Random Movie: Very Bad Things (1998)

Black comedies can be a hard combo to pull off, especially with the events that transpire in Very Bad Things. Comparatively to potty humor, black comedies (at least the good ones) tend to have an actual plot with real characters because that is really the only way that such a movie could work without an over reliance on bodily fluids. The danger comes from the delicate need to straddle the line between laughable and horrible that a black comedy must attempt. Writer and director Peter Berg is a talented guy and fortunately he is able to meld the two elements well, most of the time at least.

As Kyle and his friends escape sunny California for Las Vegas for a bachelor’s party (that sounds vaguely familiar), things start normal enough with some standard bickering in the car, especially from brothers Michael and Adam, Kyle getting shit for his soon-to-be wife’s controlling nature, as well as lots and lots of drugs and alcohol. When Michael (played by Jeremy Piven just like every other Jeremy Piven role I’ve seen) is part of a tragic accident with a stripper, a wet hotel floor, and an precariously placed towel hook, the five friends are at a loss of what to do. Real estate hot shot Boyd (Christian Slater) manages to talk them out of calling the police and “handling business” themselves before things are further complicated by another visitor.

Truthfully, having not seen the movie before, I expected the clean-up stage of the story would take a good chunk of the movie but largely that is dispatched in the first act. The rest that follows deals with the five friends and how they react to their participation in these titular ‘very bad things.’ The middle part of the movie is the most compelling and has real weight to the performances, especially of Piven and his on-screen brother Daniel Stern as both have mental breaks as they try to deal with the deaths they were apart of. Oddly though, this is where things come off the rails as it turns away from being a black comedy to a dramatic character story with very little humor. I am twisted enough that I enjoyed the satiric depravity of the deaths/murders in the beginning and ending of the film, especially as another party is brought into the festivities and I liked the character elements of Adam’s guilt pouring like sweat from his body as he tries to get back to normal life. I just wish these two halves were integrated better.

I cannot figure out why I can never recognize Jon Favreau in a movie but his character Kyle is good, especially as he is given more to do in the story and not being overshadowed by Slater, who is fucking insane. As the anti-voice of reason in the group, Slater’s Boyd gives motivational speeches that are bullshit yet somewhat believable especially given the context of the story and the rising body count. Boyd suffers in the middle of the film as well though as he becomes more reasonable (not totally though) instead of having that crazy look in his eye after someone has just died. Going back to the fine line between the horror and the humor, too much one way or another could easily cast the rest of the movie in a bad light but Berg walks that tightrope fairly consistently, even if the movie is segregated too much between the acts.

As long as a movie is honest about it, I have no problem with things being twisted and mean-spirited. The story itself is somewhat nonsensical but then again, I can think of a few other movies with plots about covering up a murder so at least Very Bad Things put a new, sick twist on things.