Aggro Dr1ft

Harmony Korine is one of those filmmakers that I find fascinating because his works are outright bizarre and strange in many ways. His works on Gummo, Spring Breakers, Julien Donkey-Boy, Mr. Lonely, and so forth have been experimental and really out there, which admittedly, I have enjoyed them.

This new Korine film is a surreal and visual experimental shot entirely in infrared presentation.....and it both works and doesn't. The visuals and the sound designs are strikingly and amazing with the colors, musical score and sound designs being very good. Including some bizarre moments that are edgy yet provocative in interesting ways. However, I do understand what Korine is going for with the atmosphere, narrative, and structure which while I do appreciate Korine doing what he does, this 80-minute project ends up feeling malnourished and left to nothing as it continues. It becomes aimless and quite full of itself, that it ends up being tedious.

Experimental movies are a mix bag for me as I enjoyed quite a bit but there are some that go far right one's mind that it becomes quite pretentious, and this one is one of them. At the end, it's something I can't say I like or hate as I am in the middle. But it's definitely something to be watched once for sure.

Chalk up another "compliment" to the man toasted as a visionary and the 'future of cinema." I walked out of the theater after 30 minutes. I've never done that in my life until now.

I love shocking, next-level cinema like Titane, Enter the Void, The Tribe, and more, but Agrro Dr1ft is just dull, senseless, and irritating to the eyes. It is a low-grade video of blurry people walking around a room in disturbing three tone neon colors with a few royal palm trees and sports cars thrown in to give you the "Miami experience." Dialogue is sparse and idiotic. Characters like "Bo the Assassin" dressed head to toe in soccer knee pads, socks, and swim goggles (shout out to the innovative costume designer) are so pathetic and ridiculous that I wanted nothing more than to punch them in their faces, hard and immediately.

The theater experience wasn't any better. It was hot, stuffy, and complete with a cramped seat next to an obnoxious, insensibly screeching, drunk frat boy moron with a full beer that he placed, with a shaky hand, on the uplifted floor just behind my head.

The "retina scorching" infrared colors are something I was never tired of during this film. A surreal, meandering story that cascades from PS2 style voice work to meditative thoughts on love, hate, violence, and purpose. It's about everything and nothing. I have to give major props to Arnaud, Joao, and Leo (and the editing team) on crafting some absolutely excellent visuals.

A whole section could be devoted to AraabMuzik's excellent soundtrack that toes the line between hip hop and ambient. It really carried the vibe to a whole new level.

Is this film anything other than vibe with some interesting things here and there? Not really, but I don't think that Harmony was intending anything beyond that.

There is no movie like AGGRO DR1FT.

I have a low standard for movies. I'll watch just about anything and find something to enjoy. Yet this movie dissapointed me because it offers so little.

This movie wants to be carried by the gimmick that is it's visual style. There are interesting aspects but it could've been done better in a ten minute YouTube video. This feels like a experiment that was dragged out to a feature length film.

There are few characters and none of them are developed. There is no coherent plot just the monologuing of the main character. There is almost no action aside from a couple brief assinations.

I checked my watch probably ten times wondering when it would end. I also considered walking out about half way through. There were scenes so bad that I laughed out loud.

I don't recommend wasting your time...

I've loved harmony since the beginning. I've been there since the 90s. Julian, gummo and spring breakers being my favorites. Trash Humpers was punk rock and meant to troll and In rage normies.. nothing more to add and very hard to sit through. But at least it had something to offer here and there. Just ridiculous absurdity in a full world. A middle finger to cinema. I hate most all mainstream films. Even as a kid I prefer deep artist films or just well thought out indie films that are philosophical or fun and takes you for a ride. I can enjoy just about any type of film as long as it's unique and not the plastic regurgitated garbage that insults your intelligence. You know what most people watch on TV and in the theatres. Don't get me wrong we all have guilty pleasures. Those shows or movies we just watch for fun and to escape. Now with that out of the way. Coming from one of his biggest fans. This movie was pointless. It doesn't even have a place in the art house world of cinema. The imagery and vibe is lacking completely like some that didn't even bother trying. Seriously could have came up with this in a week. Just on a whim as you went along, even the dialogue is cheesy and very little of that or character dialogue. Which would be fine if the art and imagery was telling a story or saying something. This film wouldn't even be worthy of being a movie to trip out too. It would just make you angry and frustrated. At this point it's like he took a pi$$ on his most die hard fan group. The fans that truly get what he's doin and back him no matter what. This wasn't even offensive. This will appeal to that nerd who loves video games and they will convince this is deep and profound. Because they have no experience in art whatsoever & wanna appear cool to someone. It's like a bad wanna be anime video game. Except at least that you could play and have some fun. No story to follow and dialog is boring when you do get it. It's not edgy. It's not profound. It's just pure stupidity and someone cashing in on his name figuring dummy's of this generation will probably not know any better and love it. While sits back and laughs, I truly think it was an experiment to see if he could get away with not trying and using no effort whatsoever and the ghetto culture and druggie community of lames would still praise it just for having a gang like theme. Because harmony could have made another epic masterpiece with many layers like spring breakers or another profound work of art like gummo or Julian. But no he chose to make what I consider nothing, it's worse than trash humpers. Because at least it invoked emotion and response from the viewer in some way shape of form. Even it has no rewatch ability like his other films. It was punk rock anti cinema and i respected the concept. He nailed what he was going for. This film is like a movie that doesn't even exist. Invoked no emotion except disappointment he would take things this far by simply doing nothing at alm and trying to cash in on a brain dead society, I knew it was going to be like this for an entire year just from the trailer and the fact that insufferable sociopath Travis Scott was starring in it. I wound be less disappointed if I didn't have to stomach that dudes ugly mug. But I was hoping I would be wrong and harmony would surprise me because I thought it would be neat if someone could actually pull off using this style of camera and make it work. Seriously though Travis Scott is less ugly in infa red than in real life but only a little. See less of his BPD and arrogance this way. Only plus side to the film. Would have worked better if they just picked a great music act and let them have music going on in the background the entire time. If it was a group like s boys or something deep like Trent Reznor score or something more obscure.. but even then the shots are nothing but the same thing happening repeatedly and there lame shots at that. Could have been shortened into 20 mins and I'm stretching it by 5 extra mins. I guess he dried up and no longer has it and doesn't care what so ever. He's not hungry or passionate anymore and it's all you'll notice throughout. Wait until it streams and just skim and fast forward throughout to not waste your time even as a harmony fan. You'll thank me later and I've never did this is for crappy low budget horror films. At least you get the good kinda cringe with those. This didn't even offer a cringe element to save it. It's just flat out a bore that could have been made by the least creative kid in class and they teacher forced him to make it or he wouldn't graduate. It had that kinda essence going for it. I've seen thousands of films since a small child dedicated my life to the arts and indulging into everything including foreign film. I've seen horrible. But I've truly never seen nothing and I mean nothing at all. It's doesn't belong in cinema and it doesn't belong to the art world. Was hoping to at least get a fever dream piece at minimum. NOPE! Dude trolled his own fanbase this time and it's nothing more than an F you at the ones that made him a star. If your not a harmony fan avoid it completely. If you are one skim just to say you seen it for yourself to verify this failure.