FauxNixon

Director Jonas Åkerlund’s 2002 Spun has the pace and editing style of the drug which is the central theme of the movie: methamphetamine.   For example, while most movies have something like 600 cuts in them, Spun contains a record of more than 5,000 cuts.  It stars Jason Schwartzman as Ross, a naive meth addict with a car; Mickey Rourke as The Cook, who manufactures the meth in very dangerous and hazardous circumstances, including motel rooms and rents weird porn while wearing his cowboy hat and visibly shoulder-holstered gun; Brittany Murphy as Nikki, a stripper who is The Cook’s girlfriend; John Leguizamo as Spider Mike, the dealer who buys what The Cook makes and then sells it from his disgusting house; Patrick Fugit as Frisbee, a spacey meth user who buys from Spider Mike and is often found lurking around his house; Mena Suvari as Cookie, Spider Mike’s live-in girlfriend and meth addict; Peter Stormare as The Mullet Cop, one of the two undercover police officers who use meth and make drug busts; and Alexis Arquette as the Mustache Cop, The Mullet Cop’s partner.

Such an introduction of character may seem unnecessary, but with a plot so intricate and a very mild main actor in Schwartzman’s role and all of the rest in abnormally active supporting roles, the introductions will prove useful in reviewing the work.

Ross has a car and goes to buy some meth from Spider Mike, but the meth is lost somewhere and all of the hyped-up meth addicts hanging around are all paranoid and grinding their teeth and generally acting like meth addicts.  When Spider Mike can’t produce, Nikki, who is hanging out at Spider Mike’s house tells him that she can hook him up in exchange for a ride.  Ross accepts and they drive to the motel where she and The Cook are staying.  She goes into the room, The Cook comes out with a baggie of crystal meth in compensation and says Nikki’ll call Ross when they need him.

Most of the characters, with the exception of The Cook and Ross, are constantly flipping out about relatively minor things: Spider Mike is running and ranting in one scene and pseudo-calm in another; Cookie flies into rages and spraypaints “Loser” on their bedroom wall; Nikki is hysterical when her dog Taco turns green from exposure to the fumes produced with the methamphetamine.

Eventually The Cook needs Ross to drive him around to pick up some ingredients.  They end up going into a convenience store and buying more than a full case of stay-awake pills, then go to a porn store where The Cook picks out some of the freakiest and weirdest stuff and buys it, then they go to a convenience store where The Cook brutally beats a gangbanger harassing the clerks and then makes use of this to get free beer, cigarettes and sunglasses; they go to the strip club where Nikki and Ross’s friend-with-benefits both work and perform and by the time they’ve finished, it’s dark and Ross drops off Nikki and The Cook at the motel.

The whole movie is like this and it is at times a challenge to watch, but it is well worth it.  Just as Requiem for a Dream was a movie of incredible importance that seemed to show the true side of heroin, so Spun shows the true side of methamphetamine from manufacture, to sale, to consumption, to addiction, and to destruction.

Spun is certainly does not have the cinematic artwork of Requiem for a Dream, but it does make for a very interesting and entertaining movie that challenges the viewer and forces them to confront what has already become one of the greatest domestic problems in American history: methamphetamine manufacture, sales, and addiction.

Mickey Rourke’s performance is fabulous.  He is the ultimate man’s man, if a little strange in his love of fetish pornography, obsession with nothing but making meth, and weird fondness for a constant stream of what seems to be some sort of Mexican wrestling.  Jason Schwartzman’s part is not as main as is traditional, but this is not a fault of his performance, but rather a compliment of it.  His character is meant to be exactly as important as Schwartzman portrays him and that performance is fantastically realistic and has the great depth found in any well-developed character.

Jonas Åkerlund has very little work in Hollywood and this is certainly not an exception.  He is not likely someone to go onto similarly interesting films like Requiem for a Dream helped do for Darren Aronofsky, but his work on this film is impressive and he certainly accomplishes the goal of producing both an entertaining movie and a gritty, realistic portrayal of life for a group of people involved with this drug.

Look for cameos by Ron Jeremy, Billy Corgan, China Chow, Deborah Harry, Tony Kaye, and Rob Halford!