I caught a bargain matinee of Garden State today. It had a nice tone to it, I came out with a bland feelgood, but ultimately I was disappointed. It lacked depth and challenge that I thought the characters implied and deserved. It seems the movie was influenced by the likes of "American Beauty" and "Donnie Darko", films with explorative indie material or feels, but having crossover mainstream distribution and appeal. But where "American Beauty" was brilliant, and "Donnie Darko", an after-the-fact success, was incredible except for the time concept which is a fatal flaw in my book, "Garden State" just didn't deliver anything except heart candy.

Perhaps I'm looking too deeply in the metaphor of a character returning home from the City of Angels (leaving a cabinet full of anti-depressants) to the clarity of the Garden (of Eden) State. But in a way that's what the main character did - he ended up back in the Garden, a veritable Heaven of loosely strung together scenarios taking place over four days, all a bit too niiiice, too perfect, too sweet. If you want a good movie story, you need a snake, and there is none. The mother? No, she's dead. The Father? There's no prodigal son story here, the tension between son and father is sub sub-story and the resolution is a total copout. You have a girl with a serious mental impairment, really?! Forget it, there's no snake in this Garden, so much for that thesis.

It was all too contrived, and the characters too one-dimensional for the amount of depth implied they have. The father was a wasted symbol. The motorcycle with the unused sidecar was a wasted symbol - should have been tied to the abyss, something missing or vacant, ie - mom. The abyss was a wasted symbol, thank god, because if it was exploited it would've been obvious. The jobs were wasted symbols. The blending in with the wall was such a waste of a metaphor that it should be a crime since the visual was so good that it was almost a reason to see the film in the first place.

And what the fuck was up with that hotel scene? If that wasn't the very definition of gratuitous sex, I don't know what is. Was it to show how fucked up everything is? No, because nothing is really fucked up, despite the principals' insistence that they are. Whatever the movie did well, it's been done better in other films, and ultimately I just felt manipulated through a cheap string of manufactured moments.