nbk

The Message Movie, as I have come to understand it, is that piece of film which strikes to the very heart of a cultural, political, or social problem afflicting America in the time in which the movie is released. A current example is Traffic, which vividly dissects our country's drug traffic problem across our southern borders. For the majority of these films, the stories are told and the messages, with the movies, slowly disappear, as things improve. In other words, there's a reason 007 can't fight Russia anymore. However, there is one movie that stands almost alone, refusing to age with grace or style. Instead, it ages with prescience and immediacy. Thus, it really doesn't age at all. With each passing year, one may marvel at how this monument of social parody/importance reinvents itself. With each OJ trial, with each Oval Office scandal, with each Columbine massacre, this film's depiction of the blurred lines between media and violence never seem so real as in this day and age. Its sociopolitical relevance never seems to touch home closer than when you watch it next. Rather than slowly fading away, it only draws nearer and nearer with time. Released and scandalous during the Year of Court TV but never more real than today, Natural Born Killers is the greatest motion picture of all time.

Working from an original story by Quentin Tarantino(pre-Pulp Fiction), Oliver Stone had envisioned a summertime popcorn movie, but soon stumbled onto something much deeper. Tarantino has since separated himself from Stone's movie as he is ashamed of the final product. His reasoning, as it is understood, is that the story may be reduced to one small line: The media makes superstars out of serial killers. However, this is no shallow point. As aforementioned, this is a very real concept that itself seems like a parody too strange to be true. What does the word "Bobbit" mean to you? What do you picture when I say "Columbine"? Or, of course, there's always Charles Manson. (referred to by Woody Harrelson in the movie as "the king") To sum up the movie's elements, this is the story of a husband and wife mass-mudering team, Mickey and Mallory (Woody Harrelson and Juliette Lewis). Growing up in abusive households, Mickey and Mallory find each other by fate and, after liberating Mallory from her parents (her father is played with rare dramatic presence by Rodney Dangerfield), proceed to "[tear] up the countryside with their vengeance right out of the Bible." Chronicling their road trip through hell is Wayne Gale, played by Robert Downey Jr, who could clearly overact his way out of a box. In fact, all the performances are delightfully over the top, which seems very suitable to the genuinely out of control nature and mood of this film. Everything is done to the extreme and Robert Downey with a purposefully fake and unplaceable accent seems to fit his slimy role like a glove (no OJ pun intended). Wayne Gale is the host, writer, producer, and director(!) of American Maniacs, a show which is the believable lovechild program of America's Most Wanted and Hard Copy. One of my favorite segments of the entire movie is the opening credits sequenceof Maniacs, which I could imagine should have gotten them into copyright infringements with the Fox network for having so accurately captured the whole spirit of those reality shows right down to the cheesy music and computer generated title cards. Mickey and Mallory are also persued by Jack Scagnetti, the coverboy cop. He's got a bestselling book, Scagnetti on Scagnetti, and a sadistic bloodlust that would rival T.E. Lawrence. Tom Sizemore is brilliant in this role, look for the scene in which his nose is actually broken by Juliette Lewis right in front of the camera- that's real! Stone's depiction of violent cops in the movie on the whole, Scagnetti is no exception, is of note and at one point he more than tips his hat to the beatings of Rodney King. There is an inherent corruption being noticed, the violent on the trail of violence, the abuse of powers, etc...

Last, in the movie's best supporting performance, is Tommy Lee Jones as prison warden Dwight McClusky, who is the movie's true piece-du-resistance, actingwise. With a ducktail hairdo and a molasses-thick accent, he runs his prison with ultimate authority, a bloodvessel ready to burst from his temples at all times in quirky alertness. Just one year after his Oscar win for The Fugitive and three after his Oscar nominated performance- also for Oliver Stone- in JFK, I think this is the best and most overlooked of his many performances through the years. I won't spoil the end, but it's a doozy. Notable scenes, in general, that I haven't mentioned: Mallory's childhood which is framed in the context of a loveable TV sitcom complete with laughtrack despite the subject matter dealing with sexual abuse and incest, Wayne Gale's broadcasts are all priceless gems thanks to Robert Downey- the best one includes an elaborate "dramatazation" clearly reminiscent of America's Most Wanted, the rampant animation sequences brought to you by the team behind

Where Oliver Stone truly earns his stripes, though, is not in pitch-perfect casting, it is in his technical proficiency in bringing his vision to the screen. As he says, he did not censor himself and as a result, a masterpiece has been created. Calling a movie the greatest of all time is a heavy title to place on a work of art that stands beside thousands of others. However, I am confident in my assertion because I think that this movie, Natural Born Killers, truly is the best representation of a director's vision successfully commited to film. There is a mastery of form to this motion picture. NBK has been called the most expensive experimental or student film ever made and with one viewing it is easily discernable why. The film's unorthodox use of editing techniques, sound design, and format is unlike anything a studio or a major director has ever put himself into before. The film is unique and innovative in its conception of "vertical cutting," an editing technique whereby you create an inner moment and an outer moment of the same action. Parallel views of one moment, in other words. This is the visual representation of someone saying one thing but then we see what they really meant by cutting back and forth during the action between formats, which represent the real and the unreal. There are many cutaways, too, to incongruous frames of violent imagery (fruit decaying, Mickey soaked in blood, ants, demons) As far as formats are concerned, the movie was shot on 18 different formats using both film stock and videotape. The scene with the most blantant difference in qualities of image is during Mickey's first prison escape by horse- look at the film's single most gorgeous shot of a lanscape in 35mm color and then cut from that to the 16mm black and white, scratched by dust and barely visible. The soundtrack is a big hit, having been personally overseen and produced by set-frequenter, Trent Reznor. And the sound design during the movie lends greatly to the idea of

being disoriented- listen in the opening car montage sequence, it's actually 4 separate songs and soundtracks all playing on top of one another. As for montage, itself, too, this was probably the single most striking feature of the movie, personally, the first time I saw it. Montage represents the pervasive effect of television and media in general in our lives, which seems to breed and feed the violent culture. In one motel room, the view through the window is replaced by a series of wartime reel-to-reel footage while nature specials of animals fornicating and violent movie clips blasts from the television. (In this particular scene, look for the clips of Scarface on the televsion while Mickey remarks how movies are getting worse and worse- Oliver Stone wrote Scarface) These backdrops of constant motion never drag us away from the action, but instead, compliment the action. All the more remarkable to think about is that all of the montage footage for each scene had to be previously timed and edited and then rear-projected right onto the sets as the actors would have to pace themselves accordingly to meet certain visual cues. Uncomfortable juxtaposition is furthered by these montage sequences and transcends into scenes of format-jumbling, like the previously talked-about Mallory childhood

Unfortunately, Natural Born Killers has been the sad victim of ignorance. Its excessive quality, which I have argued is its genius in being a biting social satire and a Message Movie, has been convoluted by people who understand its message as being one of condoning a violent state. Granted, violence in this movie is treated with a flippant attitude, but not because the filmmakers do not care about the portrayal of violence. In fact, it is clearly the opposite. A movie about how violence is portrayed flippantly by a media culture that makes superstars out of serial killers has been very articulate in showing the world itself, as it stands. In fact, the violence is the movie is so exaggerated that it becomes parody itself, the excess has a cartoon quality. The idea of vertical cutting, which makes the audience constantly aware that it is watching a movie, is purposeful and allows for an unreal reality. Bullets spinning in midair as I mentioned, incongruous action and soundtrack. Oliver Stone, who is a Vietnam veteran knows the effects of violence and has created this movie to hold up a mirror to those who have turned violence into soundbytes on the evening news between commercial breaks. Violence in the real world, today, has been made so as to make the common TV viewer calloused to the idea of the effects of real world violence. Click, click, click goes the American remote control. NBK has been blamed for countless violent copycat crimes, which is unfortunate. It clearly illustrates that this movie, which gives the audience the benefit of the doubt for once, cannot be handled or understood properly by many. This movie is a clear indictment of popular culture by a knowing director, not blind to the world around him. Satire is used for the purpose of exaggerating elements that seem themselves already cliche. In the case of NBK, the message is so effective and so pressing today as we watch the constant media circuses set up their tents all over the world, getting ready for the next school shooting that it becomes the whipping boy of those it sought to reveal in the first place. Yes, NBK is a violent movie. In my own personal situation, I know that both of my parents were uncomfortable sitting through more than the opening scene and quickly exited the room and it is certain to have a similar effect on many who have weaker dispositions to these things. The director's cut- which I cannot recommend viewing more- further includes a beheading and a shot looking through a gunshot wound in someone's hand. These are powerful images, no doubt about it. However, a sensible viewer will see the irony in attacks made upon this movie. Look at the world today and understand the vast source material that this crew had to work with in creating their parallel world. Through satire and exaggerated elements, we, as an audience, may see ourselves reflected in this society run rampant. It is not a positive reflection, by any means. How close are we to standing outside of courthouses, not in protest, but in exultation? How real is American Maniacs already compared to the reality TV we lap up daily? My favorite line in all of the movie, may very well be the most revealing and important, with respect to the parallels so clearly drawn between violence and the media: In the prison holding Mickey and Mallory, Wayne Gale, journalist and the direct personification of the media in the film, is caught up in a passioned frenzy and begins to fire a gun at prison guards. In response, Mickey grabs the gun from him, hands him his camera and says "Here, shoot with this." The gun and the TV camera are synonymously deadly. The ties between sex and the media and the correlation between sex and violence you never hear about, but are also clearly mocked as a newswoman wears a see-through knit shirt on the air and there are several closeups of blood showering over bare breasts. Scagnetti is clearly also perverse in scenes with hookers and with Mallory who he tries to sexually assault. Please watch Natural Born Killers with an open mind. Understand what it says, do not dismiss it. These shocking images are not put on screen merely to shock- as in so many other movies- but to make the audience alert to the reality of their violent environment. And please, for goodness sakes! have the sense to understand the lines clearly drawn between reality and fantasy in this movie. I consider Natural Born Killers the greatest cinematic acheivement of all time and I stand behind that decision. It's clear sociopolitical relevance and importance from when it was released until even this very day has only escalated with time as our society's continuing marriage of violence and popular media remains a threat. Understand Natural Born Killers for its unique and over-the-top vision, do not criticize it, for, in turn, you are criticizing yourself.

scene, which is shot uncomfortably like a 1950's sitcom. Also, the opening diner sequence, which essentially sets the mood for the rest of the movie, by letting all of the cats out of the bag at once, is really its own minimovie of unprecedented genius. Knifes thrown through the air in slow motion to classical music, the obsession with the color green throughout the movie is introduced, the first and some of the most dynamic vertical cutting, bullets pausing in midair rotating before their victims, and all this BEFORE the opening titles. Amazingly and quite fortunately, Natural Born Killers has not been overimitated in cinema since its release. None of these pioneering and visionary techniques has become cliche. So, I promise if you've never seen this before, you're not likely to have ever seen anything like it. And it is literally breathtaking, like the unique sensation of nothingness experienced immediately after being kicked in the crotch. This doesn't sound like the best recommendation for an experience you want to have a part of, perhaps, but believe me, you will not regret it.