) in exchange for legal favors.
If you want genuine laughs and romance in a carnival setting, go rent "Adventureland."
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(94 min.; rated R; playing in Portland at the Fox Tower) Grade: D-minus
'Splinterheads' (The Oregonian, Friday, Nov. 13, 2009)
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