# Julien Donkey-Boy (1999)

### reviewed by
Jon Popick

    PLANET SICK-BOY: http://www.sick-boy.com

Julien (Ewen Bremner, The Acid House) isn't the most normal kid you will find in cinema today. His overbearing, wrestling-obsessed German father (Werner Herzog) consumes entire bottles of cough syrup before prancing around the house wearing a gas mask and offering his sons $10 to wear Mother's wedding dress. His pregnant sister Pearl (Chloë Sevigny, The Last Days of Disco) also dances – ballet – and calls Julien on the phone pretending to be their dead mother. Brother Chris (Evan Neumann) wrestles trashcans.

The trashcan wrestling, for those of you that weren't lucky enough to see Gummo, is somewhat of an homage to the chair wrestling in writer/director Harmony Korine's debut film. Gummo, a critically maligned freak-fest, was a distinctive masterpiece about two kids that hunted and killed neighborhood cats and sold them to the local grocery store, which turned them into fresh ground chuck. Sure, it sounds like something to avoid, but the movie was visually stunning, using different film stock together with still photographs to create a shocking rural nightmare. It even made my Top Ten List in 1997.

Korine's new film, however, is a totally different nightmare altogether. Officially the first American film (and sixth overall) to meet the strict rules of the Danish `Dogme' group (no flashbacks, no artificial light/sound, etc.), julien donkey-boy is a mess. The story is virtually non-existent and, because of the Dogme restraints, the film is much darker and considerably more grainy than Gummo. Which leaves only the cavalcade of freaks, including an old man who eats lit cigarettes, a guy with no arms that plays the drums and does card tricks, and a black albino that fancies himself a rapper, repeating `I'm the black albino down from Alabama.' And don't get me started on the retard bowling.

I wasn't sure if Julien was supposed to be retarded or not. He would certainly seem to be if surrounded by a few normal characters. Bremner is also a dead ringer for Rochester Raging Rhinos midfielder Mauro Biello. His performance is gutsy and somewhat effective, as I actually wondered if he may actually have a neurological disorder. After all, he did play similar roles in Trainspotting and The Acid House.

Korine explained, after the screening I attended, that he was approached to join the Dogme group after Gummo and that the filming of julien donkey-boy was closely monitored by several Danish supervisors. The movie was mostly improvised (save the phone call between Julien and his dead mom) and Korine used about thirty digital cameras during filming. Korine preferred the initial cut of the film, which ran at an ungodly six-and-a-half hours, and, when asked if the picture was real in any way, stated that the picture was based on `a true inspiration.'

1:34 – R for mild violence, adult language and situations

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