John Dies at the EndOne bad trip and your world's never the same--that's essentially what happens to David Wong (Chase Williamson). David accidentally ends up getting stuck with a syringe filled with this creepy black gunk from another dimension after his buddy, John Cheese (Rob Mayes), calls him up in the middle of the night while having a bad reaction to the stuff himself. More than just a mind-altering drug, this alien substance--which they curiously call "Soy Sauce"--is "reality-altering". It not only endows the young guys with fourth dimension-breaking knowledge and abilities, but it also leaves them vulnerable to all the horrors that lurk beyond the veil of reality.
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Adapted from a novel by David Wong (seriously) with the same pointedly self-aware title, John Dies at the End is a hodge podge of science-fiction, fantasy, and horror, all wrapped up with a dose of psychedelia and metaphysics, experienced by a couple of slackers. (The film could be titled Dude, Where's My Reality?) Most of the story is told in flashbacks by David to a reporter, Arnie Blondestone (Paul Giamatti), who is skeptical of David's suggestion that he can predict the exact contents of his pocket or that he keeps an invisible alien or demon (or alien demon) in a dog cage in the back of his truck. Arnie entertains the idea that this might be a salable story, and allows David to tell him about his misadventures--like how he became in tune with the forces beyond time and space that have forever altered his reality. David and John are not supernatural savants; they sometimes have to enlist the aid of Dr. Albert Marconi (Clancy Brown), a sorcerer who poses as an infomercial host, especially when they get in over their heads while thwarting a demon composed of frozen meat. These are guys who stumbled into the proverbial Twilight Zone, and are freaking out while coping with these newfound "rules". There is a demented, paranoid logic to their universe after being rewired post-Soy Sauce. John is more aware of these rules--having been dead for a little while--and leaves messages for himself from the future at just the right time and place. This coy deus ex machina makes John Dies at the End an extra-dimensional take on Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure, since both films feature a duo of unlikely--even implausible--dudes managing paradoxes and metaphysics beyond their comprehension. John Dies at the End embraces insanity all throughout the film, and is unpredictable from scene to scene. Although some events suggest that there is some cause and effect to the weirdness, there are plenty of other strange things which are never really justified. It is as its existence speaks more to a universe that is so inscrutable, that all two normal fellas like David and John can do is to tread the extra-dimensional waters.
Directed and adapted by cult horror movie filmmaker Don Coscarelli--of the Phantasm series--John Dies at the End is like a waking nightmare, the kind that David describes to Arnie, also described to David by the original purveyor of the Soy Sauce, a stereotypical Rastafarian who calls himself "Robert Marley" (Tai Bennett). The flow of the narrative is dream-like, and seemingly dissonant scenes are held together with this conceit--compare John Dies at the End with Phantasm, and the similarities become apparent. Don Coscarelli's films have a way of tapping into the subconscious--into those dark, forbidden channels of the mind we like to reserve for our dreams, because to experience them in our waking life would drive us to madness. This gives John Dies at the End the feel that everything is a little off, as though it were plucked from our psyches--like the Soy Sauce trip David and John experience, messing with their neurons and synapses. The complexities that come with understanding this strange, new universe is also represented in metaphysical riddles. For example, John Dies at the End opens with an episode where David describes decapitating a zombie with an axe, having to replace the handle of said axe, then having to repeat a similar event, and replacing the head (of the axe). This prefaces the film with a pantomime of the bloody, supernatural violence to come, but also depicts a variation on a paradox known as the "Ship of Theseus". This gives John Dies at the End its own identity as more than just a cross between The Evil Dead and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. The film rarely takes itself seriously, like when the two guys visit another dimension populated by naked women in masks, and they are worshiped as heralds of some kind of trans-dimensional revelation; John comments that they entered the Eyes Wide Shut alternate reality. Continuity isn't even all that relevant here; in a blink-and-you'll-miss-it moment, Arnie is taking down notes about David's story (though it looks like he's just scribbling), but when the camera next shows his notebook, it's empty. In another film, this would likely be merely an oversight; in John Dies at the End, it suggests something more--from accentuating the dreamlike tone of the film, to some unknown metaphysical force at work. John Dies at the End is best enjoyed if you are willing to embrace the bizarre black comedy and weirdness, and to take the metaphysical at face value.
Recommended for: Fans of a strange but darkly funny fantasy horror movie that pulls from sources as varied as the Cthulhu Mythos to William S. Burroughs' "The Naked Lunch". John Dies at the End also feels like a send up to cult classics like Coscarelli's own Phantasm.
Directed and adapted by cult horror movie filmmaker Don Coscarelli--of the Phantasm series--John Dies at the End is like a waking nightmare, the kind that David describes to Arnie, also described to David by the original purveyor of the Soy Sauce, a stereotypical Rastafarian who calls himself "Robert Marley" (Tai Bennett). The flow of the narrative is dream-like, and seemingly dissonant scenes are held together with this conceit--compare John Dies at the End with Phantasm, and the similarities become apparent. Don Coscarelli's films have a way of tapping into the subconscious--into those dark, forbidden channels of the mind we like to reserve for our dreams, because to experience them in our waking life would drive us to madness. This gives John Dies at the End the feel that everything is a little off, as though it were plucked from our psyches--like the Soy Sauce trip David and John experience, messing with their neurons and synapses. The complexities that come with understanding this strange, new universe is also represented in metaphysical riddles. For example, John Dies at the End opens with an episode where David describes decapitating a zombie with an axe, having to replace the handle of said axe, then having to repeat a similar event, and replacing the head (of the axe). This prefaces the film with a pantomime of the bloody, supernatural violence to come, but also depicts a variation on a paradox known as the "Ship of Theseus". This gives John Dies at the End its own identity as more than just a cross between The Evil Dead and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. The film rarely takes itself seriously, like when the two guys visit another dimension populated by naked women in masks, and they are worshiped as heralds of some kind of trans-dimensional revelation; John comments that they entered the Eyes Wide Shut alternate reality. Continuity isn't even all that relevant here; in a blink-and-you'll-miss-it moment, Arnie is taking down notes about David's story (though it looks like he's just scribbling), but when the camera next shows his notebook, it's empty. In another film, this would likely be merely an oversight; in John Dies at the End, it suggests something more--from accentuating the dreamlike tone of the film, to some unknown metaphysical force at work. John Dies at the End is best enjoyed if you are willing to embrace the bizarre black comedy and weirdness, and to take the metaphysical at face value.
Recommended for: Fans of a strange but darkly funny fantasy horror movie that pulls from sources as varied as the Cthulhu Mythos to William S. Burroughs' "The Naked Lunch". John Dies at the End also feels like a send up to cult classics like Coscarelli's own Phantasm.