Review of Kuso (2017) by Hayden P — 15 Aug 2018

To attempt Kuso is to give up on conventional understanding of cinematic narrative. Flying Lotus' Kuso is a film that openly spits in the face of its audience for a very profound reason. To understand one must first be familiar with a sense of absurdity and nihilistic levity when it comes to art films as well as the aesthetic of the dadaist motif.

Kuso's point is very abstract and yet simple: art is meaningless until we give it meaning as is life in any context, the context Flying Lotus presents is one of scattered vignettes taking place in LA after a devastating earthquake that does more damage than the usual disaster movie shtick; each of these windows into the aftermath suggests a different outlook on the creative process.

Albeit much is open to interpretation but again that is another point of the film, that subjective interference has its own rotting smear on the end result of perception. Many will see this film as a pretentious, self indulgent, exploitative trash fire but that is the intended reaction; in other words its mode of satire is so engrossing that to be repulsed by the film is to be a part of its very important meaning.

That meaning suggests we are in a cultural wasteland soaked in garbage and dressed as art. Kuso also on a technical aspect was very competently done and the acting was a whole lot of fun to ingest. In summation this movie is as far and as close as you can get to perfect; within this duality do I find a truly unique commentary on art and culture in american cinema.