"Is that that kid from the sixth sense? He's so round!"
I first watched "Entourage" at a free screening in June. I was sitting next to an older woman who provided a running commentary. She loved the movie, but seemed especially fixated on Haley Joel Osment, with his babyface and man's body. As I sat there enjoying her quips more than the film, I realized that Haley Joel Osment sticks out like a sore thumb, not because he looks different, but because he is the only part of this thing that has changed in the past 10 years. "Entourage" is a movie stuck 10 years ago, a time capsule to the perverted '00s, when the mere acknowledgment of gays counted as inclusion and all the bastards got away with everything while we cheered them on.
I realize the 2000s were only five years ago, and that "Entourage" ended its final season in 2011, long after it had overstayed its welcome. But it had been a long time since I saw a movie where the only homosexual character is treated as a punchline, gross to the touch, or where the frat boy aesthetic was championed rather than lampooned. "Entourage" features both of these, frequently. Not that the movie ever acknowledges any of this. It doesn't even acknowledge its own characters. Rather than function as a reflexive epilogue, "Entourage" never embraces its own story or aesthetic. It just exists.
The movie, like the show, is full of cameos, with notable appearances by Jon Favreau, Gary Busey, Liam Neeson and a plot. Vincent (Adrian Grenier) and his buddies Turtle (Jerry Ferrara), Drama (Kevin Dillon), E (Kevin Connolly), and former manager Ari Gold (Jeremy Piven) are up to it again, making big-budget movies and being famous and having sex with supermodels and whatever. This time, Vincent wants to direct his own movie, a real piece-of-trash that, of course, wins an Oscar at the end of the movie. "Entourage" is directionless, moving from place to place at a lackadaisical pace. It's a bore, a remarkably toothless, extra-length episode of the television show.
Toothless. A good way to describe "Entourage." I went into the movie at least hoping to be titillated, whether it be in the most basic sense of, "Hey, this movie is excessive and those people are attractive" or "Hey, wow, these social mores are kind of messed up, I feel kind of pissed at this movie." I was not titillated in either way. Goddamnit. If a movie is going to go against the grain of pop culture, it should go against the grain of pop culture; if it isn't going to move you, it should at least offend you. Exploitation is a real and important aspect of the cinematic experience. But exploitation requires a sense of identity and reflexivity to cross boundaries. "Entourage" just doesn't recognize where it sits in the chronology of culture. It thinks it's right at home.
As I thought about "Entourage," I realized that my chatty friend was fixating on the right part of this movie. Haley Joel Osment perfectly encapsulates the film, a bizarre half-formed adult whose face is that of a child but whose body has grown beyond its years. It doesn't fit.
Turd. Circus.