Southland Tales is one crazy movie. It was so crazy that I was not able to completely follow it all and at times, I was utterly lost. However, I stuck it out. I wanted to know how it all would end. The amazing thing is that the ending makes sense. I didn’t think that it was going to be possible to pull so many storylines together, but it happened and worked well. At the end, I found myself liking the movie. I liked it a lot.

I think that one of the reasons that I like the move so much was that it felt like something that I would write. I even found myself wondering why I had not written it, shame on me for not better using my time to write such a great piece of science fiction. Anyway, it is well worth watching.

It has one of the largest ensemble casts that I’ve ever seen. One of the fun things about this movie is that my wife and I would point at the TV and say, “That’s Kevin Smith,” or “That’s the guy from Princess Bride, Mr. Inconceivable.” We also had a laugh at seeing the worlds most famous Dragon Lady, seemingly playing herself. Check out the Southland Tales (2006) on www.imdb.com for a full cast list, it’s really long!

What I liked most about this film was the narration. At first it felt off and jarring, but as the movie kept falling deeper into strange, I was glad that I had a guiding voice to keep me on track and in the know. Many of my stories use this device. In fact, I’ve been having trouble with one of my short stories for my collection that is due in the fall. Watching this movie made me realize that I had not taken the narrators voice far enough. I’m now reenergized about completing my Thesis.

Well, even though there are plenty of reviews out there that would recommend skipping this movie all together, I’m not one of them. I say see it. Have fun! The actors sure had a good time making this one.

The Soulless Machine