For a hot minute, Hollywood was making movies with multiple characters whose storylines overlapped or intertwined. Films like Crash, Traffic, 21 Grams and Mother and Child come to mind. Last year, Yorgos Lanthimos attempted to reinvent this episodic genre in Kinds of Kindness, deploying his usual arsenal of cruel souls hellbent on harming others, self-destruction or both.
But Quentin Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction is the template upon which Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck (Half Nelson) pattern Freaky Tales. In their four-part film, the ultra violence is stylized as if it was torn out of a graphic novel. They shoot slow motion close-ups of spurting wounds, dripping blood and fists connecting with jawbones. Only one of the three tales is violence-free but even that section contains a corrupt cop and R- to X-rated language that would have made my grandmother blush.
Set in Oakland and Berkeley, Freaky Tales is an ode to the grittier aspects of urban life in the East Bay. Part 1 is centered at 924 Gilman Street, an early stomping ground for the band Green Day. Part 2 follows two best friends who are aspiring rappers. Part 3 starts at a video store where Tom Hanks makes a cameo. But it’s really a spotlight for Pedro Pascal (The Last of Us). We get to watch him brood and smolder for a solid half hour.
In Part 4, Freaky Tales amps up the violence to Kill Bill levels. A star basketball player also has a secret identity as a kind of samurai warrior with super psychic powers. He’s on a quest to exact vengeance upon a gang of neo-nazis. While Metallica plays their joyful rollicking tune “For Whom The Bell Tolls,” boy oh boy does he get his revenge.
Ostensibly, all of the protagonists are underdogs linked by a desire to preserve their dignity in the face of some oppressive force. Boden and Fleck add a supernatural element to all of the storylines to link them, at least superficially. Like a magic serum, it temporarily empowers the main characters. It’s a reverse kryptonite that shows up on screen as a bolt of green lightning that’s meant to account for the strange energies that permeate the atmosphere in Oakland. After the bolt strikes its target, it disappears in a mysterious puff of smoke.
Opening in theaters on April 4.
