Me (to my wife): “Do you want to watch this DVD tonight?”
Wife: “What’s it called?”
Me: “The Salton Sea.”
Wife: “Sounds like a dumb name. Who’s in it?”
Me: “Val Kilmer...”
Wife (smiling, possibly drooling): “MMMmmm... Vaaaal. Okay, put it on.”
That is the conversation I have every time we watch a Val Kilmer film. It gets depressing after a while.
I mean, how can your average looking schmuck like me possibly hope to compete with someone like Val Kilmer? In this film he sports a range of tattoos, a bad hairdo, he’s a chronic druggie and he’s depressed. But my wife would STILL rather sleep with him instead of me if she had the choice. She’d probably still pick him if he was covered in festering sores. It just sickens me.
Personally, I say we should place a ban on ridiculously good looking guys starring in films. It’s high time that ugly guys stood up and demanded that Julie Roberts co-star with Ray Romano, Michelle Pfeiffer act alongside Billy Bob Thornton and Salma Hayek steam-up the screen with man-whale Marlon Brando.
And that’s the only problem I have with this film. Val’s just too damn good looking. In The Salton Sea he plays a guy called Danny Parker. He’s a druggie, he parties all day and night with loser hooverheads and he’s a snitch who hasn’t got a problem dobbing in his so-called speed dealing friends to the cops.
But Val’s too bloody pretty to dislike, and they know it. They want you to like him, they want the women to say to their husbands, “Why can’t you look like a sexy druggie like Val, instead of a dirty fat bloated pig who smokes too much dope?”
But Danny Parker is hiding something (don’t get excited girls, it’s not what you think). See, Danny is also Tom Van Allen. When Danny is all alone in his shitty little room, he changes out of his streetcrud clothing and swishes up with a natty suit and a hat, then whips out a trumpet and plays soulful melodies while remembering times past with his wife spent on the shores of the Salton Sea. Who is this Tom Van Allen side of his Danny? A dream? A split personality? A thing once was, now forgotten? (sounds poetic, eh?)
Unfortunately for Danny, a bad guy has gotten word of his snitching to the cops and has him marked for a pine box. Danny’s broke, so he needs to set up one big final score to pay for an extended vacation away from the cops and the people who want him six feet under.
Enter Vincent D’Onofrio as Pooh-Bear. This unsavoury character has done so much gack that his nose has been removed, leaving him with an unsightly hole in his face unless he wears a false protuberance glued to his head. Tom sets up a big deal between Pooh-Bear and a buyer, hopeful that the “finders fee” will pay for his forced retirement from the scene. But the cops get wind of this little escapade and cut themselves in for a slice of the action.
Around about here, things starting taking twists and turns and little sidesteps, so that you are never really quite sure just what Danny/Tom are up to, which is the real him, and just who’s gonna snuff it. Sure, there’s a purpose to all the madness, and ‘madness’ is a word which applies to many (if not all) of the characters in this story. Through the speedfreaks and lowlifes and nasty criminals and crooked cops, a tale of deception, revenge and identity is being woven.
Show some patience, as the truth shall be revealed in good time.
Settle back, relax and enjoy the journey. It’s worth the trip.
Framed anamorphically at 1.78:1, The Salton Sea has a distinct look which the DVD capabilities render with ease. With lots of interesting shots, they had a very locked down idea of the look of the film, with inspiration drawn from John Register and Edward Hopper. Drawing on this style using subdued colouring, dim lighting, interesting angles and strong shadows to create the mood, the characters look an integral part of the scenery, and don’t appear to float artificially before it. This means that the DVD won’t excel as an example of bright and shiny Hollywood picturemaking with a slick sheen of hyper-reality; it beds down more often than not into a depressed and sickly looking state instead, which is more in keeping with the story. The transfer hits the mark without missing a beat, with good colour across the board, great detail visible in many shots and practically an artefact-free clean print.
For the main a mellow and subdued DD5.1 soundtrack, it is pretty uniform across the board, with only a few brief schizophrenic moments which draw up the audio harder, such as during a meth lab explosion in the “Brief History of Speed” segment, or a welcome inclusion of Let Forever Be by the Chemical Brothers a little later on. While not the clearest and most dynamic sounding (you can detect this in the louder of the shouted exchanges and the above mentioned music and explosion) it is on the whole quite fine so as to be mostly transparent during the viewing, unless you have an aversion to the odd bit of sibilance. Talk heavy, most speech is fine, with the odd word a little unintelligible, but no more or worse than many films with quietly spoken passages.
Coming in having heard diddly about this film, and knowing how erratic Val can be, it pleases me very much that I can honestly recommend you hunt this one down for yourself. A stylish and interesting film, with a successful mix of comedy, drama and thrills, it has great characters ranging from the laidback Kilmer (is there any other kind of Kilmer?) to the kinetic and often outlandish D'Onofrio.
The DVD is also a pleasant surprise. While not quite up there in the extensive-bonuses Limited Edition stakes, it still contains two good quality short featurettes that don't grate on the nerves by being extended fluff pieces and rounds it all off with a good transfer. A worthy disc.
