Swiss Army Man (DANIELS, 2016)

[domino harvey]

New Paul Dano comedy focused on a bloated corpse played by Daniel Radcliffe, who reportedly spends most of the ninety minutes of the film farting non-stop, inspires record Subdance walkouts

[lacritfan]

New Paul Dano comedy focused on a bloated corpse played by Daniel Radcliffe, who reportedly spends most of the ninety minutes of the film farting non-stop, inspires record Subdance walkouts

Is that a typo or are you putting down Sundance?

[sir_luke]

If ever there was an "Onion in real life" headline...

[calculus entrophy]

New Paul Dano comedy focused on a bloated corpse played by Daniel Radcliffe, who reportedly spends most of the ninety minutes of the film farting non-stop, inspires record Subdance walkouts

"People wrote books and movies, movies that had stories, so you cared whose ass it was and why it was farting."

[bottled spider]

New Paul Dano comedy focused on a bloated corpse played by Daniel Radcliffe, who reportedly spends most of the ninety minutes of the film farting non-stop, inspires record Subdance walkouts

A reviewer on CBC radio last night described this as the Citizen Kane of fart joke movies. Also as a film people will love or hate within the first two minutes. (He loved it).

[mfunk9786]

A24 will distribute this for a sum exceeding a million dollars

[Professor Wagstaff]

Trailer

[mfunk9786]

If only this film had been willing to release us from the grasp of its main character for the last 10 minutes or so, I'd be convinced of its greatness like so many are. For much of the running time of Swiss Army Man, we are invited on a Gondry-esque journey of creativity and in-camera filmmaking bravura, entirely leaving behind any obligation to tell a coherent story or even tip off where we're headed. But unfortunately, a lack of commitment to where DANIELS (how these two filmmakers are credited and have branded themselves, which seems like the least strange part of all this somehow) choose to end the proceedings essentially ruined things for me:

SpoilerShow

Dano's character has obviously been in/near the backyard and surrounding area of Winstead's suburban home for the entirely of the film, hallucinating that he's been shipwrecked, and there is reason to believe he's a pretty dangerous stalker. Once he stumbles upon a corpse (or worse?), he finds some kind of respite and way to talk out his guilt for his unusual behavior, but also a way of indulging it, involving his play-acting with the corpse in his obsession and going even further with his troublesome fantasies.

Where DANIELS fail, in my view, is in keeping us in Dano's orbit even once the spell is broken and we've returned to the real world - showing people who're impressed or even heartened by Radcliffe and Dano's shenanigans up to the final credits in slow motion, doubling down on the fart gag that was always the weakest element of the film to begin with. If the final 15 minutes or so of this film isn't an endorsement of being an obsessive stalker of an innocent woman, it certainly doesn't seem to have much interest in taking that seriously, as much as Winstead makes a case in her reactions to Dano that what we're seeing is genuinely fucked up. Yes, this could just be seen as a more twisted, perverse way to end the film - but it's also much less impactful than simply snapping the viewer out of it and playing things straight for the remainder of its runtime. That, to me, would be exciting filmmaking, and a great way of pulling the rug out from something that now, in retrospect, is sort of embarrassing to have been enjoying so much up to that point.

In other words, Swiss Army Man is a pretty good film and a special little thing, but it could've been so much more. When the reactions to something this unique have been either rapture or repulsion, it feels very strange to be stuck in the middle.

[knives]

Behind all of the weird Adult Swim stuff this is a pretty generic Gondry aping Fox Searchlight sort of deal with some Wayne Coyne thrown in for good measure. The film overcomes this sort of emotional predictability thanks to the visual smarts that go into this (I hope the Daniels do a wide variety of genre work in the future) and especially the performances. Dano is at his core just doing his usual thing, but this is easily the best variation of it I've encountered and really only beat by his There Will Be Blood performance. Radcliffe though really makes the film. I can only imagine how hard it was to perform this role especially in the early portions before the script wimps out by having him be a more typical character. His deadness is very funny and I could see how is Kulshev like blank stare could have made the dramatic bits effective. They certainly brought out the funniest parts. I like the film and think it is good, but man is the sentimentality of the film's concerns cheap in execution.

To Mfunk's comments on the ending,

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I think the film does go enough outside of Dano's perspective (even if it is just a shift from subjective 1st person to objective view 1st person) to be appropriately critical of him. Yeah, the return may be unnecessary (I think it is the film's attempt to tease an ambiguous ending which I feel it doesn't work as because of the opening scene). Additionally, and if anything this shows a bit of the weakness of the film, the film seriously foreshadows this throughout making it clear that he is at least a potential stalker if not revealing to what degree. So I guess I basically agree with you, just not to the same extent.