All right, originally this was supposed to be a review of Religulous but I have a lot to say about that movie, and I’m going to save them until I can collect my thoughts. Quick and dirty: I think it is a profoundly cruel and troubling movie. And this comes from the point of view of a non-believer. In the meantime, The Salton Sea:
Bit of knowledge that I’m dropping on you: This movie was directed by the guy that directed Disturbia and Eagle Eye (spoiler for Eagle Eye so you don’t go watch it: the bad guy on the phone is an evil computer trying to kill the president, yes, it is as idiotic as it sounds).
Ok, the review, for serious. This is a drug movie, a small odd little genre that has produced really good movies (Requiem For a Dream) and a fair number of utterly forgettable little films none of which are ever granted a mainstream release. In The Salton Sea the drug of choice is crystal meth, fun fun. Val Kilmer is a meth addict/police informant who’s basically living a double life trying to investigate the death of his wife. It’s not a great movie, but it’s certainly not a bad movie. Some parts are actually rather good, Val Kilmer does a decent job and it has Peter Saarsgard, who’s always good. The no-nose secondary bad guy is creepy as all hell, I’m not sure who the actor is but his mannerisms were great. The direction is fairly competent. There is some lousiness, however. The opening narration is heavy handed as hell and some of the initial flashback scenes are pretty poorly acted. Val Kilmer’s plan for revenge is a bit outlandish, however, I don’t want to spoil anything but it seems to rely on some very specific things happening, and is very obvious given the Chekov’s gun we see earlier in the film. MILD SPOILER Also, he seemed to kick the whole meth habit pretty damn quick END SPOILER. In the end, I’m not really willing to give this movie a strong recommendation, I mean it’s ok, it’s entertaining, but it’s nothing that I’d go out of my way to see. It’s basically an “if it’s on tv” kinda movie. Given the subject matter, though, there’s virtually no chance of it showing up on TV. I dunno if you have space on your Netflix queue, go for it.
