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“Chariot” is a dull sci-fi thriller, directed and written by Adam Sigal. One of the best lines from this movie is, “witness the end of an error.” In this movie, one of the blunders concerns Harrison Hardy (played by Thomas Mann), who crosses paths with Maria (played by Rosa Salazar), a woman he supposedly shared a past with and now dominates his present. Additionally, they meet at a peculiar venue, which does not look like any other ordinary venue. As Hardy does not know anything about having lived before, a single piece of information that suggests something is off is an almost 5,000 times recurring snippet of a dream. In search of some help, he visits the quirky Dr. Karn (John Malkovich), who recommends a hypnosis treatment approach in order to cure Hardy’s subconscious looping condition.
I’m sure your thinking Hardy’s Dream is something gory or gruesome. A portion of disturbing content the director cares to frighten his audience with over and over again. As your lowly reviewer, I need to serve my purpose for scaring you so brace yourself in case you are faint-hearted. The dream is shot from much younger Hardy’s perspective, starting off in his mother’s kitchen. While making dinner, she instructs him to move to the next room and talk to his father about buying garlic from the grocery. As Hardy makes his way through the hallway that links the rooms his parents inhabit, he sees an attic in the ceiling that was absent in his childhood abode. Then he looks up and observes a red string hanging out from the ceiling. At that point, he wakes up.
Having the same dream every night for decades is concerning, but if I were Hardy, I would be more worried about the fact that my subconscious was completely dried up, without any imagination. Sigal’s nonchalant approach to staging the dream only adds to its uninteresting nature, setting the tone for the rest of the film. Strange events are happening in Hardy’s world, but “Chariot” never cares to explore these. Either Rosa explains them away, as she does when Hardy asks “what’s the deal about” the man who floats through their lobbies every night. For example, she flat out says to him, “he floats.”
As expected, John Malkovich is one example of many who fit the description of the latter, but before I get into that, I do have to mention Scout Taylor Compton’s character, Lauren. On the surface, Lauren comes off as a friendly, flirty woman, but Rosa gives Hardy a heads-up that she shares her body with an angry 55-year-old British bloke named Oliver who is always pissed off. He takes the reins whenever he damn well feels like it, and he is extremely unhappy that Lauren has a sex life.
My favorite part of “Chariot” is the way that Lauren and Oliver’s accents dip and rise with Taylor Compton’s voice. Whenever Dr. Karn is off screen, the movie is boring, yet she infuses it with so much energy. Too bad her time on screen is limited.
First of all, Malkovich’s actual background on being a performer is puzzling, judging by how he presented himself on screen. His geriatric joker look with shaggy beard and a revolting red wig makes his presence very unsettling. I was surprised at how well he fitted into the upper echelon of the Nicolas Cage performance scale. This is obvious from the expression on his face after Hardy shares his “nightmare”. All I could see in his maniac stare were these words flashing figuratively “that’s it?!”. Dr. Karn uses terms like “defect,” to define his patient’s experiences which I think makes him troubling as well. Once, he drags in this guy named Rory Calhoun (Shane West). This is an in-house joke to anyone who has ever watched “Motel Hell.”
Thomas Mann still emits an incredibly unappealing sense of curiosity in the heinously awful “Me and Earl and the Dying Girl.” It’s clear that there’s no other problem that troubles him except the problem of his character. It’s hard to muster even a hint of sympathy towards him; without a doubt he’s the most boring thing ever.
While this is happening, even the most obscure character looks like they are living their greatest and strangest life, the kind that makes you want to stalk them as they step off the screen. There is a two-headed woman and a black male whose work is to attempt to get the last two remaining turtles in the world to have a species-saving cuddle. By the time Dr. Karn strolls in with a bow that yanks his wig back so harshly that his head is shaped like The Warner Sister Dot, you are wishing he would leave his irritating patient behind and give us an epic speech.
In “Chariot” Malkovich is allowed to do just that during the climax. He tells us the entire plot (you can watch a sample of this part in the trailer, by the way), and the menace in his voice is wickedly delightful. “If you wish, you may close your eyes,” he tells his hapless prey. “I was trying to do this the easy way.” His screenplay did things the hard way. By turning all the ideas that came to mind regarding the protagonist’s central narrative into a mundane exercise, Sigal effectively wrecks his own universe. It’s a pity because he could have placed a sense of wonder around his protagonist instead. It’s disappointing beyond comprehension – what are we to take interest in, for if anything, the film we are watching is as unimpressed with itself as we are?
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