January 13, 2002

Center of the world - review

We watched Center of the World last night. What a snore.

This is how Center of the World is billed:
"... an erotic drama about a young computer wizard (Peter Sarsgaard) whose immersion in the digital world has left him unaccustomed to normal social interaction. When he persuades a beautiful stripper (Molly Parker) to spend three days with him in Las Vegas, their arrangement becomes a journey into the dark secrets of their sexuality."

The billing is bullshit. Directed by Wayne Wang, with weird camera techniques that I guess he used to distinguish flashbacks or fantasies from the right-now, it spent most of the time boring viewers with details in the lives of three people one couldn't give a rat's ass about. The rich computer geek was just that, a rich computer geek with nothing of substance to say, having some sort of existential crisis because his work, and therefore his life, is meaningless. Florence, the self-righteous stripper and erstwhile drummer in some band, was mysterious about who she really is becuase she really isn't anyone. And her friend Jerri, a hooker, is in the movie so Wang can entice geekboys with a shot of her cleavage. Carla Gugino's heaving cleavage was the only erotic part of the movie. Mostly it was shallow and slooooooowww. It was a geekboy dotcom millionaire living out his fantasy because he has the bucks to pay for it. After 96 minutes (more if you watch the two alternative endings, which are really just re-sequenced versions of the ending but with the unrealistic addition of Florence refunding Richard's money), all I really wanted to do was smack that annoying smirk off Florence's face and smack Richard a hard one and tell him to grow up.

I guess it wouldn't have annoyed me so much if it had actually been erotic. Or had some depth. But it was neither erotic nor thought-provoking. My recommendation: don't waste your time.

Posted by Lee at January 13, 2002 03:23 PM
Comments

I like the website... http://www.center-of-the-world.com/ but I agree with you about the movie, I kept waiting for something interesting to happen. They were shallow, self-indulgent, and annoying characters, without character.

Posted by: stanley at January 13, 2002 04:13 PM
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