Rubber

Director: Quentin Dupieux
Writer: Quentin Dupieux
Released: 2010
Cast: Stephen Spinella, Roxane Mesquida, Wings Hauser, Jack Plotnick

[Caution: Spoilers ahead.]

Rubber is neither as good as it could have been, or as clever as it consistently reminds the viewer that it thinks it is. But it's definitely the best movie about a homicidal, psycho-kinetic tire I'm likely to see anytime soon, and by far the most interesting and engaging existential study I've seen since Dellamorte Dellamore.

Which makes it all the more frustrating that there's really no story.

Early in the piece, the film's Lieutenant Chad breaks the 4th wall to inform us that things in movies sometimes happen for no reason. "In Oliver Stone's JFK, why is the president suddenly assassinated by some stranger? No reason. In the excellent Chain Saw Massacre by Tobe Hooper, why don't we ever see the characters go to the bathroom, or wash their hands like people do in real life? Absolutely no reason."

He assures us that he could go on for hours with more examples, and that all great films, without exception, contain some element of No Reason. Because life itself is filled with No Reason. "Why can't we see the air around us? No reason. Why are we always thinking? No reason. Why do some people love sausages and other people hate sausages? No fuckin' reason."

This isn't a hard sell, coming as it does from a cop who's just climbed from the trunk of a car that drove slowly down a dirt road, purposely weaving back and forth, knocking over and destroying 14 kitchen chairs. And while his examples of No Reason are so simplistic that you can't help but feel he's missed the point entirely ("In The Pianist, by Polanski, how come this guy has to hide, and live like a bum, when he plays the piano so well?"), you also get a strong feeling that he doth protest too much, preparing the audience for a movie that has little regard for storytelling techniques, be they traditional or non-traditional.

Skip the fact that this tire suddenly and inexplicably comes to life, because we wouldn't have a movie, otherwise. But why is there a group of spectators watching the events of the movie unfold from a desert hilltop?

No reason.

Why is the tire's instinct to kill anything that comes across its path?

No reason.

Why does it seem to fall in love with Roxane Mesquida's character?

No reason.

Why are the spectators forced to watch all this, starved for days, then fed a poisoned turkey?

No reason.

Why should we care, other than the fact that it's completely out of the blue and totally unexpected?

No fuckin' reason.

Rubber was interesting enough at first. "Roger Corman by way of Samuel Beckett" is how one review put it, and that's honestly what made me want to see it. But I also wanted a story. And a bunch of things happening for no reason isn't a story. It's reality. But when reality suddenly consists of a tire making people's heads explode, you'd better believe I want a reason.

[Good]