Review of Rubber (2010) by Max M — 23 Jan 2012

Why did I watch Rubber?

No reason.

Why did I enjoy Rubber?

Plenty of reasons.

From Chucky to Christine, to vaginal teeth to hungry mattresses, now comes a psychokinetic tire. But this one is a little different. Rubber is send-up of the genre that make the previous listed movies. And a brilliant one.

Rubber follows the story of a tire named Robert (name given at the end credits) as he comes to life through his psychokinetic abilities, who (who?) happens to fall in love with a beautiful female traveler. So he stalks her. Destroying anyone who gets in his way. By blowing up their heads with his psychokinetic powers.

Before watching this film, I was under the impression it was going to be a film I was only going to enjoy because of how stupid and bad I thought it was going to be. Like The Room, or Samurai Cop.

Something of that sort.

But no.

I thoroughly enjoyed Rubber. And much of that goes to its creator, Quentin Dupieux. This was his baby. I mean, he wrote it, directed it, edited it, did its cinematography, and collaborated with Gaspard Auge on its soundtrack. Dupieux is actually a musician when not making films. So it is not a surprise that the soundtrack was pretty neat. Not that I am disregarding Auge's work with it.

BECAUSE I'M NOT.

Rubber can be inspiring to wannabe filmmakers, like myself, because I could not help but notice that it seemed to be shot with an SLR camera. With his incredible filmmaking knowledge and skills, he made the film look like a legit film. He made it look like it was shot with something more than just an SLR camera.

The cinematography was beautiful, the casting was near-perfect, camera work was spectacular. I caught myself not wanting to stop watching Robert struggle to move himself along near the beginning of the film. The way it was shot made that scene so captivating. I could watch Robert move along all day.

And the film's audio / sound was great. The sound of Robert rolling over gravel, the sound of him vibrating before he blows somebody's head off, etc.

Rubber was hard not to be sucked into, for me.

But, of course, there were some problems I had with the film.

The dialogue needed lots of work. It was too simple and pretty dull. Also worth noting, was the CGI head explosions. I really wish they would have gone traditional with that.

THEY SHOULDA GONE SCANNERS WIT DAT SHIT.

Those are really the only two issues I had with the film, but unfortunately those are two big issues.

What frustrates me more than those two issues themselves, is the lack of understanding this film has with many other viewers. I honestly do not understand why they would sit through a film about a killer tire if they were not into ridiculous things. And because of this, the film is not getting enough credit as it should. I also think these audiences did not understand the point of this film.

Well.

That's about it.

Don't see Rubber if you are not a fan of the genre it mocks, or if you don't understand / like satire.

Three mangos out of four.