Nowhere (film)

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Nowhere is a 1997 film by director and screenwriter Gregg Araki. It is a bleak depiction of mid-1990s youth. It stars James Duval and Rachel True as Dark and Mel, a bisexual teen couple who are both sexually promiscuous.

The film is part of a series of three films by Araki nicknamed the "Teenage Apocalypse Trilogy" by its fans, due to the tendency that it depicts urban teenagers as misery-ridden zombies. It is highly sexual and contains scenes of graphic violence. The film is notable in that it features a variety of actors who had, at the time, not yet reached their current level of stardom. Among them are Heather Graham, Ryan Phillippe, Mena Suvari, Kathleen Robertson, and Denise Richards.

Also in keeping with Araki's film making tradition, various celebrities from the past forty years make unexpected cameos. Included are Shannen Doherty, Charlotte Rae, Debi Mazar, Jordan Ladd, Christina Applegate, Jeremy Jordan, Jaason Simmons, Beverly D'Angelo, Eve Plumb, Christopher Knight, Traci Lords, Rose McGowan, John Ritter, Staci Keanan, Devon Odessa and Brian Buzzini.

There are several segments (the dialogue in the 'alien raygun retainer' scene, the man with the mangled face in the hills) that are almost identical to elements from the similarly themed Brett Easton Ellis book Less Than Zero.

Plot

Due to the nature of Nowhere, the film is argued to have no real plot, or that it is an art film, and that its main purpose is to convey a message through a visual plot that is supported by the actions of the cast. However, a basic rundown of the actual "acted" storyline is as follows:

Dark Smith (James Duvall) is an alienated, 18-year-old guy struggling with college and personal project deadlines, perceived difficulties of daily life, fluctuating romantic status with his bisexual, polyamorous girlfriend Mel (Rachel True) and conflicting bisexual feelings for a classmate, Montgomery a young blond male with burgeoning bisexual inclinations of his own and, interestingly enough, heterochromia. The day starts off normally enough with Dark meeting up with his friends which include the local scurvy, green-haired drug dealer Handjob, the metal-mouthed, intelligent Dingbat (Christina Applegate), Montgomery, Mel and her purple-haired, acid-tongued lesbian lover Lucifer (Kathleen Robertson) for breakfast at their local coffeehouse hangout called The Hole. Various mentions of a party at Jujyfruit's along with plans for a drug-fueled game of kick the can are made and the film segues into portions of the goings-on of the lives of the other characters in the film.

• Cowboy is another one of Dark's best friends who is a gay rock musician struggling with balancing his band duties and his bandmate/boyfriend Bart, who is heavily addicted to drugs supplied by Handjob.
• Egg is a young girl who becomes starstruck, resulting in an inadvertent meeting with a heartthrob television personality that winds up being more than she had planned for.
• Shad and Lilith are a nihilistic couple, crazed with sex and lust for life, and their segments are little more than clips that serve to illustrate this. Shad is Alyssa's twin brother.
• Alyssa (a poetess and Montgomery's best friend) and Elvis are another couple touched on only briefly. In contrast to her brother's rather indicatively violent nature Alyssa is more demure, coquettish, and sweet. Her boyfriend Elvis, a biker, is apparently flake-ish in his romantic commitment to Alyssa but Alyssa seems oblivious to such fact. Elvis has a sadomasochistic streak and as is exhibited towards the end of the film, capable of extreme violence.
• Zero (Mel's younger brother) and Zoe (played by Mena Suvari in her first film role) are high schoolers, implied through dialogue to be sexually active and both underage. Zero wants to impress Zoe by taking her to Jujyfruit's party but has some difficulty, in addition to further difficulties that arise in regard to arriving at the party.
• Cowboy's boyfriend Bart's interaction with his drug dealer Handjob and his two S&M mistresses, Kriss & Kozy, who mutilate Bart in a very painful way despite his extreme state of drug intoxication.
• Dingbat's airheaded social butterfly role coupled with her crush on Ducky (Scott Caan in his fifth film) makes her a major supporting character and keeps her involved throughout the story. She's friends with Ducky's sister Egg and she, along with Egg and Alyssa, have eating issues. (Binging and purging, anorexia, and drug-induced appetite suppression)

As all of these little plot lines develop, the story progresses towards the oft-mentioned party at Jujyfruit's house. A bacchanalian orgy of excess, drinking, drugs, and friends, strangers, nobodies and somebodies, all pushed together and put under pressure. Here the film descends from the innocuous and normal beginning with natural lighting and balanced visuals to sharply contrasted and/or colored lighting, and seemingly hallucinatory visions and surrealistic visuals and events as well as chaotic and/or subjectively improbable happenings and reaches its chaotic and penultimate finale where some of the issues in the plot come to a head. Dark and Mel argue about her desire to have an open relationship and Dark's desire for committal. Egg and Bart both decide the world is better off without them in it and they commit suicide. Ducky receives word of his sister's death and attempts to commit suicide himself by drowning himself in a swimming pool but is saved by Dark and Dingbat. Bart's drug dealer Handjob is beaten to death by Elvis for selling them cut drugs, and Dark, covered in blood from his proximity to it, returns home, where Montgomery, escaped from the aliens that had abducted him during the game of kick the can, comes to Dark's window, naked, and asks if he can come in.

In a brief emotional moment, Dark and Montgomery confess to their mutual attraction, and it seems after the disorienting and troubled day Dark has experienced, the day won't have been a total waste. However, Dark's happiness is short-lived as an alien parasite living inside Montgomery bursts out and leaves through the window.

Availability

Available in VHS format. A region 2 DVD with no special features exists. There is no current Region 1 DVD available.

See also

• Totally Fucked Up
• The Doom Generation

External links

• Official web site
• Screen caps & Soundtrack Listing

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Last updated on Friday February 15, 2008 at 18:50:46 PST (GMT -0800)
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