This Oliver North film is one of the more disturbing, dark, twisted flicks I’ve seen in quite a while. Worth seeing, but beware…I’m writing now because I can’t fall asleep.
Its cast is simply top notch. Sean Penn plays Bobbie, a man stranded in Superior, AZ, a dirt town, with all his bridges burnt. Jennifer Lopez plays the leading lady, Grace, whose Lynch-ian life Bobbie is dragged into by his libido, and necessity for money. Keep in mind that this isn’t the million dollar ass J. Lo from ‘The Cell’, but rather Jennifer Lopez, fledgling latina actress who still cares about the craft of acting, and is starting to get good at it. Nick Nolte is Jennifer Lopez’s husband. Billy Bob Thornton is marvelous as a filthy, local mechanic who’s not quite as ignorant as he seems. Jon Voight is a stellar if somewhat skewed voice of reason found in a blind man who panhandles on the main drive of Superior with his dead(?) dog. Joaquin Phoenix and Claire Danes play perfection as a small town couple. And the cherry on the top of this all-star sundae is a cameo by Liv Tyler.
The plot is so circumstantial, so driven by dumb-luck over dumb-luck irony, that it’s woefully hard to summarize any sense of plot without giving too much away. One scene in particular is worth special note. Joaquin Phoenix’s character is a real hothead named Toby N. Tucker (T.N.T. for short). There’s a beautiful sense of the film coming through the screen as Sean Penn shows a hothead how to be the genuine article, and leaves the cardboard cut-out lying crying on the street.
The cinematography of ‘U Turn’ elevates it from mediocre and weird to dark, twisted and mysterious. The combination of editing, camerawork and music provide an eerie look at the southwest through a mildly hallucinogenic lens.
For a night of discomforting mindbenders this makes the list along with
‘Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas’, ‘Natural Born Killers’,
‘Psycho’, ‘Clockwork Orange’ and ‘Lost Highway’.