SWEET AND LOWDOWN (1999) *** Who says that the age of myths and legends was over long ago? Myths occur whenever an individual lives as one. With general directions from Woody Allen, Sean Penn creates a character who is a brilliant guitarist, enjoys shooting rats at the dump, enjoys watching trains, is intimidated beyond rational thought by the very concept of Django Reinhardt, charms the ladies and battles and ignores and jams and drinks and fights with men, and romances nothing so hard as conjunctive synchronism...whether that character is Emmet Ray (a/k/a Homer P. Risley) none of them seem to know and would appear entirely open to question. The film, and Ray's life, loses momentum with the appearance of Uma Thurman....why anyone would have any time for Uma when Samantha Morton's around gives the myth the credence of the insecure unsecured post-revelationist that we see in too many heroes. Especially when Samantha can't speak, is daft as a brush, sweet as sugared honey, and her few thoughts all turn to Emmet...what else could he want? What happened the afternoon of the gas station robbery is as great a mystery as anything Agatha Chrisie or Conan Doyle ever thought up, even if it doesn't have much plot and nothing but anecdotal evidence. Incidentally, objectivists vainly persist in claims that Emmet Ray never existed. He's obviously infinitely more true than Michael Jackson or Will Young or the Spice Girls. It's not enough for me to get a ticket, and it won't be the first thing that I'm thinking of when I get there, but I'm gonna get me some Emmet Ray records when I get to heaven. Maybe there's one where he does fusion with Spinal Tap. Fortunately we don't have to wait that long for a collaboration between Sean and Woody.
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