Me You Madness (C or 2/4 stars)
Beautiful Scottish star Louise Linton produces, directs, writes & stars in 'Me You Madness', an utterly nutty, mostly unsuccessful, but still oddly compelling comedy to watch. Linton stars as Catherine Black, a brilliant, designer-dressed, uber-rich hedge fund manager in L.A. She's fabulous, as she likes to tell us many times in copious breaking-of-the-4th-wall moments. But beneath her svelte, bleach-blonded fabulousness, we soon learn that she is a proud murderous psychopath.
Her likely next conquest comes in the form of 35 yr. old Tyler Jones (Ed Westwick), a good-looking petty thief who stumbles his way into her lavish & sprawling Malibu mansion looking to rent a room. After being roofied & bedded by Catherine & her slinky BFF Yu Yan (Shuya Chang), hot-but-dumb-as-a-bag-of-rocks Tyler is swept up in a new life of $$ & romance -- oblivious that in-btwn. Catherine's b*tch boss board meetings & intense spin classes, she partakes in her gleeful hobby of chopping up guys just like him. In fact, Catherine - prone to blaring 1980s pop hits - even exhibits Flashdance-style dancing while seductively clutching a bunch of dismembered body parts that she retrieves from her ice box.
Speaking of music numbers, Tyler gets his own solo number played out in a silk robe & his undies as he prances through the endless rooms of the Malibu mansion {straaange, but a curio to behold}. When Tyler finally discovers her cadaverous freezer in the garage, Catherine uses the likes of a broken martini glass, a hedge trimmer, a crossbow & a chainsaw in attempts to subdue Tyler. But Mr. Dumb Dumb still wants to convince her that he is the right man for her; a man to change her ways. And as she wields these weapons, she actually contemplates ... is he right? Is Tyler the man to halt her serial killer ways? Ridiculousness ensues.
This movie is audacious, but also absolutely absurd. The 1st 10 minutes or so are pretty entertaining & actually quite ingenious. Louise Linton sets-up her Catherine as a sort of Sharon Stone 'Catherine Tremmel a la Basic Instinct' type -- I really dug that. I enjoyed her cheeky one-liners & personal rants that she throws us {the audience}. But as the film goes on, it gets sillier, trashier, ego-drenched & self -indulgent x1000. And at just 95 minutes in length, it reallllllllllllly starts wearing out its welcome with even a good half hour or more before the end credits. And then the ending itself felt like it came from a different movie that we had been watching.
It's cool to watch a darkly comedic serial killer comedy that puts a spin on 2000's American Psycho {starring Christian Bale} and even 2005's Mr. & Mrs. Smith. But what felt inspired early on falls steeply into 'who cares!?' territory with a smattering of original visual motifs & humorous asides sprinkled in. Other than the sporadic humor & Louise Linton's genial presence, I would say that the best component to this mess is the wall-to-wall upbeat 1980s soundtrack -- fanTASTIC selections throughout. Though this bizarre vanity project is not good, per say ... I can see it becoming a so-bad-it's-good cult classic. Despite my misgivings, I still felt engrossed enough to see where it was all going. So, there's something to be said about that.
Her likely next conquest comes in the form of 35 yr. old Tyler Jones (Ed Westwick), a good-looking petty thief who stumbles his way into her lavish & sprawling Malibu mansion looking to rent a room. After being roofied & bedded by Catherine & her slinky BFF Yu Yan (Shuya Chang), hot-but-dumb-as-a-bag-of-rocks Tyler is swept up in a new life of $$ & romance -- oblivious that in-btwn. Catherine's b*tch boss board meetings & intense spin classes, she partakes in her gleeful hobby of chopping up guys just like him. In fact, Catherine - prone to blaring 1980s pop hits - even exhibits Flashdance-style dancing while seductively clutching a bunch of dismembered body parts that she retrieves from her ice box.
Speaking of music numbers, Tyler gets his own solo number played out in a silk robe & his undies as he prances through the endless rooms of the Malibu mansion {straaange, but a curio to behold}. When Tyler finally discovers her cadaverous freezer in the garage, Catherine uses the likes of a broken martini glass, a hedge trimmer, a crossbow & a chainsaw in attempts to subdue Tyler. But Mr. Dumb Dumb still wants to convince her that he is the right man for her; a man to change her ways. And as she wields these weapons, she actually contemplates ... is he right? Is Tyler the man to halt her serial killer ways? Ridiculousness ensues.
This movie is audacious, but also absolutely absurd. The 1st 10 minutes or so are pretty entertaining & actually quite ingenious. Louise Linton sets-up her Catherine as a sort of Sharon Stone 'Catherine Tremmel a la Basic Instinct' type -- I really dug that. I enjoyed her cheeky one-liners & personal rants that she throws us {the audience}. But as the film goes on, it gets sillier, trashier, ego-drenched & self -indulgent x1000. And at just 95 minutes in length, it reallllllllllllly starts wearing out its welcome with even a good half hour or more before the end credits. And then the ending itself felt like it came from a different movie that we had been watching.
It's cool to watch a darkly comedic serial killer comedy that puts a spin on 2000's American Psycho {starring Christian Bale} and even 2005's Mr. & Mrs. Smith. But what felt inspired early on falls steeply into 'who cares!?' territory with a smattering of original visual motifs & humorous asides sprinkled in. Other than the sporadic humor & Louise Linton's genial presence, I would say that the best component to this mess is the wall-to-wall upbeat 1980s soundtrack -- fanTASTIC selections throughout. Though this bizarre vanity project is not good, per say ... I can see it becoming a so-bad-it's-good cult classic. Despite my misgivings, I still felt engrossed enough to see where it was all going. So, there's something to be said about that.