![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.gadflyonline.com\/wpblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/04\/gigantic.jpg\" "\\"gigantic\\"")
<\/a>The movie opens with an amateur (I know, because if I were to write a screenplay, this is what I would do) screenwriting move: an attempt to subtlety illustrate the main premise in a symbolic opening scene. In this first scene Brian is watching his friend Larry, a researcher, conduct an experiment on a couple of rats, where he places the rats in an adverse situation (a fish tank full of water) to see if they will give up or attempt to escape.\u00a0 Larry explains that some rats consistently exhibit one behaviour over another and when given anti-depressants, the rats\u2019 attempt to escape increases.<\/p>\n
The human incarnation of these rats are represented by Brian (Dano), a dull, emotionless 28 year old, who works at a high end mattress shop and has been obsessed with adopting a Chinese baby since he was 8; his octogenarian father (Ed Asner), with whom he does hallucinogenic mushrooms; and his homeless stalker (Zach Galifianakis), who may or not be a figment of his imagination.\u00a0 Brian. despite being dull and emotionless, is the kind of person who doesn\u2019t give up, as exemplified by his persistence in adopting a Chinese baby and by fighting back against the homeless stalker, who again, may or may not exist.\u00a0 So that leaves Happy (ironic!), a dazed flake who walks around in her underwear in front of strangers but fears public nudity, hasn\u2019t held a real job, never had a boyfriend, and has started and quit 5 different degrees in 5 years.\u00a0 Happy lives with her affluent, loud-mouthed father (Goodman) with a back problem, which, like Galifianakis\u2019s character, may or may not exist. Oh, and her mother doesn\u2019t care about her.\u00a0 Oh, and she also might be pregnant with Brian\u2019s baby. Happy, despite her name, is the kind of person that runs away when faced with adversity. Brian and Happy strike up a relationship, despite a considerable lack of chemistry.<\/p>\n
If any of this seems confusing, that\u2019s because it is.\u00a0 There are a number of horribly caricatured characters and too many story lines, all of which make the movie feel more like a collection of scenes mashed together rather than scenes with an intention to propel the story further.\u00a0\u00a0 There are too many ideas, characters, and stories that dilute the main premise of the movie.\u00a0 I felt lost at points, as if my copy of the movie had scenes missing.<\/p>\n
Most unsettling, there is an unnecessary use of quirk. A note to Matt Aselton:\u00a0 not all indie movies need to be whimsical and unusual! \u00a0An interview with Matt Aselton indicated that he was going for a feel that was \u201coff-centre\u201d.<\/a> I am all for quirk, but only as long as it fuels the story along.\u00a0 In this movie, the quirk feels forced, like it\u2019s there for the sake of being \u201coff-centre.\u201d There are so many scenes in the movie that instead of being funny or interesting, come off as awkward and peculiar.\u00a0 If you are interested in charming quirky movies, I would suggest:\u00a0 You Me and Everyone we Know, Rushmore, Lars and the Real Girl and Stranger than Fiction<\/em>.\u00a0 In these films, the quirk is essential to the story and not simply tacked on to fit into the Indie Movie Archetype.<\/p>\n There are a few redeeming qualities in the film.\u00a0 The cinematography was really interesting at some points; some of the shots were compositionally very beautiful, like photographs.\u00a0 Happy\u2019s wardrobe was pretty amazing \u2013 I\u2019d like to raid her closet! And the best part of all, in one of the last scenes of the movie, Happy beats the bejesus out of a pi\u00f1ata of Muammar Gaddafi!!\u00a0 A little heavy handed \u2013 finally Happy has some fight in her \u2013 but a great, fun scene that even NATO would applaud.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \ufeff Whenever my husband and I are in the video store, I manage to find a seemingly unknown indie gem with credible actors and a film festival insignia on the box.\u00a0\u00a0 My husband will look at me doubtfully, not because he doesn\u2019t like indie movies but because he figures, if there are well known actors […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":331,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[231,102,101,98,100,99,26],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/329"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=329"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/329\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3054,"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/329\/revisions\/3054"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/331"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=329"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=329"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=329"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/a>