Remember the prom mom? She was 18, it was her prom and nobody knew she was pregnant, so she went to the bathroom, hiked up her dress, had the kid, stuffed him in a trash can, and went back to the dance floor a half hour later. Stuck, directed by Stuart Gordon and starring Mena Suvari and Stephen Rea is one of those similar "like, this is going to mess up, like, MY ENTIRE LIFE; seriously, why does this have to happen to me?" kind of stories. The problem is, the tone careens from "cautionary tale" to "dead baby joke" in a way that leaves you feeling a bit unmoved.
Based on the true story of Chante Mallard, a Texas woman who ran over a homeless man while driving home drunk. The man flew through her windshield and became lodged so Mallard, who apparently felt victimized through this whole debacle, drove home and left him in her garage still alive while she had sex with her boyfriend. The film is pretty faithful to the story, except it kind of sucks.
It's clear that Gordon chose the story for its black comedy, but it's really mishandled. The boyfriend (Russell Hornsby) plays his character for cheap laughs instead of trying to match the tone of Mena Suvari and Stephen Rea, who apparently weren't let in on the joke. The resulting mess of botched comedy, pondering drama, and squishy horror sound effects is a little boring. Like the prom mom, the story of Mallard is outrageous enough on its own.
Opens June 6th, 2008, at the Landmark Lagoon Cinema.