2 Everything 2 Terrible Tokyo Drift

2010 mind-melter

Rating: 16/20

Plot: Unlike the Everything Is Terrible collective's Doggiewoggiez Poochiewoochiez!, a 2012 remake of Jodorowsky's The Holy Mountain using nothing but borrowed clips from famous movies and obscure videos featuring dogs, this has no plot whatsoever.

I recommended this to my brother who emailed back and asked--more or less--what I was doing with my life watching stuff like this. And here, I thought it was the epitome of artistry. I think he's come around though. This is the sort of thing that appeals to me on multiple levels. First, I'm a fan of the method, a mad method of sampling and recontextualization. It's avant-garde, but it's the way I like my avant-garde with constant elbow nudging and a tongue in cheek. There are recognizable movies here including a couple we've watched for bad movie club, and an intimidating amount of silly video snippets from Christian puppet shows, randy pornographies, news programs, infomercials, and whatever the hell else these guys dug up while scouring thrift stores, yard sales, or people's garbage cans. It's a deluge of imagery that paints humanity as a doomed race of dumbasses, an aural and sonic assault that I reckon would irritate nearly everybody who hasn't already acquired a taste for this sort of thing--the cinematic equivalent of a Negativland, only more unhinged--but for me was just the kind of visceral experience that makes me giddy. It's wild, and I'm impressed with it as a labor of love. It's a 55-minute film, but it's the kind that feels like it could have taken the lifetime of a deranged mad scientist to create. I can't even make a guess on just how many items were sampled here or how many overall snippets this contains, and I would have just as much trouble guessing how many hours this took to put together. It's not a hodgepodge either although it is a hodgepodge, a mind-fuckery that always seems to be threatening to cross the line into too-much or completely intolerable. But it really is artfully put together with themes popping up here and there. It's almost like a time capsule, a slice of life from circa the mid-80's to maybe the mid-90's. There's something like nostalgia, but it's not the kind of nostalgia that makes you feel good. It's more like a nostalgia that makes you sick to your stomach and makes you feel a little sad for the species. Is there a word for that because I believe nostalgia always has a positive connotation. Anyway, it's sick in a good way because this is enormously entertaining. The child within couldn't stop giggling in the wee hours, guffaws that shook the bed and threatened to wake my wife which made me decide to stop watching and continue the next morning. This is awe-inspiring stuff, and I'm putting all of their videos on my Christmas list.

I first started watching what I thought was the first movie but what actually turned out to be bonus material or something. I was hooked instantly with a montage of news clips with talking heads reporting on people seeing Jesus in pieces of toast and other things. Some of the stuff made me laugh like a ninny, some probably gave me nightmares that I don't remember, and some made me wonder about the context. I watched with a constant grin but was also a little sick at what humanity has accomplished. After that stuff, I saw 2 Everything 2 Terrible Tokyo Drift and figured it had to be good since even the title made me laugh.

You can check some of these guys' stuff out here. And you should!