Date Rape

Predictions: Andres de la Hoz will hate this movie. I just don't know how to please that guy....

As far as I recall, Date Rape was released in the 3dmm Film Festival that I organized. Quite ironic that me, the good 'ole organizer of the festival didn't bother to see all of the movies. Then I got a lot of the movies released over the past months and saw them all, except for this one. No reason at all. Jeff recently asked me to write a review, so here it is. The artillery's out.

Alright, so the movie starts. I was under the impression that this was a short film, but whatddya know. I was mistaken. The funny thing is that the plot of the movie IS a short, but the endlessly endless dialogue and the ever-so-present jeff ching still cameras make the first half of the movie move so slowly, so motherfuckingly slowly that I thought I was in for a grand epic not seen since the likes of that other egregiously boring, visually still Root Pie, that movie Jeff Ching likes which I haven't been able to fully finish watching due to me being fully convinced that one day it'll be used in hell to show to poor infidels just what "eternal torture" really means. Getting back to THIS movie, though, it plods along, like a poor cripple shot in both legs, crawling and crawling in a meandering bunch of silly, unfunny conversations and a joke about Sammy Sagittarius that is actually not the total failure I'd expect it to be.

Then, in a reversal worthy of any mystery novel, our expectations are completely thrown in for a loop when there's *gasp* a camera switch. Yup, you heard it, folks. A Jeff Ching movie actually changes the angle. Sure, the angles that proceed are lame, badly constructed, and last for like 60 frames, but it is such a nice change of pace that it seems like it's a change-a-second in comparison. And then, in an even more bizarre, psychotic, and downright miraculous reversal, I actually start thinking "hey, this is not so bad". The movie suddenly starts having a sense of humor. Sure, I still have a poker face, but at least somewhere in the deep corners of my subconscious, a chuckle is arising.

My expectations of this Jeff Ching movie actually being mildly competent are put to halt for a few minutes, while I watch as Jeff tosses another Sum41 song for no purpose whatsoever, and we see a strange "comedy" scene, with an excitement factor of about -23423. And then it keeps plodding along, and it goes on and on and on in 435 frame conversations.

Around this point, I realize this is scene 18, and it's not even close to being half of the movie. While I'm drinking a yogurt and pondering whether I should jam the spoon right into my eyes to end this "non-scenes" or if I should wait to see if this thing picks up, it actually *gasps* picks up. There's actually a completely constructed handmade scene. Wow. And suddenly the movie DOES get interesting, and we get a bunch of scenes that made me consider grinning. That is, until some classic Jeff Ching nonsense presented itself, this time being robots who beat a character up (?!?). But let's forgive that detail and keep watching. Then we get a classic "cumfort inn" custom scene which makes one consider the tough question of what's the joke: the sign or the scene construction.

Reaching the end, we get a token three hundred and infinity long scene, but at this point I'm used to it so I don't really mind. Then the movie starts having some flashbacks that explain the whole pun of the thing, in classic "3dmm short film with a desire to be cool at the end" fashion. Unfortunately, Jeff doesn't take the Apology route (a movie that he rightfully admires), but instead goes in the "that movie that was released like a year ago that was called silent something and was about this guy who was deaf or mute or something", the classic approach whre the flashbacks spell things out over and over and over and take up half the movie. At least here, however, there IS some explaining to do. This part of the movie takes a bizarre turn, however. Suddenly the soundtrack starts flying off like Jimmy Pozin without his prozac. There's more music in those minutes that in like the rest of the movie.

The whole twist is, of course, not really funny. But you know, for all the horrible, manic, and sadistic things I've got to say with regards to this movie, I can't say it was a really excrutiating experience to watch it. I chuckled a few times. I half-grinned maybe once. And I didn't feel too compelled to stop watching. And in this 3dmming world were most movies are lame action crap or lame short crap that doesn't even make me consider giving it pity points, a movie that makes me chuckle is quite a motherfucking achievement. Now, I can give two ratings. One is for the movie as a 3dmm movie, one is for the movie as a Jeff Ching movie. As a Jeff Ching movie, it's actually improved. Hell, it's the best yet. So it gets an 4/5 in Ching-status. But with real movie standards, I'm going to have to give it a -53/5.

No, but seriously. 3/5.