The Re-Visit: Southland Tales

Dwayne Johnson is on a roll right now—and I’m loving every second of it. FASTER, FAST FIVE, SNITCH, GI JOE: RETALIATION, PAIN & GAIN, and next week’s FAST & FURIOSIX… and with more shit on the way. So to get my Rock fix, I’ve been re-visiting some of his “older” stuff, and got around to checking out the much-hated SOUTHLAND TALES, from over-zealous director Richard Kelly. I don’t recall liking it the first time around… I don’t even remember understanding what the hell was going on, but it stars The Rock, so fuck it, I’ll give it a whirl. The result? I’m still confused, but I did come to a realization: SOUTHLAND TALES is (more or less) a Sci-Fi version of THE BIG LEBOWSKI. Oh what the fuck?

It’s true, folks. Only Kelly really knows what the hell he was thinking when he made SOUTHLAND TALES, but this is one thing I do know: he was heavily influenced by The Coen Brother’s THE BIG LEBOWSKI. Whether the similarities were done consciously or not, they cannot be ignored. Check this shit out (you might need a Road Soda or a Caucasian to help you deal, as this is some pretty heavy shit right here):

• Both films are tales centered in and about Los Angeles and the greater Los Angeles area, so much so that LA itself becomes a character.
• The main character spends much of his screen time in a ratty hoodie sweatshirt and shorts, looking like a degenerate bum.
• Both main characters refer to themselves with “classic” nicknames (The Dude in THE BIG LEBOWSKI, Pimp in SOUTHLAND TALES).
• Both films feature actual news footage of President Bush (THE BIG LEBOWSKI goes for Senior, SOUTHLAND TALES goes for Junior).
• Both films are set in a different time than when they were actually made, but only by a few years. SOUTHLAND TALES was released 2006, but set in “the distant future” of 2008. THE BIG LEBOWSKI was released in 1997, but set “in the early 90s”.

• Both films feature a music video sequence with rockette-style background dancers that doesn’t even really take place in reality.
• In SOUTHLAND TALES, there’s a sequence of a floating Ice Cream Truck as it travels over downtown LA. In THE BIG LEBOWSKI, there’s a sequence of a floating Dude chasing a floating Maude Lebowski on a magic rug over downtown LA.
• Both films feature a narrator that is all-knowing and all-seeing of the story, though not a big part of the actual story itself (sorry Justin Timberlake, but you will never be as cool as Sam Elliot)
• Both films feature an all-star cast of characters, with more big names than you can shake a stick at. Seriously, if you put the cast of SOUTHLAND TALES and THE BIG LEBOWSKI together, you’d get half of Hollywood.

• Both films feature a porn star driving around in a convertible, on the run from various bad guys. Actually, the fact that both feature porn stars that look incredibly alike is something of note here (and both “big” stars of the late 1990s).
• SOUTHLAND TALES and THE BIG LEBOWSKI each have a cult following.
• THE BIG LEBOWSKI’s  porn kingpin Jackie Treehorn is remarkably similar to SOUTHLAND TALES’ Baron von Westfalen, a kingpin of clean energy who controls political parties… much like Treehorn controls the Malibu police department.
• SOUTHLAND TALES cuts off fingers (and a hand) to count votes for political purposes… THE BIG LEBOWSKI cuts off toes to get ransom money.
• SOUTHLAND TALES  has Marxist Anarchists (at least, I think that’s what they are) running the show and driving the plot forward, and THE BIG LEBOWSKI has Nihilists (who believe in nothing) to help drive the plot forward.

I could probably tie more and more together, but honestly, this is all my brain could handle. Mostly, I didn’t know what the shit was going on half the time, so my mind started wandering, trying to make sense of it all, and the only thing that made sense… was THE BIG LEBOWSKI. So many fuckin’ similarities… I couldn’t just sit back and ignore them, could I? No way. So I started paying attention… was I missing some LEBOWSKI-esque references here and there? No doubt. Would it be worth watching SOUTHLAND TALES again to catch them all? No way.

Movie Grade: D

Discovering its ties to THE BIG LEBOWKI: A