U Turn

U Turn

After watching films damn near everyday, or at least averaging that, for a few years, I’ve fallen completely off the wagon this year. I planned on October being a big month and to watch a lot of horror like I do every year, but that drive just wasn’t there. Well, I’m glad U Turn was my first film in a while, because it hits immediately and it rekindles that missing spark. Immediately sets itself apart with its visual identity and cues, it’s so clearly of its era it’s endearing. Oliver Stone has tremendous leeway as a director because of the lengths he’s willing to take his style, and I can completely understand why someone would watch this film and call it garbage, and another sublime. Certainly works best when you take it as tongue in cheek and not at face value, seeing actors of this caliber in such unassuming, sideways roles is more than enough reason to watch this on its own. Billy Bob Thornton and Joaquin Phoenix are the most obvious standouts, but Sean Penn grounds all the insanity with an almost “man out of time” archetype that sells the pitch of this backwards armpit as a microcosm of America itself perfectly. Oliver Stone has a soldier in me.

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