By STEPHEN HOLDEN
Published: January 29, 2010
There is one joke in the first-time filmmaker Hue Rhodes’s pretentious indie road comedy, “Saint John of Las Vegas,” that plays off its inspiration, Dante’s “Inferno,” with witty ingenuity. The image of a sinner burning eternally in hell becomes a carnival performer, Smitty (John Cho), known as the Flame Lord, who after a technical malfunction finds himself trapped in his protective suit that bursts into flames every 20 seconds. Approached by John Alighieri (Steve Buscemi), a ratty-looking insurance-claims adjuster investigating a possible fraud, Smitty pleads for a cigarette.
The greater hell, of course, is Las Vegas and its environs, filmed to look like a terminally seedy and desolate wasteland peopled by loonies. John, who sporadically narrates the movie, is a compulsive gambler who has fled Las Vegas to live in Albuquerque, where he works for an auto-insurance company. His office is its own little circle of hell, whose unscrupulous, money-mad overseer, Townsend (Peter Dinklage), is determined never to pay a claim if he can help it.
When John summons the courage to ask for a raise, Townsend sends him on a mission with Virgil (Romany Malco), the company’s arrogant top fraud investigator, to disprove the claims of Tasty D Lite (Emmanuelle Chriqui), a stripper who insists she was injured when her car was rear-ended. John finally meets Tasty in what must be saddest, emptiest little strip club in the entire Southwest. Although she is in a wheelchair, he requests a lap dance, which she struggles to provide.
Other oddballs who may or may not have allegorical connections to Dante have their surreal turns in the spotlight. While on the road in the dead of night, John and Virgil encounter a group of armed nude naturists, some in cowboy hats, who try to prevent them from entering their territory. The comedian Sarah Silverman is ill used as John’s chirpy office mate and girlfriend, Jill, who paints smiley faces on her fingernails.
The investigation eventually leads John and Virgil to a scrap yard in search of the smashed vehicle, where Virgil’s Mephistophelean motives emerge. Virgil appears in John’s recurrent dream of attending a revival meeting at which the congregation hustles him to the altar where Virgil is presiding.
With long sideburns and a pompadour, his eyes bugging more than usual, Mr. Buscemi does his best to make his character a sympathetic sad sack who emerges stronger and wiser from his visit down below. But this disjointed, desperately whimsical film is simply not funny: not for a minute.
“Saint john of Las vegas” is rated R (Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian). It has strong language.
Saint john of Las vegas
Opens on Friday in Manhattan.
Written and directed by Hue Rhodes; director of photography, Giles Nuttgens; edited by Annette Davey; music by David Torn; production designer, Rosario Provenza; produced by Mark Burton, Matt Wall, Lawrence Mattis and Kelly McCormick; released by Indie Vest Pictures. At the Angelika Film Center, Mercer and Houston Streets, Greenwich Village. Running time: 1 hour 25 minutes.
WITH: Steve Buscemi (John), Romany Malco (Virgil), Sarah Silverman (Jill), Peter Dinklage (Mr. Townsend), Emmanuelle Chriqui (Tasty D Lite), John Cho (Smitty), Tim Blake Nelson (Militant Ned) and Jesse Garcia (Park Ranger).
