The Brown Bunny

Gallo follows up the very promising Buffalo '66 with this self-indulgent folly. As a grieving speedway rider (Gallo) makes a long return journey to LA after a race in New Hampshire, what we mainly see are interminable shots of the freeway from the driver's viewpoint, alternating with interminable shots of the moody ex-model's profile of the driver himself. Every so often he breaks the journey for a dreary intimate episode with some ill-defined (but immediately available) woman spotted en route - he's searching, searching, searching - but there ain't nothing like the real thing, and eventually he's reunited with true love Daisy (Sevigny), who, it turns out, betrayed him at a party. (At this stage, the plot, such as it is, begins to resound with strange echoes of Irreversible, made by Gallo's buddy Gaspar Noé.) By the time we reach the ludicrously overplayed climax, the whole absurd but oddly predictable farrago has become horribly clear. This is a study of masculine masochism and guilt writ not just large but very very long - and, regrettably, it's as shallow as a salt lake.