What Is It? (2005)

User Rating:

6.6/10   

Director:

Crispin Glover

Writer:

Crispin Glover (writer)

Genre:

Drama

Tagline:

Being the adventures of a young man whose principle interests are snails, salt, a pipe, and how to get home. As tormented by an hubristic, racist inner psyche.

Plot:

What Is It? is a bewildering, unnerving, surreal, blackly comic film from the visionary mind of Crispin Glover that tells the inner and outer struggles of a young man facing villains and demons on multiple planes. |

Plot Keywords:

Sadism | Low Budget Film | Wheelchair | Avant Garde | Underground Film

Awards:

2 wins

Cast

Michael Blevis	...	The young man
Rikky Wittman	...	The minstrel's nemesis
John Insinna	...	The young man's outer sanctum friend and inner santum choking victim
Kelly Swiderski	...	Inner sanctum concubine and outer sanctum snail collector
Lisa Fusco	...	The young man's fantasy girl
Crispin Glover	...	Dueling Demi-God Auteur and The young man's inner psyche
Fairuza Balk	...	Snail (voice)
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Robin Adams	...	Inner sanctum concubine and outer sanctum girl who recognizes burning
Cheryl Brown	...	Outer Sanctum Mocking tormentor and walkie-talkie grabbing woman that cries later
Tom Carroll	...	Grave digger and mocking tormentor
Lynn Conley	...	The minstrel's concubine, mocking tormentor and ultimate outer sanctum victor
Zoryna Dreams	...	Monkey woman
Ivonna Earnest	...	Baby Elephant
Scott Farley	...	Floating cloud minstrel double
Mary P. Hayes	...	The young man's mother
Kiva	...	Monkey woman
Muffy	...	Monkey woman
Karin Odell	...	Monkey woman
Adam Parfrey	...	The minstrel
Carlos Richardson	...	The young man's alter ego
Steven C. Stewart	...	Dueling Demi-God Auteur and the young man's uber ego
Eric Yates	...	Inner sanctum Puppet show audience member and outer sanctum / inner sanctum victim

Runtime:

82 min | USA:72 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Certification:

USA:Unrated

Company:

Volcanic Eruptions

Trivia:

Crispin Glover's directorial debut.

Quotes:

Dueling Demi-God Auteur and The young man's inner psyche: Good. He's dead. Now we can have a good time.

Movie Connections:

References Back to the Future (1985)

Soundtrack:

Some Niggers Never Die (They Just Smell That Way)

Sumptuous Decadent Beautiful Ugliness

Hilarious, evocative, confusing, brilliant film. Reminds me of Bunuel's L'Age D'Or or Jodorowsky's Holy Mountain-- lots of strange characters mucking about and looking for..... what is it? I laughed almost the whole way through, all the while keeping a peripheral eye on the bewildered and occasionally horrified reactions of the audience that surrounded me in the theatre. Entertaining through and through, from the beginning to the guts and poisoned entrails all the way to the end, if it was an end. I only wish i could remember every detail. It haunts me sometimes.

Honestly, though, i have only the most positive recollections of this film. As it doesn't seem to be available to take home and watch, i suppose i'll have to wait a few more years until Crispin Glover comes my way again with his Big Slide Show (and subsequent "What is it?" screening)... I saw this film in Atlanta almost directly after being involved in a rather devastating car crash, so i was slightly dazed at the time, which was perhaps a very good state of mind to watch the prophetic talking arthropods and the retards in the superhero costumes and godlike Glover in his appropriate burly-Q setting, scantily clad girlies rising out of the floor like a magnificent DADAist wet dream.

Is it a statement on Life As We Know It? Of course everyone EXPECTS art to be just that. I rather think that the truth is more evident in the absences and in the negative space. What you don't tell us is what we must deduce, but is far more valid than the lies that other people feed us day in and day out. Rather one "WHAT IS IT?" than 5000 movies like "Titanic" or "Sleepless in Seattle" (shudder, gag, groan).

Thank you, Mr. Glover (additionally a fun man to watch on screen or at his Big Slide Show-- smart, funny, quirky, and outrageously hot). Make more films, write more books, keep the nightmare alive.