|
BREAKFAST OF CHAMPIONS Send This Review to a Friend
Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.'s works soar because his writing style is so colorful and entertaining, not just because of his storytelling ability. This makes it difficult to capture the essence of his creativity on screen, just as it is a tall order to adapt works by Vladimir Nabokov without losing the literary quality that makes his writing special. Alan Rudolph goes for broke in writing and directing his adaptation of Vonnegut's "Breakfast of Champions," another of the new films showcased at the recent Toronto International Film Festival.
Rudolph has always followed his own instincts, just as his early mentor Robert Altman has done. Here he splashes the screen with broad visual ideas and encourages his actors to let themselves go in spinning an off-the-wall satire of American banality involving used car salesman Dwayne Hoover, played to the hilt by Bruce Willis as a frenzied man who would appear to be cracking up. Bad taste is everywhere, which is the point of this spoof set in Midland City, a stand-in for the worst of what small town America has to offer.
The film is populated with an ultra strange assortment of characters, including Nick Nolte as closet transvestite Harry Le Sabre, who is bursting to reveal himself, and Albert Finney as cornball author Kilgore Trout, headed for Dwayne's town to be fawned over in a pathetic arts fair. Finney's odd-ball performance is particularly entertaining.
Barbara Hershey plays Dwayne's wife Celia, a bundle of neuroses, and Lukas Haas is his son Bunny, who fancies himself a lounge singer and dresses like a poor man's Liberace. Dwayne occasionally busies himself sexually with his secretary Francine, portrayed in a state of perpetual preoccupation by Glenne Headly, always delightful at comedy. All of this adds up to a psychedelic mishmash that can leave your head spinning and your eyes bulging, with moments that are amusing and other moments that simply seem like an assault on the senses.
I've liked most of Rudolph's past films even when some critics have greeted them coolly. My favorites among them are "Welcome to L.A.," "Choose Me," and the more recent "Afterglow," which had terrific performances by Nolte and Julie Christie. I admire Rudolph's brazenness in trying to pull off this virtually impossible task of finding the film equivalent of Vonnegut's work. But I left the theater exhausted, even though memories of particular scenes and the outrageous performances are still dancing in my cluttered head. Add "Breakfast of Champions" to the unusual collection of work by an unusual director, for whom lovers of non-formulaic cinema should be grateful. A Hollywood Pictures release.
|