Wristcutters: A Love Story

Sometimes we find beauty in the strangest places; and, remarkably for such a gruesome title, Wristcutters could probably be said to be a rather uplifting affirmation of life, hidden within a seriously quirky black comedy. Set in an afterlife reserved for people who commit suicide, it seems to contain wacky nuggets of truth from oddball characters including Zia, searching for the love of his life, Mikal, an accidental visitor, Eugene, a Russian musician that electrocuted himself on stage from being badly heckled, and the weird and wonderful Kneller, played by the ever-mysterious Tom Waits.

Zia slits his wrists and promptly wakes up in a world resembling this one, except that the colours are rather washed out and nobody smiles. He abandons his job at Kamikaze Pizza to search for his former love Desirée, and soon makes close friends with Mikal and Eugene, who accompany him on one of the strangest road trips since Dorothy lost her innocence in the Wizard of Oz.

What gives Wristcutters its edge, are the frequent, addictively interesting, and not immediately fathomable symbols that keep cropping up and nagging away like in any good movie that yearns for cult status: such as the black hole under the passenger seat where things just disappear. We just know that place - how many things have you lost there? Then there are people who are just far too weird to have been dreamt up on the back of a Hollywood paycheck: like the throat-singing mute, the dead-again messiah, or the policeman who still has a hole in his head.

There is a temptingly meaningful logic at work that will leave you fitting the pieces together long after the film has finished. Explaining how to perform minor miracles to the lovelorn Zia, Kneller tells him: "As long as you want it so bad, it's not going to happen - the only way it's gonna work is if it doesn't matter . . . " We soon start looking for clues to this rather crazy world and here Mikal (played by the much under-rated Shannyn Sossamon) looks like a good bet - but then so does anyone if you let your imagination run wild enough.

The religious orthodoxy behind the ultimate ideas of Wristcutters is a weakness, but it is put subtly and light-heartedly so will be inoffensive to most viewers.

If the stars in your sky have gone out for a while, maybe treat yourself to this zany and very well-produced story to set them on fire again. Wristcutters - a Love Story is at once touching, hilarious, thought-provoking and a hugely enjoyable ride.

This is one of "those" movies. You know the kind - like a catchy tune the vibe of this movie stays in your head... the movie had all the chances in the world to be depressing, but it was far from it, there are only a few drama elements and the title is not deceiving, it truly is a love story and a beautiful one at that and also threaded with great humor, when I laughed, I laughed hard. And I would probably cry if the ending was any different.

I won't go into possibilities and impossibilities of metaphysical, because that's absolutely not what this story is about; purgatory, if you will, is only the stage, where the romantic play is performed, with that, it's innovative though actually daring, as it was probably obvious the box office would never explode from what 'Wristcutters' would make. In my opinion, the movie is so well made it would have been great even if it was stripped of suicide thing and it was just a plain love story. Oh and Shannyn Sossamon was so convincing, I think I'm in love with her now. ;)

An excellent film and well worth seeing: It defies pigeonholing into a genre; it's a romantic comedy, but not *at all* like the stereotypical romantic comedy, even if it does use some of the same conventions. It's a road movie, but not in the traditional sense. The dynamics and even the plot work and are believable, requiring less suspension of disbelief than I would've imagined. The music and cinematography work well into a story that is darkly/morbidly funny but also a bit sweet, without being saccharine. The acting is well done and the characters believable and quite well developed. This is definitely an art-house film, but one that it really decently pedestrian and accessible, rather than esoteric or exclusionary (that is, appealing to only art-house film lovers). The sound works well, and visual effects are only ever momentarily cheesy.

This is a creative treat that, while boasting of no discernible insight or idealist film-making ambitions, manages thoroughly entertaining – perhaps it is due to the aforementioned low-key approach that Wristcutters fares so well. Balkan director Goran Dukic combines the best of offbeat indie cinema with 'traditional' dark humour, making the film appropriately edgy but never tipping over into 'desperately quirky' like so many "festival type films" fall prey to.

In fact, when I sneaked in as a volunteer to a screening during the Stcokholm International Film Festival, the manager presented the film as one of his personal favourites of 2006. This should serve as a mark of its success and indeed I was pleasantly surprised at how much fun I had. This is highly ironic since both the style and substance of Wristcutters are unspeakably gloomy and sad. Much credit it due to Dukic for making something as tragic as suicide victims into laugh-out-loud catalysts.

But the film perhaps belongs to Patrick Fugit who inhabits the protagonist Zia – a young man who slits his wrists in the first scene of the film and ends up in a 'suicide limbo' of sorts, where all people who have taken their own lives are banished. I say 'banished' because this afterlife is an unreasonably gloomy, grey and grainy nowhere-place that is captured remarkably through a seemingly colourless lens that aptly emphasizes the mundane and depressing state. There are barren industries and vast stretches of desert – nothing else. Oh and no one smiles. Ever.

Zia leads a dull life in this post-apocalyptic hole until one day he finds out that his ex-girlfriend on earth has also committed suicide and ought to be in the same place as him. He sets out on a road-trip with his friend Eugene (a superbly funny Shea Whigham) – a Russian immigrant who lives with his whole family of suicide victims and soon the two are joined by a beautiful newcomer and hitchhiker (Shannyn Sossamon) who claims she got here "by mistake" and is now trying to rectify it by finding the people in charge.

Although much fun is to be found in the creatively barren setting, the central triumvirate is possibly one of the most dynamic mix of characters on film in recent years, no hyperbole. Shea Whigham is gloriously hard-boiled and hilarious as Eugene the Russian and enables the director Dukic to reconnect with his Slavic roots. It is both admirable and puzzling that the film manages so funny without resorting to laughter or smiles (there are two smiles throughout the movie, seriously).

But 'Wristcutters' has problems: it remains a shallow look at an infinitely more layered issue, suicide. It explores no characters to depth nor does it ever bring up what drove them to taking their own life in the first place. In this way, no interesting philosophical notions are navigated and no insights or messages come through other than an overriding 'Pro-Life' attitude – Pro-Life being for living and against suicide which is punished by an eternity in a perpetually gloomy state, a subtle hell of creative proportions.

Thankfully it avoids most of its shortcomings by simply being short and sweet. Of course, this renders Wristcutters: A Love Story an ultimately forgettable little indie romp.

7 out of 10

this is a must see picture. if you enjoyed Garden State then you will most definitely enjoy this. A movie that deals with life, and the appreciation of it all, even from a dead perspective in a creative way. a must see for Tom Waits Fans and recommended to anyone who's a sucker for a love story. The movie deals with what's at the core of a person. Cinematography that let's a viewer sink into the story, and laugh at what most would refer to as a "dark" or "sad" topic. With all that's going on in the world, it's about time that we start to realize that life is what we have, it's something valuable, that we have the choice to live, and can start living it any day. When Mikal says, "most of my friends were already half dead or dead anyways.", it does make you think and the movie pushes the idea it's never to late to start your life. The actors are all well picked for this movie, it seems as though they all move with ease together. You will leave the theater feeling not so much better about life, but with a smile on your face. You'll feel not a huge sigh of a relief, but a sigh of delight. Something about the movie made me remember time and time again that the purpose is to enjoy what you have, and to love without regret. It's a movie that makes you appreciate life from a new angle.