The Oregonian (2011)

(Repost of a review I wrote five years ago, because someone on FB just asked me what had been released in the last five years that was worth watching. I'm still not sure if I liked this one or not.)

The Oregonian.

It stars that chick who was in “The Fair Haired Child” episode of Masters Of Horror (which, to date, remains the only thing ever done by William Malone that I didn't hate, although I'm pretty sure that William Malone still hates me for that review of Parasomnia I wrote). It takes place in Oregon. Things happen. Look, do you know how hard it is to review a movie which, at its base core, is a diarrhetic explosion of everything Alejandro Jodorowsky ever consumed?

So, there’s this girl. I thought she was living with her dad, but apparently it’s her boyfriend, which is what happens when you allow your impressionable child to watch too much Grizzly Adams. Her bf is either drunk or dead, so she decides to take advantage of the situation by gassing up the station wagon and peeling out of the gravel driveway, bound for glory. Instead, she somehow manages to crack up about three feet down the road and is violently thrown into a purgatorial nightmare world where giant muppets violently masturbate, an omelette addict pisses an entire Skittle spectrum and some guy who looks like Gorgeous George displays an O face not unlike a rabid wombat experiencing an exceptionally painful bout of torrential diarrhea. There’s also some half naked hippie guys running around making daiquiris. I fucking hate daiquiris. Goddamned glassful of moose sperm with a fucking paper umbrella in it. Gross. Fuck that shit, Pabst Blue Ribbon!

Our heroine really wants to get to a phone and call for help, because she’s hurt, and she might have hurt some other people too. But no one really seems to care. After a while, she doesn’t seem to care either. I’m not sure if I cared or not. I was too busy saying things like “the fuck?” and “the hell?” and “are we out of Xanax again?” The Oregonian made me very uneasy. Not in a profound, what-is-the-meaning-of-life kind of way, but rather in a “I just ate a quart of yogurt that might have been past the shelf date and I’m miles from a toilet, what do I do?” kind of way.

In order to retain whatever professionalism I might once have had, I will say this: The Oregonian is well shot. It’s a gritty, mucky, earth-toned Kodachrome creation. As it stands however, I feel like I just got back from a poverty stricken carnival, where a cancerous clown with facial warts and sticky fingers violently molested me behind the camel tent, then smiled and gave me a nickel and threatened to kill my entire family if I ever told.

Not all of the grungy visuals work, but a fair amount of them do. That Chick From The Fair Haired Child has some legit acting chops. She’s also very pretty, but never once gets naked. Not that I’m into that sort of thing, but if you are – just saying. I can see the appeal of the film: fans of the aforementioned Jodorowsky would probably dig it. It might appeal to the cult followers of Begotten.  It’s not my thing at all, but hey – maybe it’s yours.