2019

Director: Daniel Scheinert

Genre: Comedy Drama

“Nobody’s dick’s that long. Not even Long Dick Johnson, and he had a fucking long dick. Thus, the name.” - Rose of Sharon Cassidy, Fallout New Vegas.

That’s a quote from one of my favorite video games. It’s a very fun game with many memorable characters and fun, silly dialogue like that one. Another feature of this game is that you can choose how smart your character is, and if you set this stat to be very low, your character will have trouble getting through conversations without saying something dumb.

There’s nothing wrong with a character that’s not overly intelligent. I should hope not, because I’m not a very smart person. Many great characters are slow witted, simplistic, or just not interested in gaining more knowledge.

Take one of the best examples: Homer Simpson. He’s known for not being smart. He often ends up in troubled situations simply because he didn’t think things through. And many times he has engaged in illegal activities, such as drunk driving, or dealings with the mob. But we never lose sympathy with his character because we know his intentions are innocent.

Say for example, if Homer started engaging in sexual acts with an animal, and invited his friends to join him. Then, I lose all sympathy toward him because there are no good intentions behind this.

If you’ve seen The Death of Dick Long, you know what I’ve been talking about. If you haven’t, let me explain.

If this movie is trying to be funny, it’s not. If it’s trying to be a dark drama, it fails as that as well. The main characters are simple minded, don’t think things through, and live their lives by following their own perverted instincts. While the dumb actions of the characters start off as engaging, any feelings of sympathy or watchability are lost when you learn how Dick Long died.

Spoilers: he got fucked to death by a horse. And him and his friends have been engaging in acts of beastiality for years.

I’ve got no problem with any movie that deals with a taboo subject. But with this one, the presentation really threw me off. I wasn’t sure whether the movie was expecting me to laugh at the main character, or feel sympathy toward him when he lost his wife and family because of this event. It’s not like he made one mistake that ended up causing the death of a friend. He’s been doing stuff like this for eight years, according to the movie.

Basically, the main character we follow is not innocent enough to warrant sympathy, and is not malicious enough to make him interesting. He’s just a shitty person that only cares about fulfilling his perverted desires.

Overall, this movie suffers from presenting a clear point of what it’s meant to be about. It seems to me like the creators read a real life story about someone dying in a similar manner, and they thought it could be interesting to tell the aftermath of that story. But, it’s not particularly interesting.

People do dumb things all over the world. And there are a lot of perverts that do weird shit all the time. This movie lacks something special or unique that would elevate it above just a one sentence headline in a newspaper.

Much like the director’s previous movie, Swiss Army man, The Death of Dick Long is engaging, juvenile, and confused about its intentions. But while Swiss Army Man was commendable for its weirdness, this movie just left me with a sour taste in my mouth.

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