The Rock plays Boxer Santoros who is a movie star, and a film producer who wrote a screenplay, and he has amnesia, and he traveled through time, and is married too a presidential candidate’s daughter, and he’s cheating on her, and he’s searching for some kind of secret, and his name is sometimes Jericho Kane and he’s the key to everything going on.

The woman he’s cheating with is Krysta Now, played by Sarah Michelle Gellar. She’s a porn star, and a talk show host, and a media mogul, and a member of a neo-marxist revolutionist cell, and she has a new album out. And she wrote a screenplay that predicts the future.

There’s also Roland / Ronald played by Sean William Scott. He’s a cop and a terrorist, and he’s helping Boxer/ Jericho research his movie, and he has a twin brother, and the two of them have a secret, and he’s high on some kind of weird drug that makes him act like a Philip K. Dick character. He keeps getting killed but he always gets better because of God, and if he and his twin brother meet the world will end.

Also important is Zora played by Cheri Oteri. She’s a member of a different Marxist revolutionary cell. But in a twist it turns out she’s really working with the first Marxist group. But it turns out she’s really working with a different cop. And she’s a stand up comedian, and a drug dealer and she’s looking for a video tape that could make trouble. But it turns out it’s the wrong tape.

The movie is narrated by Private Pilot Ailene, played by Justin Timberlake. He’s the omniscient narrator, and a war veteran, and a movie star, and a drug dealer, and the drugs he’s dealing are also a controversial new energy source. He has a dance number.

To have to describe Southland Tales is too learn to hate Southland Tales and I really think that plays at least some part in the current of vitriol that has been directed at this movie. I can’t believe Kelly couldn’t make these titular tales less complicated. All of this back story can’t possibly be necessary. Most of it seemed irrelevant to the characters. It certainly didn’t help explain their motivation.

Given how much of the film is reserved for exposition, it’s absolutely unreal how little sense the story makes. In addition to all those characters I listed there’s an endless series of supporting character each with an equally complicated web of plot lines. Not only did each of their million different plot lines feel unrelated but they often seemed at odds with each other. Most of the time character’s actions seem completely inexplicable. My favorite example: Boxer gets ambushed and abducted by some goons who drug him and take him to… his bedroom, where he wakes up and has a conversation with his wife (Mandy Moore, who I still like).

Kelly really seems to have a problem fitting all the requisite information into his movies. Donnie Darko: The Directors Cut resorted to exposition on title cards to communicate a bunch of boring details. Southland Tales crams in exposition via Fox News style graphics flying across the screen. And that’s still not enough because the movie relies on wall to wall Justin Timberlake voice overs to tell us what each scene is about. The movie part of this movie seems like a superfluous addition to the exposition.

I came into Southland feeling like an ambassador from the general viewing public. So much had been written about this movie that I felt like I hated it before I ever walked into the theater. I felt like I was denied the experience of watching the movie for myself.
I feel a responsibility to give this movie a fair shake. For one, I wouldn’t call Richard Kelly a great director but he is an salient new voice in modern cinema. I run hot and cold on Donnie Darko depending on which day I watch it but it can’t be denied that that film found an audience of devotees. His voice resonates with a certain crowd and therefore his films deserve to be taken seriously.

As frustrated as I ever got with Southland Tales I never quite got over the notion that there was a decent movie that could be found in the midst of whatever it is Kelly thinks this movie is about. Somewhere between an unidentifiable beginning and an inexplicable ending there’s some sort of middle that connects the two.

Southland Tales happens at about a million ideas a minute and some of those ideas are pretty good. In particular the musical scenes are great. There’s a fantastic virtuoso version of the star spangled banner and JT’s musical number is classic.

I don’t know what history will make of Southland Tales and I wouldn’t be surprised if the film were eventually vindicated (sort of). But right now in 2007 this is one of the worst movies of the year.

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