Wednesday, August 01, 2018

Fantasia 2018: Knuckleball

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Perhaps proving her point I think of Stockard Channing's "Don't think about elephants" line an awful lot. In Six Degrees of Separation Stockard's character is attempting to not think about the elephant in the room - in this case the money she and her husband are trying to make off of a rich guest they're having over for dinner - and she says, "Whatever you do, don't think about elephants." But once the elephants are on parade there's no stopping the...

... and so it went with watching the movie Knuckleball after (importantly, after) having been told that it's an ultra-violent spin on its forefather Home Alone. Suddenly Kevin McAllisters are all you can see, as far as the eye can see. Lucky for us, and them, Knuckleball is fluent in elephant riding. It hops right on the beast's back and rides that bitch like a rodeo pro. There are explicit nods shot-wise, costume-wise, dialogue-wise, but just when you're thinking it's a goof Knuckleball goes for the guts. Literally. Home Alone meets Martyrs? Why the fuck not.

At just over eighty minutes long Knuckleball skins itself down to fighting shape - there's no excess meat hanging off; all the better to bruise. Luca Villacis (in the Culkin role) is a winning kid, adding a dash of haunted to the proceedings with his big woeful gaze, and the weirdo next-door neighbor is given gum-toothed gusto by Munro Chambers. Knuckleball is lean and mean but it'll get your heart thumping, one hard elephant stomp in the snow at a time.


1 comment:

Matt miller said...

I'm really looking forward to this and the lovely Munro Chambers. His character doesn't seem so lovely, though.