MUBI

The first time I saw Julien Donkey Boy I had been drinking, smoking marijuana and taking prescription opiates. Certainly not the smartest thing to do watching a film or otherwise. I was a big fan of Gummo in the sense that I had watched it a bunch of times. I could never admit to anyone that I really liked it though. I had purchased the DVD for this film only because I loved the cover. At some point my friend said that I needed to see it and so I finally removed the shrink-wrap and popped it into the player.

I liked it almost immediately. It seemed to be one of those films that was really real feeling. It was as if the camera was invisible and people were just going about there lives. I remember trying to turn it up louder because the sound didn’t seem to be coming through completely. I suppose this could be a problem for some people as well as the grainy visuals. I say trudge through it for this is a film unlike any other.

I have wanted to be a filmmaker for many years. At the time of seeing this film I had given up. I felt that all that had to be said through film had been said already. As I watched Harmony Korine’s film pass before my stoned eyes my mind changed. I can’t say that I understood the film totally but I felt what it meant right away. The dialogue was pitch perfect in the respect that I just felt like this was a real family in a real world. The visuals are not for everyone as they are almost like an expressionist painting animated. One may feel like “Why are you showing me this? What the fuck does this have to do with anything?” The old man is drinking cough syrup, one of his sons is crawling up the stairs on his elbows, his daughter is dancing in a tutu and the other son is watching her with lust in his eyes! Cut to: The older son singing his own version of Fara Shaka and trying to pray in the bathtub but having little success. You really have to pay attention to what goes on around you in your real life unfiltered to even appreciate what this film is showing you. It moves from moment to moment without giving you a heads up…my kind of film for sure!

I actually passed out before the film was over. I remember opening my eyes and seeing Julien in his bed whispering and not knowing why…and then an ice skater on a TV and I just was too fucked up to care. I woke up the next morning without any hangover as my peasant blood allows me to do and the first thought I had was, “That is the best film I have ever seen.” And I don’t mean “best” in the sense that every other film be judged against it. No, it was just the “best” film for me. Like how the subjectivity of a religious experience is tailored to the person whom has it. The scene where Julien tries to feed his brother, who seems to have an eating disorder, bacon in a dog dish. His little brother is scared and aquiesces even though he knows this is not healthy behaviour…the editing unlike anything I have ever seen before. The blind girl stranded in the middle of the ice as Julien’s sister miscarriages on the ice, her screams making her twirl in terror. Werner Herzog’s character, with a handlebar mustache drawn on his face, trying to convince the son he is usually trying to make into his version of a man to wear one of his dead mother’s dresses because “I haven’t danced since your mother died.”

This film is not for everyone as no film is. But if you enter it with an open heart and mind you will find a movie that is as beautiful and humane as it seems bizarre.