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nTitle: Spring Breakers (2013)
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nDirector: Harmony Korine
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nCast: James Franco, Selena Gomez, Vanessa Hudgens, AshleynBenson, Rachel Corine
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nWatching a Harmony Korine film can be a grueling experience, don’tnknow how many of you out there have seen Korine’s first film Gummo (1997), butnit is such a raw and crude film that it can prove to be too much for somenpeople. But then, the thing about Korine’s films is that most of the time theynmix the real with the fictional until the lines blur and you don’t know whichnone is which. There’s lots of improvisation to his films, magical moments arenprovoked and end up happening in front of the camera, take for example a scenenin which one of the girls puts a gun in James Franco’s mouth and he begins tonstart giving the gun a blow job. That scene was improvised! On Gummo we meetnthese two hill billy teenagers whom we follow through a day in their life, inntheir neighborhood. Man, let me tell ya, you never saw America look so ugly!nYou know how most films will film in these squeaky clean beautiful locations?nWell, not Korine, for Gummo he went to the ugliest, scummiest parts of Americanto capture a side of American life you probably don’t want to see. Which is whynKorine’s latest, Spring Breakers, surprised me a bit. I mean, first thing Inthought when I heard about this movie having girls in bikini from beginning tonend was how Korine had sold out! I was like, damn, he finally broke down andndid a commercial film! Which is like the furthest thing on my mind when I thinknof an ateur like Korine, but there it is. Spring Breakers. A “commercial film” that made its budget back more than three times over!
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nSpring Breakers is all about these four girls who are borednof college and want to have fun, they are ready to cut loose and live life tonthe fullest; squeeze it for all it’s worth. Basically they want to fulfillnevery hedonistic desire they can think of. So they do what any pennilessncollege girls would do, they rob a restaurant, take the money and run. For anwhile, their plan works, but then things take a turn towards the dark side. Willnthey end up living the American Dream or the American Nightmare?
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nSpring Breakers was a confusing film for me because thenmarketing made it look like one of those dumb movies about young kids partyingnlike animals, you know, like Project X (2012) 21 & Over (2013). I personallyndon’t like these types of movies; don’tnknow why, I guess they feel overtly stupid to me somehow. So I kind of letnSpring Breakers slip by me because of this preconception of the type of movienit might be. But deep down inside I thought to myself that Harmony Korine wasnnot the kind of guy who’d sell out like that. I mean, his movies were always sonshocking, like a solid punch to your gut! They aren’t pretty things, they focus on the darknside of humanity. Some of his films, like for example Mister Lonely (2007) arenincredibly surrealistic, feeling like something Alejandro Jodorowsky might havendirected. So yeah, it surprised me then that Korine was suddenly doing thisnmovie filled with sunsets and beaches and beautiful people in bikinis. So wasnKorine betraying himself with Spring Breakers? I get what he did here. Korine’s films never made money. They were always art house films deemed too shocking or weird for mass consumption, but you know how the movie world is; directors have to walk that fine line between making art and making money if they want to stay in the game. And so girls in flourescent bikinis was a smart move on Korine’s part; yes my friends, sex will always sell. But did Korine sell out all the way? Hell no!
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nThe deal with Spring Breakers is that from a distance, itnlooks like your typical party film about young people getting drunk and doingnstupid things. And for a while, this movie is about that. These girls go intonthe heart of Spring Break in Florida and go all out, they smoke their weed, dontheir coke, have sex like maniacs, basically these girls party like animals,nbut like most films about excess, there’s the dark side. The side where lifenshows you that going over board has its limits and that having your brain onnstupid mode for so long will blind you to the consequences of your actions. Inliked how the film starts out in a beautiful place and slowly descends into anvery dark place. We are talking about young girls who like the dangerous sidenof life, they like to test their limits, they want to see how far they can gonwithout getting in trouble. Hell, these girls are described as having “demonnblood” in their veins! It’s no wonder they end up being soul mates with ‘Alien’nthe drug dealing character played by James Franco.
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nAnd speaking of James Franco, wow, what a performance. Inhave to say the guy really surprised me with this one. I mean, I’ve alwaysnadmired his work but honestly? To me this is his best performance yet, henreally created a character here. When the girls fall into Aliens hands, younworry for their safety. Alien exudes true evil, they kind of evil that comesnfrom a person who understands the hypnotic influence of words, money and power!nHe brought to mind a similar character played by Gary Oldman in Tony Scott’snTrue Romance (1993), remember that one? The crazy white pimp who thought he wasnblack? Alien has this out of control quality to him that’s scary, but also getnthe vibe that the guy is smart, he knows what to say and how to say it,nespecially to impressionable young girls. So be ready for a bravuranperformance, I wouldn’t be surprised if he gets a nomination come Oscar time! Innembodies his character so well it reminded me of the Daniel Day Lewis transformingnperformance in Martin Scorsese’s Gangsnof New York (2002). This is the kind of performance that an actor gets lostninto. There’s some controversy concerning this character because supposedly,nJames Franco based his character on a real life rapper called Riff Raff? Thenfull story is that Korine offered this role to Riff Raff, who turned down thenrole, so then it went to Franco. So the movie comes out and Riff Raff decidesnto sue Korine for 10 million dollars because he feels the character is based onnhim. Franco says no way, the character is based on another rapper called ‘Dangerous’.nControversy aside, the performance is phenomenal, not to be missed.
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nSometimes you watch a movie and suddenly you know you’renwatching one of the best movies of the year, and this is what happened to menwith Spring Breakers. After a while I was just being floored away by thisnmovie. The visuals are amazing, the party scenes were filmed with gusto, they don’tnfeel staged, they have that realism that I’ve come to expect from a Korinenfilm, I’m sure they just filmed a real life party, you get the feeling thingsnare unfolding in front of the camera naturally. Then there are the colors ofnthe film which are intoxicating! Korine did things with fluorescent colors all throughoutnthe film; the colors on this movie are loud and beautiful to look at. Kudo’s tonKorine for trying something different, sometimes his films are so gritty andnreal, so harsh, but this one feels like some feverish drug addled dream; andifferent color from every pill taken in the film. The first few scenes filmednin St. Petersburg Florida look amazing, they make you want to pack up your bagsnon go on “Spring Break Forever”. Korine also did this great thing where he playsnwith images and dialog, to the point where they collide, juggling the two andnmaking this interesting mix of dialog taking over the images and vice versa,nloved that. Spring Breakers is a Korine film masqueraded as a commercial film,nit’s the film that Oliver Stone’s Savages (2012) should have been, it has thatnedge that Savages was desperately in need of. Everyone talks about this one as “thenmovie with the four girls in bikini from beginning to end” and you might makenthe same mistake I did, mistaking it for a stupid movie, well, let me tell ya,nit isn’t. This movie might just knock your socks off and become one of yournfavorite movies of the year.
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nRating: 5 out of 5
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