“8mm” is a risky film to watch on a public library computer. But this felt like a fitting way to watch a film that aims to saturate viewers with the taboo feel of its subject matter — sex, murder, and worse yet, the combination of both. “8mm” finds private eye Tom Welles (Nicolas Cage) hired to investigate a snuff film discovered among a late tycoon’s possessions. Welles quickly dismisses the footage of a slain teenage girl; it could have easily been created with special effects and fake blood, he tells the tycoon’s widow. “Just think of how many people seem to be realistically killed in movies and on television every day,” her attorney assures her.
It is with this notion that “8mm” proves resonant, suggesting an all-too-close link between real and cinematic violence. What's even more chilling is the fact that the film raised this possibility just a few months before the world did in the wake of the Columbine High School massacre.
However, “8mm” is not a somber social commentary. This is the kind of thriller Hitchcock would have made if he were around in the ’90s. Provocative yet playful, it seduces the audience with taboo scenarios while raising ethical questions surrounding them. And it goes one step further than, say, “Rear Window” by showing its hero become desensitized to the madness around him. Watch as Welles sleepily sorts through S&M tapes (which hilariously include shots of dogs barking and cats hissing, edited in flashy MTV fashion). And behold as he convincingly portrays a porn connoisseur.
“This doesn’t turn me on,” Welles reminds fellow detective/porn store clerk Max California (Joaquin Phoenix). “It doesn’t exactly turn you off though,” California responds. The film won’t turn you off either. “8mm” is a dazzling descent into depravity. Like screenwriter Andrew Kevin Walker’s first major film effort, “Seven,” this one will leave you surprisingly giddy with anticipation at whatever seedy horror is around the corner — a credit to its style, sense of humor, and engagingly eccentric ensemble.
“8mm” grows more colorful as it digs deeper into its dirty world, showing just where director Joel Schumacher wants to aim the spotlight. The location of the teen girl’s murder is like a forest hut out of Grimm’s fairy tales, splattered with thick graffiti paint that you can practically feel smudging your fingers. It’s no surprise that Schumacher once worked in the fashion industry. From Phoenix’s blue hair to Cage’s Lennon shades, the film is a funhouse runway. And it’s a funhouse filled with plenty of freaks. Phoenix gives one of his most charming performances as the oddly sweet punk Max California — the most innocent character next to Cage and his ever-baby-cradling wife played by Catherine Keener. They may be likable and innocent, but these characters are no less otherworldly. Cage approaches a Jimmy Stewart level of an everyman quality; he’s definitely not your typical grungy, ’90s-appropriate antihero. Peter Stormare is more extreme, chewing the scenery as Dino Velvet. (Does that sound like an evil porn producer's name or what?) Throughout the film, Dino slinks around in his velvet robe, stewing with anger and sexuality. “Women — they’re always late,” he says after firing a crossbow during off-time on the set of one of his bondage films. James Gandolfini is almost as fun to watch as Velvet’s colleague Eddie Poole, bringing the same fiery attitude he brought to Tony Soprano. SPOILER: It’s a surreal hoot to watch him burn in a pile of porn tapes at the hands of Cage’s character.
The film’s sick charm lies in this kind of grandiosity or excess. It establishes a sense of sensationalist fun yet sophisticated suspense missing from many thrillers of the 2000s and beyond. Similarly lurid films like “Captivity” and “Hostel” aren’t nearly as engaging, probably because they aim to test viewers' boiling points and turn them away in disgust while "8mm" tries to lure them in. In other words, its intentions feel purer — and its grisly material is significantly less explicit, leaving its most horrifying content to the imagination. All in all, “8mm” is a criminally underrated flick — possibly Schumacher’s best work. Don’t be afraid to get your hands dirty with this one. As one of the characters says when describing its world, it’s a dance with the devil — one you won’t want to end.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qiuSniZTVF0&w=420&h=315]