Igby Goes Down review by The Grim Ringler

Igby Goes Down

Color me jaded but, ya know what, I would have much rather seen a bad porno by this same title than to have witnessed the mediocrity I bumbled through tonight. Where to begin?

Igby – played indifferently by Kieran Culkan – is a troubled teen. Coming from a well-off but emotionally vacant family, the only way Igby can express himself is by acting out and running off. And to a degree you can’t blame him because his family is so distant and emotionally sick, but while you can’t blame him, you certainly don’t cheer for him. Igby is the classic cad, getting by on his charm and boyish looks and always seeming to be on the watch for a handout. He runs away from school only to crash at the practice loft of a junkie dancer his godfather is screwing, whom Igby in turn also screws, and he’s content. And when he meets a neat girl at a social party thrown by his uncle he’s content to see where she and he are headed, not even getting anything more than perturbed when he learns she is also seeing his brother. There is so much apathy in this film it gets to the point where you say ‘ok, I’ll bite, screw everybody!’. It feels as if they really wanted to make a dark comedy in the vein of Rushmore and the other Wes Anderson films, but that they just didn’t get how to do it. Max, the lead in Rushmore is so naïve and so childishly selfish that you pull for him, he isn’t a bad guy; he just does what he has to do to succeed. But Igby is so apathetic he just floats from one scene to the next, one handout to the next. Even when we learn that Igby’s mother is dying and he cuts loose after her death, letting all his frustrations out on her dead body, all I could do was think of how much more effective it was when Tom Cruise did it in Magnolia. The entire movie just feels like eight movies smashed together to be an indie darling. Sigh… Heck, it got so bad that I was praying that Igby would grow some guts and DO something, anything to show he wasn’t a robot, kill himself, kill someone, heck, kick a dog, but nope, he just floated by on his way out to sea. Yawn.

The film looks fine, and sounds about as well as could be expected, though when the moon blows up in the third act and Stallone gets, oh, wait, never mind, the sound is find ‘cause all there is is a bunch of mumbling. The disc comes with a commentary by the director and Culkin and there are deleted scenes and a making of featurette. I have to admit though that I got through two deleted scenes and gave up ‘cause I just really don’t dig this movie. The movie’s sorta like when a priest farts in church, at first it’s funny, but after a couple minutes you forget it ever even happened. If you saw it and loved it, then by gosh there is more of it to love on disc, otherwise rent at your own peril.

I wish I could say something good about the film but I can’t. I can’t damn it outright because it isn’t horrible. The acting is passable, and Jeff Goldblum is hilarious in the film, but otherwise, eh, it’s all mashed potatoes hold the gravy – very bland. It’s nice to see Claire Danes working again, and Amanda Peet is cute naked, but that’s about it. If you want to see apathy rent Rules of Attraction/.

…c…


5 out of 10 Jackasses

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