How to make two hours of your life disappear

Rating: 2/10 (1 August 2005)

Garden State is a good example of the pseudo-intelligent scripting that's been haunting cinema more and more lately. It reminded me of 'Closer' and 'The Royal Tenenbaums"... movies made by modern thinkers of modern thought: You don't actually need an idea to make a movie.
As long as you can trick the audience in believing they're watching something deep and real, they will buy your story. If nothing happens, nothing has to make sense, so let's not take any chances. Put in some sweet pop music, then add some more and the kids will think every scene is gold. This is what I like to call nouveau-sub-pop; regular thrash with a flavor of Meaning.
In Garden State, the meaning is something like: it's OK to be Different. The 14 year old kids love it. Even 40-year old kids will eat it and say thanks, forgiving it the pretentiousness, the pointless moments, the numb characters and all of that feel-good rubbish.
An ice-skating alligator? Bless the rebels who made this movie!