DVD Review: Things Behind The Sun - Page 4

Much of the rest of what they state is blatantly obvious in the script and film, as well as detailed in the other bonus features — brief on camera interviews with Anders (who looks and sounds like a blond Roseanne Barr), Stoltz, Sonic Youth, and Brittany Finamore, who plays the young Sherry. The young Owen is played even more wimpily than Mann’s performance by Owen Butler; but kudos to the young Dan, a chilling Justin De Prume. Perhaps the only bit of useful information Anders imparts in her commentary is that the young kids’ scenes were shot first, which allowed the older actors to pick up physical habits from their younger counterparts, thus adding to their own performances. This is especially true with Stoltz (for whom De Prume is a dead ringer), who perfectly adopts the mannerisms of his younger stand-in. There is also some audition footage, suggested reading on traumatic events by Anders, filmographies, and weblinks.

Yet, for all the potential this film has - and which a better and/or more objective director may have well exploited - it bogs down in the sort of feminist PC clichés that made Monster such a bad film. The men are either unrepentant beasts like Dan and his rapist pals, or wimpy excuses for men, like Owen and Chuck, straight out of the Alice Walker school of misandry. The film even ends with a trite dedication to Anders’ long dead grandmother, described as a rape ‘survivor,’ not ‘victim.’

Yet, despite this seeming sensitivity, instead of showing how the vast majority of rape victims actually do adjust, mature, and cope with their violation, then move on, Anders indulges the Hollywood cliché of the eternal victim who cannot move on. This is, however, in keeping with the film’s immature schizophrenic attitudes toward sex and psychology. As example, it also has too many pointless T&A scenes of sex, yet no male genitalia.

Yes, we know Owen is impotent, so why do we need to see him try banging two different women, and failing? That such gratuitous, and sexist, sex is in this film is startling since the rest of the film is so PC. And, as a whole, the film is far too long at two full hours. It could lose much of its first forty minutes by just getting Owen back to Florida, and cutting the scenes of him shooting blanks. Yet, if that were not enough, there is the bizarre threesome scene with Sherry and two of her groupies, climaxing to furious rock music, an obvious steal from the famous drug scene of Martin Sheen in Apocalypse Now, to the music of The Doors’ The End. Even worse, though, is the whole device of the flashbacks tells too much of the story, and lessens the impact of Owens’ telegraphed guilt, as well the impact of the film.

Article Author: Dan Schneider

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