Review of Bellflower (2011) by Walter M — 05 Apr 2013

By day, Woodrow(Evan Glodell, who also directed, co-wrote and co-edited) and Aiden(Tyler Dawson) like to audition for "Jackass" by playing around with destructive toys in southern California.(Children do not do this at home.) By night, they go to a bar where Woodrow competes against Milly(Jessie Wiseman) in a cricket eating contest.(By the way, don't do this either.) After they have a few beers to wash down the crunchy insects, Woodrow asks Milly out to a date but she wants to go someplace cheap. So, he suggests this place in Texas that serves day old meatloaf to which she agrees.

"Bellflower" readily disproves the old romantic axiom to find a woman who will eat crickets, and love will follow. It does for a while but as shown in the prologue, problems arise. At least, Milly warned Woodrow. But even early on, he shows a propensity for violence, as neither he nor Aiden are the kind of sensitive new age guys who don't know who play in the Seattle Kingdome. And as a filmmaker, Evan Glodell is smarter than to glorify their antics. He also succeeds in getting their apocalyptic fantasies right but not in the details of the reality, like what they do for money or even what year this is supposed to be, with its outdated cultural references and technology. And then there is the distressing reinforcement of the stereotype that all male geeks hate women.