Rent Gummo (1997)

Grim For Grim's Sake - Gummo review by griggs

I don’t know what I was expecting, but being a Harmony Korine film, it was probably this, in hindsight.

Gummo doesn’t really have a plot. It’s more a string of images strung together from a tornado-flattened corner of Ohio, and whether that’s the point or just a cop-out depends entirely on my mood watching it. The setting does most of the heavy lifting — bleached, broke, thoroughly grim in a way that feels lived-in rather than staged. Korine seems to have just pointed a camera at people and let them be weird, which gives the whole thing a queasy, documentary-ish energy.

Some images stick with me: bacon taped to a bathroom wall, a kid wrestling a kitchen chair like it owes him money, Linda Manz tap-dancing in shoes five sizes too big.

There’s a rawness here that lands in places and feels like showing off in others. It’s strange, occasionally brilliant, and grim mostly for the sake of being grim. Worth a watch, though one go-round will probably do you.