Natasha Melnik – Through the Shattered Lens

“What is rock and roll?” — Fire Up The Shoeshaw by Lionrick

In 1999’s Go, Sarah Polley plays Ronna, a supermarket cashier who is on the verge of getting kicked out of her apartment because she can’t pay the rent. (As Julianne Moore put it in Boogie Nights, “My landlord is a real jerk.”) When Adam (Scott Wolf) and Zack (Jay Mohr) approach her and ask if she can hook them up with twenty ecstasy pills, Ronna agrees. Her co-worker, Simon (Desmond Askew), is a low-level dealer and he’s gone to Las Vegas for the weekend. Ronna decides to get the pills from Simon’s connection, Todd Gaines (Timothy Olyphant). Because Ronna doesn’t have enough money to pay Todd, she agrees to leave her friend Claire (Katie Holmes) behind as collateral.

Meanwhile, Simon goes to Vegas with Marcus (Taye Diggs), Singh (James Duval), and Tiny (Breckin Meyer). While Singh and Tiny deal with the consequences of eating too much shrimp and Marcus deals with people assuming that he must work at the casino, Simon nearly burns down the hotel and then manages to piss off both a bouncer (Jimmy Shubert) and his father (J.E. Freeman).

Finally, in the film’s third storyline, Adam and Zack are revealed to be two soap opera actors who are secretly dating and who were busted by a bizarre cop named Burke Halverson (William Fichtner). Halverson wants Adam and Zack to help him set up Todd Gaines. However, beyond that, Halverson really wants Adam and Zack to have Christmas dinner with him and his wife (Jane Krakowski). Adam and Zack suspect that Halverson has ulterior motives and he does. However, it turns out that neither one of them could have guessed what Halverson really wants them to do.

Go is one of those films that seems like the greatest thing ever made when you’re a teenager and you’re watching it at your friend’s house with the volume turned down super low so that their parents don’t come in the room and ask why William Fichtner is wandering around naked while talking to Jay Mohr about cologne. Under those circumstances, it makes sense that the employees of a grocery store would all look like models and that they would spend their break playing the dead celebrity game. When you’re the right age, it doesn’t matter that Todd Gaines is a homicidal drug addict. All that matters is that Timothy Olyphant has probably never been sexier than he was in this film.

Once you grow up, it becomes a bit more obvious that Ronna, Simon, and even Adam and Zack are basically complete and total idiots and that they really have no one to blame but themselves for the trouble that they get into. When you’re a teenager and you watch Go, you ask yourself, “How could anyone evict someone during the holidays!?” When you’re an adult and you watch Go, you ask yourself, “Why didn’t you just pay your rent, Ronna?”

That said, I still love Go. Yes, it’s basically a rip-off of Pulp Fiction, but it’s still an energetic, well-acted, and surprisingly funny movie and I love the soundtrack. I love the fact that the film actually earns the right to be called Go by giving us a narrative that never stops to catch its breath. It’s a film about being young and being stupid and it perfectly captures why so many of us have nostalgia for the mistakes we made years ago. Go was Doug Liman’s follow-up to Swingers and feels like the type of film that would have been produced by Trent and Sue. It’s derivative, irresponsible, and oddly charming. It’s a mix of Los Angeles and Vegas that encourages us all to never stop moving.

2004’s The Hillside Strangler opens with a woman stepping into a dressing room with several tops. She removes all of the tags. Then she puts all of them on and finally covers them with the sweater that she was wearing when she first stepped into the dressing room.

What she doesn’t realize is that she’s being watched by a security guard named Kenneth Bianchi (played by C. Thomas Howell, with a thin mustache). Bianchi isn’t the type of security guard who relies on cameras. Instead, he sneaks around in the store’s heating ducts and stares down into the dressing room. Bianchi manages to get out of the duct quickly enough to stop the woman as she walks out of the store. He takes her back to his office and orders her to remove each layer of stolen clothing while he watches.

Agck! Seriously, as a former teen shoplifter, this scene totally freaked me out. Beyond the creepiness of seeing Bianchi in the air ducts, this scene also captures the authoritarian mindset. As soon as we see Bianchi, we know that his job is about more than just a paycheck to him. His job is about wielding power and giving orders. Wearing his uniform, Bianchi feels that he’s untouchable.

Bianchi dreams of being a real cop but the Rochester Police Department rejects his application to join because his test scores were too low. Sick of having to listen to him whine, Bianchi’s mother sends him to Los Angeles so that he can stay with his cousin, Angelo Buono (Nicholas Turturro). Maybe Angelo can knock some sense into him. Maybe Angelo can teach him about being a man.

Instead, Angelo soon gets as tried of Bianchi as everyone else. Still, he is impressed when Bianchi orders a fake diploma from Colombia University and sets up a practice as a sex therapist. When Angelo attempts to set himself up as a pimp, he makes Bianchi is partner. When Angelo and Bianchi fail at being pimps, they start picking up women and strangling them. Angelo and Bianchi start out by stalking sex workers but soon, they’re using a fake LAPD badge to prey on anyone that catches their interest.

Based on the true crimes of Angelo Buono and Kenneth Bianchi, The Hillside Strangler is a grim and frequently trashy film, a portrait of two misogynists who can only feel confident when they’re hurting others. Bianchi is the type who wears a t-shirt that reads, “Official Local Sex Instructor.” Buono has a doormat that reads, “Italian Stallion” and a sign on his wall that announces, “Candy is Dandy But Sex Won’t Rot Their Teeth.” Turturro and Howell give two disturbing performances as two losers who feed on each other’s sadism and anger. Bianchi is desperate for Bouno’s approval. Buono finds Bianchi to be annoying but he still enjoys being the younger man’s idol. Would Bianchi and Buono have committed their crimes if they had never met? The film leaves you wondering. As a viewing experience, it’s effective and disturbing.

In real life, Angelo Buono died in prison in 2002. Kenneth Bianchi continues to serve his life sentence.