Gummo (1997)

☆ ☆ ☆ ½

Gummo (1997) – H. Korine

There’s only one way to take Harmony Korine’s debut feature, Gummo, and that is as a punk rock attempt to be offensive or subversive (not unlike the early Butthole Surfers or some weird shit found on CDs that came with Bananafish).  Of course, it’s also a joke, a put-on, with some relation to the Paul Morrissey films that he did for Andy Warhol (e.g., Heat or Trash) and maybe von Trier’s subsequent The Idiots.  Fully scripted but coming across like a melange of found-footage with white trash denizens of some American shithole (presumed to be Nashville) – the use of amateurs as well as professional actors (such as Chloe Sevigny) raises the question of whether this is parody, condescension, political commentary, or some echo of the way things really are (the horror!).  Plotless, of course, but returning to the same characters as they idle their days away meaninglessly (killing cats, sniffing glue, and many other sordid acts – indeed, ordinary acts also seem sordid and dirty in this context).  Yet, despite the tolerance-testing content, Korine’s talents are not to be denied – Gummo is a feat of editing, art direction, sound design (music mostly) and WTF bravado.  This isn’t to say I want to watch it again (and I’ve felt less love for subsequent Korine flicks that I’ve seen) but I bet there are delirious (or fucked up) youngsters quoting lines from this somewhere.