Out of luck

Saint John of Las Vegas is a weak indie entry

AGAINST THE ODDS: Steve Buscemi

by MATTHEW HAYS

There’s a strange irony to the timing of the release of Saint John of Las Vegas, a new low-budget film that opens this week. Just a few days ago, the official announcement came that Miramax, the fabled independent film distributor and production house, was being shuttered by parent company Disney.

That announcement, of course, simply made official what many industry onlookers had already declared. But it was a bitter day for an entire generation of film freaks—and I count myself among them—who had our cinematic sensibilities and expectations shaped and warped by the independent cinema associated with Miramax and Sundance. Indeed, it is arguable that names like Todd Haynes, Jim Jarmusch, Patricia Rozema and Steve Buscemi would be unrecognizable if it weren’t for these two institutions.

Now, here’s Buscemi, doing his shtick again after an unwarranted absence from leading-role status in movies. But sadly, everything about Saint John of Las Vegas is a reminder of precisely what was so often annoying about American indie cinema of the past few decades. Filmmaker Hue Rhodes’ feature plays out like a bad pastiche of every irritating Sundance cliché imaginable. There’s our fraught anti-hero (Buscemi), a hapless recovering gambler who still sneaks in the odd scratch-and-win card. Stuck in a soulless job, he’s forced into an awkward spot when he must go to Vegas to prove that a stripper is in fact fraudulently claiming insurance money. He knows the gambling oasis could prove his downfall, so he’s reluctant—but his boss insists, so he has no choice.

Saint John of Las Vegas does away with such unnecessary things as character motivation. (This being a quasi-road movie, none of it has to make much sense.) The flat gags, however, are here in full force. The attempts at keeping things quirky—the wheelchair-bound stripper performs a lap dance! Buscemi’s boss is a dwarf!—feel contrived and tedious. And even the considerable charisma of pro oddball Buscemi, flanked by the added considerable charisma of Sarah Silverman, cannot save this movie.

This feature serves best as a kind of artefact. Herein lies what made us groan about indies spawned from Sundance. Lest we forget Poison, Welcome to the Dollhouse and The Deep End.

SAINT JOHN OF LAS VEGAS OPENS
FRIDAY, FEB. 5