Directors
Jon Schroder & Randall K. Rubin
Cast
Edward Furlong………Jimmy Wright
Rachal Bella………Judy
AJ Buckley………Buddy
Chaney Kley………Dinko
James Eckhouse………Jimmy’s Dad
Gay Storm………Jimmy’s Mom
William Sadler………Uncle Rodney
DVD Release Date: January 1, 2008
Rating: R
Running Time: 100 Minutes
The Movie
Jimmy Wright is a troubled kid that likes to keep to himself and would rather not have anything to do with anyone. He’s not even the type of guy that likes to hang out with other degenerates like him but would rather fly solo. The one thing that keeps him sane, so to speak, is his video camera that he takes everywhere and films anything he sees. This includes his own actions, the kids at the local high school, and one extremely disturbing intimate scene between his parents that no child should ever be disgraced enough to view.
It all started back in college – which Jimmy is no longer in – when his roommate committed suicide and taped the entire thing on Jimmy’s camera. Take that sort of mind-blowing situation and combine it with all the other messed up things in his life and you can see why he doesn’t mind being such a loner. That is when he comes across one of the local girls named Judy whom he has had his eye on for quite some time. She isn’t exactly as bad off as Jimmy, but she has problems of her own and it stems mostly from being mistreated by the other girls.
Coming to her rescue and showing her signs of a more exciting life, Jimmy and Judy end up falling madly in love and running off together. Every single moment of their wild escapade is caught on his camera and portrayed straight from their visions as they happen. Murder, sex, violence, and everything in between that couldn’t possibly be good for you is thrown together as Jimmy and Judy do what they want, when they want. The only thing standing in their way is getting caught and being forced to stop.
Think of Natural Born Killers as the writers of this film did and get a picture in your mind of trying to make a film when you have no imagination. The gist of Jimmy And Judy is that these kids don’t care who they step on, who they offend, or even who they kill as they get to where they want to go. The only thing is that they don’t want to go anywhere. As with Natural Born Killers, Mickey and Mallory were looking to get notice by the media and have everyone know who they were. Jimmy and Judy are doing this all for their own benefit and filming it all so they can watch themselves. Lame.
All the action that happens in this film is really rather lackluster and nothing that will shock you or even make you sit up and go, “Damn!” It just doesn’t cut it and most of the reason is Edward Furlong. It is hard to say Furlong is a shadow of his former self because besides Pecker and American History X in the late nineties, T2 is all he has on his résumé that anyone would even remotely care about. Considering who he was in that film with, it’s not like he was the star either. He is an overweight and bloated actor that is simply trying to stay in the business and this is not the way to do it.
The Video
The film is shown in 1.78:1 Anamorphic Widescreen format and if you are one of those people that thought The Blair Witch Project was annoying to watch then you will definitely not like this film. Imagine the shaky handheld cam syndrome but one hundred times worse. When things are able to be seen level-headedly so to speak, then the colors and everything looks fine. But other then those few moments, it is nauseating.
The Audio
The film is heard in Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound and it sounds pretty good as dialogue can usually be heard at a decent volume and the music comes through nicely.
Special Features
Audio Commentary – Producers/writers/directors Randall K. Rubin and Jon Schroder are joined by cinematographer Ben Kufrin for commentary and do nothing more then talk about what is on scene at the time and a little bit of information to gear up for shooting each shot. There is constant talk about how they prepared for each scene by finding things or shooting in a dark room or something since they didn’t have the budget for much else. At times they are rather hard to hear so you may find yourself turning up the volume and then down again a good bit.
Deleted & Extended Scenes – There are close to fourteen minutes of extra scenes here and none of them really would have done much if left in the film. Well, they don’t do much being left out either so perhaps cutting them was the best idea.
Trailer
Unrated Trailer
Trailers – Hatchet, Jerome Bixby’s The Man From Earth, and Masters Of Horror: The Damned Thing
The Inside Pulse
You know, it really does have its moments, but Jimmy And Judy just tries too hard to be something that has already been and it doesn’t even do it well. The special features are just filler in order to make the DVD not look so bare, but they provide no real sustenance. Perhaps my biggest complaint is how awful the shaky cam is because if you can’t get past that part of it and adjust, then you won’t enjoy it whatsoever. Considering the entire thing is shown on handheld video, I actually got a bit queasy. Blair Witch was a walk in the park for me while I watched others run out of the theatre with their hands over their mouths. It’s hard for me to imagine what those people would do if they tried watching this. Can we say the floor would be a brand new shade of blown chunks?
