Child of God Lester Ballard (Scott PREY 4 ME Haze) watches from the barn of his soon to be lost family property as an auctioneer announces the sale of the property to the group of gathered prospective buyers. Ballard has lost his mother, his father, and now is losing his home. Unable to articulate the anger he feels beyond grunting, swearing and threathing those gathered for the auction with his ever in hand rifle, his rant is ended with a solid bit of wood smacked into the back of his head. Tennessee of the 1960's wasn't a place of understanding for the mentally ill and Ballard, with rifle, is left to his own devices.
Homeless, Ballard wanders the rugged mountainous terrain in the area of his boyhood home until he comes across a dilapidated abandoned cabin. Cleaning it as best as he can and scrounging or stealing a well used mattress he makes the cabin his own. Cold and hungry, Ballard takes to stealing to eek out an existence. Little by little the rules of society he followed whilst living on the family farm are stripped away. Not knowing there is a line he should not cross or a taboo that should not be broken, Ballard commits heinous crime after crime.
James Franco's film adaptation of Cormac McCarthy's third novel is a darkly comedic tale of a put upon man who I was unsure if I should feel sorry for, hate, or admire for his rugged determinism. Neither Ballard's mental illness nor his predicament are his own doing (at least at first) and with his goofy grin and child like mutterings he is often sympathetic. We see him at his most primal and base and all that comes with it. I can't recall another performance by an actor where we see them defecating (and using a stick to wipe), snot running from the nose in great globs, spit spewing from the mouth in volumes unsurpassed by even the most drool inclined dog, ejaculate sprayed across the rear quarter panel of a car during a voyeuristic episode of two lovers, and all that is before Ballard's course takes a turn for the worse. Scott Haze certainly did not hold back on his performance of a man devolving into a force of nature.
Franco has created a film that is beyond my ken. Was I supposed to be laughing? Or was my laughter instead demonstrating that I was on the side of the town folk that drove Ballard from his home as if he was some mangy mongrel who should be put down? The ending left me dumb struck. What was I to take away?
An at times fascinating, in a horrific manner, film that may not be fully appreciated due to my ignorance of the message.
** 1/2 out of ****
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