Kevin Smith’s Tusk is about as far removed from the director’s early body of work as one could possibly get, yet still carries that personal touch that made Clerks resonate with so many audiences. While Smith’s debut was influenced by his years working at a convenience store, it’s no coincidence that Tusk‘s protagonist, Wallace Bryton (Justin Long), is a successful podcaster whose long-running weekly show features himself and his closest friend laughing themselves into a stupor.
The film opens with one of these conversations, where Wallace and Teddy (Haley Joel Osment) are taking mean-spirited jabs at a YouTube celebrity, whose fame comes from the fact that he accidentally managed to slice his own leg off while wielding a samurai sword. Wallace has booked a flight to Canada to interview the young man, much to the chagrin of his live-in girlfriend Allie (Genesis Rodriguez), who disapproves of Wallace’s cruel brand of comedy.
An unfortunate turn of events finds Wallace north of the border without a guest for the next episode, until he stumbles across an advertisement on the bulletin board of a local tavern, where an elderly man offers to trade room and board in exchange for someone willing to listen to his tales of a life spent at sea. Two hours later, Wallace finds himself at Pippy Hill, a sprawling estate full of eccentricities and inhabited by the wheelchair-bound Howard Howe (Michael Parks), whose musings about meeting a young Ernest Hemingway fascinate Wallace. But Howe’s story of being shipwrecked and rescued by a walrus is the most bizarre of all, and his strange devotion to the creature that saved his life masks a
sinister plan.
Peppered with Smith’s signature vulgarity, Tusk spends the first 40 minutes or so establishing a genuinely creepy vibe, before taking an abrupt detour into a realm that few filmmakers would have been brave enough – or stoned enough – to explore. There are images in this film that can’t be unseen, and Long deserves a tremendous amount of praise for stepping into a role that’s so far out of his comfort zone it might as well exist in another universe.
But Tusk is not without its problems. A bizarre cameo from an A-list star during the second half of the film is amusing at first, but quickly overstays its welcome and becomes far too indulgent. Likewise, the decision to reveal the darker side of Wallace’s personality makes it difficult to sympathize with his predicament, which is further complicated upon discovering that his two friends aren’t exactly saints, either.
While Tusk doesn’t quite measure up to the bar Smith set with Red State (my personal favorite), it’s another positive step in his ongoing evolution as a filmmaker. Smith took a ridiculously silly idea for a film that most people never would have dared to attempt, and somehow made it work – for the most part, anyway. It’s definitely Smith’s least mainstream-friendly offering, but that’s okay, because his passion and vision is alive in every frame, and it makes me excited to see what he does next.