James Marsden: Interstate 60
After thoroughly enjoying "27 Dresses," I went home and watched "Interstate 60" again. I've watched this James Marsden movie several times now. A "road trip" movie. Also a comedy, a fantasy, and a coming-of-age movie.
Despite the lack of sex, violence and nudity, this movie got an R rating for language. Minus the foul language, I could see this movie being popular with religious audiences as well as mainstream audiences. A reviewer over on IMBD calls Interstate 60 "a refreshingly moral story with important messages presented in a humorous way,” and I’ll second that.
The hero is Neal Oliver (played by James Marsden). He’s just out of college, indecisive, doesn't know what to do with his life. His father is pressuring him to become a lawyer. Neal is a good artist but he lacks self-confidence. He’s weak and easily influenced; he keeps looking toward externals for answers.
The movie opens with an unfortunate expository scene. I can’t believe any serious screen writer would open a movie with such a clunker scene. Let’s fast-forward to Neal’s birthday party. (Look for the shot of an X-Men comic book on Neal’s desk - Cyclops on the cover.) While blowing out the candles on his cake, Neal wishes for the answers to his life. Shortly thereafter a mysterious man offers him a courier job. Neal finds himself driving west on a highway that doesn’t exist on any map. Along the way he has adventures with the strange people he meets in the strange towns along Interstate 60 -- a road where the past and the present, the what-ifs and the might-have-beens, get all jumbled up.
And oh yeah, there's a killer on the loose in the Interstate 60 universe. It would appear to be Neal’s evil doppelganger.
Other reviewers described Interstate 60 as an extended Twilight Zone episode, or the pilot for a terrific TV show. I completely agree. Interstate 60 would make a great TV series.
I loved the look of the highway scenes shot in the American Southwest. Beautiful.
In one vignette, Neal drives through the town of Banton, where the town fathers have solved the drug problem by inventing, legalizing and controlling the sales of their own addictive drug. Neal's encounter with the town sheriff (Kurt Russell) is fantastic.
But I think the standout vignette occurs in the town of Morlaw, where every adult is a lawyer. It is just hilarious.
I think the climax of the movie is when Neal throws away his literally magic Magic 8 Ball, upon which he has been relying for guidance. Or maybe it's the point where he's trying to get away from the killer - he’s looking up and down Interstate 60 and saying to himself, "Well, I only have 2 choices, I have to go east or west," and suddenly he realizes he can drive off-road and head north or south.
James Marsden is the lead, and is in all but 2 scenes. He is a wonderful comedic actor. In the director's commentary, Bob Gale has several flattering comments to make about Marsden. I'm dying for someone to write an Interstate 60/X-men crossover.
Co-stars include Gary Oldman, Michael J. Fox, Chris Cooper, Kurt Russell, and some good actors I hadn't seen before. Bob Gale is the writer/director of Interstate 60, and was the writer/director of Back to the Future. In his director's commentary he says things like "movies are all about character, it's all about the writing."
Don't skip the director's commentary and the special behind-the-scenes feature. It is really fun listening as the director of a small, low-budget movie relates his trials and tribulations with the art department, and the location manager, and the props guy, and the sound guy, and the rest of his not-terribly-qualified crew. He recounts his arguments with the executive producers over music choices for the movie. The big guys wanted him to use a soundtrack of classic rock songs. He refused, and the reason he gives is interesting. He said he didn’t want people filtering a scene through the emotions that they experienced when they first heard the song.
I have some problems with the movie. The voiceover by Neal is completely unnecessary. This is a visual medium -- show, don't tell. And as I noted before, the first scene is expository and a turn-off. Finally, a lot of time is taken at the beginning of the movie to develop Neal's character and backstory before he finally makes that turn onto Interstate 60. This kind of exposition might work in a novel, but not in a 2 hour movie. The movie needed to "hit the road" sooner than it does, and risks boring and losing audience members. I got the impression that Bob Gale is actually a novelist, not a scriptwriter. It made me think about the differences involved in telling a story on paper and telling a story on film.
Well, I wondered why I had not seen this movie in the theaters in 2002. As a James Marsden fan I would have made the time to seen it. But in the director's commentary, Bob Gale says that the movie was never released theatrically in the U.S. He couldn't get distribution. It had a limited theatrical release overseas, but in the U.S. it went straight to DVD. It’s well worth ordering through Netflix.
Despite the lack of sex, violence and nudity, this movie got an R rating for language. Minus the foul language, I could see this movie being popular with religious audiences as well as mainstream audiences. A reviewer over on IMBD calls Interstate 60 "a refreshingly moral story with important messages presented in a humorous way,” and I’ll second that.
The hero is Neal Oliver (played by James Marsden). He’s just out of college, indecisive, doesn't know what to do with his life. His father is pressuring him to become a lawyer. Neal is a good artist but he lacks self-confidence. He’s weak and easily influenced; he keeps looking toward externals for answers.
The movie opens with an unfortunate expository scene. I can’t believe any serious screen writer would open a movie with such a clunker scene. Let’s fast-forward to Neal’s birthday party. (Look for the shot of an X-Men comic book on Neal’s desk - Cyclops on the cover.) While blowing out the candles on his cake, Neal wishes for the answers to his life. Shortly thereafter a mysterious man offers him a courier job. Neal finds himself driving west on a highway that doesn’t exist on any map. Along the way he has adventures with the strange people he meets in the strange towns along Interstate 60 -- a road where the past and the present, the what-ifs and the might-have-beens, get all jumbled up.
And oh yeah, there's a killer on the loose in the Interstate 60 universe. It would appear to be Neal’s evil doppelganger.
Other reviewers described Interstate 60 as an extended Twilight Zone episode, or the pilot for a terrific TV show. I completely agree. Interstate 60 would make a great TV series.
I loved the look of the highway scenes shot in the American Southwest. Beautiful.
In one vignette, Neal drives through the town of Banton, where the town fathers have solved the drug problem by inventing, legalizing and controlling the sales of their own addictive drug. Neal's encounter with the town sheriff (Kurt Russell) is fantastic.
But I think the standout vignette occurs in the town of Morlaw, where every adult is a lawyer. It is just hilarious.
I think the climax of the movie is when Neal throws away his literally magic Magic 8 Ball, upon which he has been relying for guidance. Or maybe it's the point where he's trying to get away from the killer - he’s looking up and down Interstate 60 and saying to himself, "Well, I only have 2 choices, I have to go east or west," and suddenly he realizes he can drive off-road and head north or south.
James Marsden is the lead, and is in all but 2 scenes. He is a wonderful comedic actor. In the director's commentary, Bob Gale has several flattering comments to make about Marsden. I'm dying for someone to write an Interstate 60/X-men crossover.
Co-stars include Gary Oldman, Michael J. Fox, Chris Cooper, Kurt Russell, and some good actors I hadn't seen before. Bob Gale is the writer/director of Interstate 60, and was the writer/director of Back to the Future. In his director's commentary he says things like "movies are all about character, it's all about the writing."
Don't skip the director's commentary and the special behind-the-scenes feature. It is really fun listening as the director of a small, low-budget movie relates his trials and tribulations with the art department, and the location manager, and the props guy, and the sound guy, and the rest of his not-terribly-qualified crew. He recounts his arguments with the executive producers over music choices for the movie. The big guys wanted him to use a soundtrack of classic rock songs. He refused, and the reason he gives is interesting. He said he didn’t want people filtering a scene through the emotions that they experienced when they first heard the song.
I have some problems with the movie. The voiceover by Neal is completely unnecessary. This is a visual medium -- show, don't tell. And as I noted before, the first scene is expository and a turn-off. Finally, a lot of time is taken at the beginning of the movie to develop Neal's character and backstory before he finally makes that turn onto Interstate 60. This kind of exposition might work in a novel, but not in a 2 hour movie. The movie needed to "hit the road" sooner than it does, and risks boring and losing audience members. I got the impression that Bob Gale is actually a novelist, not a scriptwriter. It made me think about the differences involved in telling a story on paper and telling a story on film.
Well, I wondered why I had not seen this movie in the theaters in 2002. As a James Marsden fan I would have made the time to seen it. But in the director's commentary, Bob Gale says that the movie was never released theatrically in the U.S. He couldn't get distribution. It had a limited theatrical release overseas, but in the U.S. it went straight to DVD. It’s well worth ordering through Netflix.