Review of Safety Not Guaranteed (2012) by Zeusifer — 13 Oct 2012

This is a movie about life and how time sucks the life out of you. The 4 main characters are Kenneth (the crazy, socially inept, nice, crazy guy), Darius (the pretty, bitter, sad, antisocial young woman), Jeff (the self centered, egotistical, rude, nostalgic aging man) & Arnau (the nerdy, quiet, awkward, intelligent student).

Kenneth has always been weird. He's never fit in anywhere and he never will. Someone described him as someone who doesn't fit in nicely with her friends. Although Kenneth is painfully aware of how people view him, he pretends that he's a skilled martial arts expert who is capable of traveling back in time. He has created an alternate reality to kill the pain. He survives by remaining delusional.

Darius wasn't always weird. She was a normal, relatively happy kid until tragedy struck. She was never able to get over her loss and never connected with anyone. She thinks that she doesn't know what she wants out of life but deep down she realizes that she doesn't want anything out of life. She's drawn to Kenneth because he's one of the few people she meets who is more broken than her.

Jeff tries to act like a big shot and flaunts his expensive car to compensate for the dread he feels. He's not where he wants to be and is nostalgic. He has become jaded and self destructive and he knows that he will grow old and become a creepy old man and although he seems to embrace this, knowing that he'll be even worse off in the future fills him with dread.

Arnau is very intelligent but he's also paralyzed by his interconnectedness. When he tries to connect to Darius by showering her with compliments it comes off as awkward and creepy. Much like Kenneth, he is painfully aware of his shortcomings and despite his intellectual acumen, he's unable to break out of his shell.

Overall, this is a good movie. Everyone will find their own meaning but I believe it's a simple movie about life. We're born, we stick around for a while and then we die. No one is really happy. We may experience happiness every now and then but we're all generally sad and there's nothing we can do about it. It's human nature.