Go

Plot synopsis:
The film is told out of chronological format, the story being told from four different points of view. As such, the following summary only generalizes the actual sequence of events which take place.Ronna's storyIt is Christmas Eve in Los Angeles. Adam (Scott Wolf) and Zack (Jay Mohr), a couple of TV soap opera actors, have been busted for narcotics possession. In a plea deal, they will help Officer Burke (William Fichtner) set up a sting operation for Simon (Desmond Askew), an occasional drug dealer who sells ecstasy from his cash register at a local grocery store. Unbeknownst to them, Simon has taken a vacation to Las Vegas. Filling in at his register is Ronna (Sarah Polley), an 18-year-old runaway and high school dropout who is facing eviction and desperate for the extra paid hours of income. When the actors ask about Simon and where they might buy some ecstasy, Ronna recognizes a lucrative financial opportunity. She offers to "see what she can do" for them, taking down their address. They give her a flier with the details of a rave later that evening.After work, Ronna and co-worker friends Claire (Katie Holmes) and Mannie (Nathan Bexton) debate the underground drug trade "rules," such as circumventing Simon to become competing dealers themselves. Ronna decides this will be a one-time-only deal and proceeds to Simon's drug supplier, Todd (Timothy Olyphant). Todd is suspicious of Ronna's sudden interest in dealing drugs, and that the quantity she has requested is the exact amount that constitutes a drug trafficking felony. Reluctantly, he offers to sell her the drugs at a higher price. Unprepared for the price hike, she offers to leave collateral in exchange for bringing the balance back after the sale is complete, and bullies Claire into being the collateral. Ronna and Mannie then proceed to Adam and Zack's pre-rave party at their apartment. Ronna goes inside to complete the deal, while Mannie stays in the car and downs two of the pills he swiped from the bottle.Inside at the "party", there's only Adam and Zack behaving uncomfortably, along with an older man (Officer Burke, the undercover officer) who seems overly focused on finishing the drug deal. Ronna quickly realizes something is amiss here, so she asks to use the restroom before completing the deal. When Zack turns to show Ronna the way to the bathroom, he whispers "Go!" to her. She goes into the bathroom, flushes the drugs down the toilet, and emerges empty-handed. She tells Burke she wasn't able to obtain the drugs after all, and to defend herself from further scrutiny, notes to Burke that she is underage to be drinking the beer he gave her. Realizing he is now on surveillance giving alcohol to a minor, and without evidence to hold her, Burke lets Ronna go.Ronna, in a state of panic, ponders her situation with Mannie, who is slowly succumbing to the effects of the pills he took. She doesn't have the money to buy Claire's release from Todd, and now she has no drugs to sell. In desperation, she shoplifts a large supply of over-the-counter medication from her own grocery store. Finding pills roughly the same appearance as the ecstasy pills, she refills Todd's bottle and returns to his apartment. She explains to Todd that the deal fell through, gives the "stash" back to him, and frees Claire from collateral duty. Ronna realizes that she's still facing eviction and decides to attend the rave to sell the remaining medication as ecstasy. Her scam works, and she quickly makes more then enough money to cover her rent. Meanwhile, Todd has discovered the fake pills and shows up at the rave to settle the score. He sees Ronna and Mannie from afar and chases them through the dancing crowd. Mannie is too high to run and is slowing them both down. Ronna hides Mannie behind a piece of sheet metal in a back alleyway, tells him to keep quiet until she comes back, and runs off alone.Todd catches up to Ronna in the parking lot. He has a few last words with her about the nature of the illegal drug trade, and takes out a gun intent on killing her. At that very moment, a yellow Mazda Miata swerves around a corner of the parking lot at high speed and squarely hits Ronna, catapulting her onto its roof. It then shoots forwards and stops suddenly, sending her flying into a ditch. The driver, in panic from seeing Todd with a gun, flees the scene. Todd leaves Ronna for dead and flees as well as it begins to rain. Ronna lies motionless in the ditch.Simon's storyEarlier.... After recruiting Ronna to cover his shift at the grocery store, Simon goes off with three of his friends Marcus (Taye Diggs), Tiny (Breckin Meyer), and Singh (James Duval) for some adventures in Las Vegas, footing their hotel bill with the credit card he had borrowed from Todd. Shortly after arriving, Tiny and Singh develop bad cases of diarrhoea from eating some bad seafood at the hotel's buffet restaurant and are stuck in their hotel room while Simon and Marcus hit the casino. Simon quickly loses much of his money and then wanders into a wedding party on the premises. There, he meets two female guests, with whom he eventually smokes pot and has sex (both of them). One of the women accidentally starts a fire in her hotel room, causing Simon to flee naked (clothes in tow) in an elevator.Putting his clothes back on, he meets up with Marcus back in the casino. Marcus's yellow sports coat gets him mistaken for a hotel employee, even earning him a tip when a customer mistakes him for a bathroom attendant. This eventually works to his advantage, though, when another hotel guest assumes Marcus is a parking valet and hands him the keys to his Ferrari. Simon and Marcus jump at this golden opportunity to take the red Ferrari for a spin, winding up at the Crazy Horse strip club. En route, Simon discovers a 9 mm pistol in the glove compartment, which he pockets for himself.At the strip club, Marcus warns Simon not to order "champagne" - strip club code for a private lap dance they cannot afford - however, Simon does precisely that, and he heads to a back room with two dancers and Marcus in tow. Before the lap dance commences, they receive a stern warning from menacing Victor Junior (Jimmy Shubert), one of the bouncers and the son of the club owner, to behave like gentlemen and not touch the dancers "or else." Simon hands the bouncer Todd's credit card and he and Marcus enter the back room; the lap dances have barely begun when Simon loses his self-control and gropes his dancer. Victor Jr. immediately bursts into the room and begins beating him. Marcus tries to defend Simon and is himself attacked by the bouncer. Simon then draws the gun he found and shoots Victor Jr., wounding him in the arm. Simon and Marcus hastily flee the premises and head back to the hotel.Simon and Marcus rush into their room and roust up the sickly Tiny and Singh, telling them they have 30 seconds to get up and out. Before they can flee, the Victors Jr. and Sr. (J.E. Freeman) arrive at their door, so Simon and crew bribe a young boy staying in the next room to open the connecting door for their escape. After a frantic car chase down the Las Vegas Strip, Simon and his three friends manage to elude their pursuers and reach the highway back to Los Angeles and drive away in the light of dawn in Simon's damaged car. They believe they are safe, reasoning that their pursuers would have called the police in Vegas...or so they think. What Simon forgets is that it was Todd's credit card he left back at the strip club.Adam and Zack's storyEarlier... Adam and Zack are actually closeted gay lovers forced to be decoys in a police sting operation, in exchange for having their own drug charges dropped. In the grocery store parking lot, they test out their hidden microphones; inside, they look for Simon, their usual dealer, but find only Ronna. Later, after the sting with Ronna goes bad, Burke handcuffs Zack, then makes a bizarre suggestion: Why don't they spend Christmas Eve at his house and have dinner? Nervous, they reluctantly accept his invitation.It is an odd atmosphere in the house, and Zack and Adam have odd encounters with Burke and his wife Irene (Jane Krakowski). Zack comes out of the bathroom and runs into Burke completely nude; Burke urges him to lie down on his bed and try out some cologne. Adam, meanwhile, meets Irene, who comes on to him and even kisses him full on the lips. Later, when the four sit down to Christmas dinner, Burke explains that he and his wife are the fourth leading sales team in the region for Confederated Products, an Amway-type retail company, and that virtually everything in the house from the food to the cologne is from the company. Burke wants Adam and Zack to sell Confederated products for him. Zack then gets Adam to feign illness to excuse themselves, and they leave the house, both of them uneasy from the evening's events.Adam and Zack engage in small talk and discover that both of them are cheating on each other with the same man, Jimmy, a makeup artist in their television studio. They go to Jimmy's apartment and find out from his sister that he is attending the same rave that they had earlier advertised to Ronna. Adam and Zack show up and get revenge on their mutual two-timing lover by holding Jimmy down and cutting a sizable chunk of his long hair.Satisfied, they leave the party, get into Adam's yellow Miata and barrel into Ronna, sending her flying into the ditch. Then they see a man with a drawn pistol (Todd) and, terrified, flee the scene.They stop at a gas station and try to figure out what to do, debating whether Ronna survived the accident and, if so, whether or not the man with the gun finished her off. Adam goes to the toilet where he realizes that he is still wearing the hidden microphone from earlier that afternoon. Panicked, they throw the devices away and drive back to the spot where they hit Ronna. They find her still lying in the ditch, unconscious but alive, and hoist her on top of a nearby car with the alarm blaring. They watch in satisfaction from afar as other partygoers discover Ronna early the next morning and call an ambulance for her.ConclusionIt is dawn now, and Claire, who does not know what happened to Ronna, leaves the rave and goes to the diner where she usually meets Ronna when they get separated. She encounters Todd; they engage in small talk, then realize they are attracted to each other. They end up kissing and groping in the stairwell of Todd's house, where they are discovered by none other than Victor Jr. and Victor Sr., the Crazy Horse bouncer and owner whom are after Simon and have tracked him through Todd's credit card. Todd explains they have the wrong man; he begins to draw out directions to Simon's place, when Simon himself walks into Todd's apartment ironically, to seek refuge from the bouncers. At first they want to kill him, but Claire points out that she and Todd would be witnesses to the crime. So an "eye for an eye" deal is struck where Victor Jr. gets to shoot Simon in the arm. Just as he is about to get justice, performance anxiety suddenly springs upon Junior and he cannot bring himself to pull the trigger. Claire gets impatient and leaves during his hesitations; as she gets halfway down the hall she hears a gunshot. She flinches and shuts her eyes. Simon calls out: "It's all right... I'm okay!"Meanwhile, Ronna wakes up in the hospital recovered enough to return to work, happy that, despite the night's batterings, she did indeed make enough money to save herself from eviction. She talks with Claire and suddenly realizes to her horror that she never went back for Mannie, who is presumably still hidden where she left him. Ronna and Claire return to the scene and find Mannie still there, shivering and terrified, but otherwise okay. They all get into Ronna's car and drive away, and Mannie wonders aloud what they'll do for New Year's Day just a week away.

Tags: comedy, adult comedy, cult, flashback, humor, revenge, storytelling

Review:
Sarah Polley (whom I never heard of at the time but follow her work now) was great; Katie Holmes wasn't quite Katie Holmes - and that was good; Fichtner's good; but my favorite was Timothy Olyphant who did a kick-ass job of a charasmatic bad-guy (it was hard not to hate him by the end).
In my opinion those scenes are the best, but there is a lot to choose from so I'm not offended if yours isn't.This movie really shows that even simple and straight forward stories, can be both unpredictable and entertaining, if they are told the right way.
Add to this a pumping soundtrack, solid editing and an overall great production in an unpredictably entertaining movie, you will agree with me that Go is one of the best films ever made..
She is supported by an equally excellent cast including Taye Diggs, Scott Wolf, Katie Holmes, Jay Mohr, and Timothy Olyphant - among others.Many viewed this movie as being an MTV version of Tarantino's "Pulp Fiction" and, while this may to an extent me true, it is obviously much more than that; and an excellent stand-alone movie of it's own.Split into 3 separate storylines which clash and collide along the way, finally merging as the movie comes to a close, this movie constantly keeps the viewer on edge; and provides an excellent example of the drug/club etc.
Everything about the premise for Go screams that it doesn't have a cat's chance in Hell of working, but the stylised energy combined with the tasteful handling of a lot of different scenes and situations work surprisingly well, and blend to create an experience which most certainly wears you out, but in an oddly refreshing sort of way.The film, in covering an array of different characters but never bombarding nor overwhelming us, manages to deliver on a basis of both narrative and character.
Those that laugh at certain parts of Go have completely missed the point.The first of three stories, this and another two of which revolve around those whom aren't usually explored in films of this ilk, sees Sarah Polley's shop worker named Ronna heavily in debt; facing eviction and desperate for money.
Ronna's ability to defy her male counterparts in doing what's best for her in avoiding the drug deal sting and being able to fool the dealer as she pulls along a casual and inept male companion, in Mannie (Bexton), who'd be lost without her, adds meat and awareness to an unfortunate but otherwise familiar short story.Continuing with the film's theme of debt, and relatively hapless young adults getting themselves into hotter water than they'd like through which they'll come to learn the harsh realities of life that comes with getting involved in the sorts of activity they do, Simon (Askew), who's one of Ronna's co-workers, and a group of friends spend some time in Las Vegas.
The strand centres on, like the first, usually somewhat marginalised characters for the genre; in this case two homosexual male actors, named Adam (Wolf) and Zack (Mohr), who go on a kind of odyssey which seems to be about the revealing of true feelings and unexplored sexual appetites; highlighted by the actions of a police officer and his wife when around at their house as well as the revelations that arise when they have a conversation with each other, which in turn pushes the film out into a revenge piece of sorts.
Go was made at a time when Doug Liman could compliment his all-over-the-place approach to film-making with character and substance; much unlike his 2005, fetishistic firearm flick Mr. and Mrs. Smith; while his most recent work, 2008's Jumper, did not garner much of a positive critical consensus.
I liked the way the story was told in this film and I really enjoyed Jay Mohr and Scott Wolf's story as a small dark comedy.
The movie takes on three stories (Ronna, Simon, and Adam and Zack) after a drug dealing act.
How the film acts is like a mix between "Reservoir Dogs," or "Pulp Fiction." The cast is really good, the direction by Doug Liman was great, the dialouge was superb, and the intertwining of the characters was marvelous.
This film is basically what IMDb's synopsis says: "the story of the events after a drug deal, told from three different points of view".
But it is better than PULP FICTION because of its clearer sense of humor, irony, and coherent story telling.We get the stories of several people on an very un-Christmasy messy Christmas Eve. Each story is told from someone's perspective and the stories all interconnect at a decidedly un-Christmasy rave full of loud music, drugs, people looking for other people, mistaken identities, and the other ingredients of a wild comedy.
I definitely liked the humor in this movie more than Pulp Fiction's; not only was the script excellent, but the lines were delivered in such a way that even if I knew what a character was going to say, I laughed out loud because of how well they put it.
TV's Katie Holmes is the most famous person in "Go," a movie directed by the same guy who did "Swingers." It's sort of a teen version of "Pulp Fiction." The story of one weekend in LA is told from three different perspectives, each completing and complementing the other.
Of course, there are people everywhere saying this has echoes of "Pulp Fiction."  But if that movie didn't come out first, I wouldn't think that would have any impact on how this film is made.
Despite its flaws, the energy is kept high--whether it's through the hot soundtrack, the talented young cast, the lightning-fast editing--and I think many will have a real good time!P.S.:  There's a great strip club scene with Surrender Cinema star Nikki Fritz that is DEFINITELY worth checking out..
The funny tale(s) of what happens to a web of loosely related young people on Christmas Eve, it bears a strong structural similarity to 'Pulp Fiction' and also owes no small amount of gratitude to that film's wit and sharp dialogue.
What I liked: Pulp Fiction style, funny, speedy (no boring parts), Katie Holmes was pretty, good acting, good direction plus it is pretty weird.
There is even an accidental overdose through incorrect identification of illicit substances.The more I think about it, the more I think QT should sue, though he lifts more stuff than anyone, he just calls it "homages".Go tells the same story from three perspectives: 1 / Follows a minor drug deal gone bad when the intended amateur-pusher Rhonna (Sarah Polley) works out that she is heading into a trap laid by a cop and two gay soap stars trying to themselves avoid jail and public shame.This situation leads to Rhonna being unable to repay the true dealer Todd (Timothy Olyphant who is actually PG13 menacing) and trying to pull a swifty.
The characters also make this film watchable, including Sarah Polley, Katie Holmes, Jay Mohr, Scott Wolf, Taye Diggs and J.E. Freeman.
A sort of cross between Pulp Fiction & Trainspotting, set in a harsh but slightly surreal world where people do silly things, but no-one really ever suffers too much.Holmes' was relatively unknown compared to Polley, who already had an impressive CV when she starred here.
Over a long weekend three sets of teens/early twenties are either directly involved in a drug deal or caught up in the knock-on effects.The spectre of Pulp Fiction hangs over this production so heavily that it is impossible not to mention it early and probably several times later.
Stands to reason -- this is a movie after all.There is some skill in the way the plot lines intertwine and how things work out -- but it also leads to some open questions about what would have happened if X and Y had not come along at the right moment.I did laugh a couple of times --- especially in one scene where Brit actor Desmond Askew got hold of a gun for the first time and the conversation between Katie Holmes and a drug dealer that she is being held "hostage" by.
Liman puts together an energizing tale of music, drugs, and teens in LA in this entanglement of people in a "day-in-the-life" style reminiscent of Pulp Fiction's time warping yarn: Simon (Askew) and his troubles in Las Vegas, Ronna (Polley) and her troubles scoring E with Adam and Zack.
STAR RATING:*****Unmissable****Very Good***Okay**You Could Go Out For A Meal Instead*Avoid At All Costs Ronna (Sarah Polley) lives a mundane existence as a check-out girl in her local-super-market.Facing a most unwanted Christmas present in the shape of an eviction on Christmas Eve,so,with the assistance of her unwitting partner in crime Claire (Katie Holmes) she buys some Ecstasy off a creepy,condescending dealer to sell at an underground rave.Meanwhile,over in Vegas,Simon (Desmond Askew) and his friend Marcus (Taye Diggs) are driving around in a stolen car after a night of wild partying.Meanwhile,TV stars Adam (Scott Wolf) and Zack (Jay Mohr) find themselves in a creepy drugs sting of their own.Towards the end of the 90s,the 'reverse-plotting' drama began to take off.This is obviously one of the earlier,and certainly more successful attempts.Mainly because it's so well-written and well-acted and because the soundtrack is so alive and buzzing.If you can seek it out somewhere,give it a go before it gets deleted or something.****.
This film is one of those sleeper movies that will just slowly grow into a cult classic.Despite a raw feel to some of the cinematography, fine acting performances from the entire cast bring together several angles of one story.
The thing that worked so well about Doug Liman's first and only other film, Swingers, was the script.This time around, he was jinxed with a script that begs to be cool.
Ultra-energetic, hip-to-the-bone movie of a night in the fast lane of drug- & fun-chasing California teens, with a load of up-and-coming young stars at the time.
One concerns a first-time dealer hoping to secure rent money, another concerns a group of pals on a road trip to Vegas and the last concerns a gay couple coerced into co-operating with a sting operation.The narrative approach is similar to films like "Pulp Fiction", wherein multiple story lines contain some common element(s) and intersect at times throughout the film.
Excellent movie from "The Bourne Identity"-director Doug Liman starring a great young cast among who Katie Holmes, Sarah Polley, Jay Mohr, Taye Diggs, Breckin Meyer...
Each of the stories features a common theme of basically decent youth who take a risk at the high stake gambles of life (i.e. drug dealing, promiscuous sex, car theft), but who ultimately lack the requisite nerves of steel and moral indifference to successfully enter the world of amorality they so naively feel they can conquer.Most of the fun in the film rests in following the characters through the labyrinth of a plot writer John August and director Doug Liman have concocted.
This was good (except for the weak acting) but I must say - aren't people getting a bit tired of these sorts of drug deal gun-en-up movies with the typical cut 'n' paste style (ie telling the story from different perspectives) it is starting to become very formulaic and unoriginal.And what's with all these TV stars doing films...
While Doug Liman's "Swingers" will remain his masterpiece, this film still feels fresh, funny and new nearly 15 years later.Sarah Polley, Katie Holmes, Scott Wolf, Jay Mohr and Timothly Olyphant do some of their best acting and draw you in to a story that feels like a roller coaster ride that you want to take again.
Directed by Doug Liman, this is oddly compelling like an insane night that goes into the vault and never to be spoken about again.The first section, Ronna (Sarah Polley) Claire (Katie Holmes) and Mannie have a night to remember.
Uniquely structured over the course of one crazy night in the lives of a bunch of young people in the city of angels.The story follows four main characters Ronna (Sarah Polley), a supermarket cashier, who needs $300 to avoid being evicted from her apartment.
Then there are Adam and Zack (Scott Wolf and Jay Mohr) a couple of gay soap opera actors who are cutting a deal with the police to help then arrest Simon who is friends with Tod (Timothy Olyphant) a local drug dealer.The movie has a very 90s feel to it when watched today.
Needless to say the deal goes bad and Ronna is now totally screwed.Then the movie sort of starts over again but this time from Simon's point of view and his wild adventures in Vegas.
This movie was a first for many TV stars on the big screen like Katie Holmes, Scott Wolf, and Jay Mohr, but it's the newcomers like Sarah Polley and Desmond Askew that make this film work.
Stylistically, Go feels a bit too much like a TV production; the fact that most of the cast are by now familiar TV mainstays doesn't help - Katie Holmes (Dawson's Creek), Scott Wolf (Table for Five, Everwood), Timothy Olyphant (Deadwood), William Fichtner (Prison Break), Jane Krakowski (30 Rock) and Jay Mohr (Action, Garry Unmarried) are all quite good but many of them feel amateurish at times, and don't help much in defining the already shallow characters.All of which makes Go feel a little like a writing student's exercise, with too little for the viewer to relate or connect to; but it's clever, fast-paced and entertaining enough to be very rewarding, especially at its modest runtime.
All around good movie with a cheezy ending and some crazy scenes showing you what it's like to be on drugs, this film is not recommended for people with epilepsy or heart problems (seriously).
Go is an entertaining piece of work from director Doug Liman (Swingers, which by the way is on my most boring movies of all time list) but though it has some interesting and original plot elements, as a whole it is nothing new.
The best way the abnormal sequence of time was put to use was in one scene when you see one end of a phone conversation and then a half hour later you hear the other end of it (even though it is obvious that it is going to happen.) It had some exceptional performances as well, including Sarah Polley as a supermarket clerk trying to scrounge up enough money to pay her rent, William Fichtner as a very creepy narc, Desmond Askew as a mischievous young British dealer (whose section of the film was definitely the best and most exciting), and Taye Diggs as his best friend.
A good film overall with some great performances and some interesting plot points that make up for the unoriginality of the movie as a whole.
A once in a lifetime opportunity to go to the biggest rave of the year and hang out with some really cool people; a chance to ditch work, hit the road to Vegas, and get caught up in sex, drugs, and mayhem; getting out of a sticky situation only to get caught up in one even stickier; Doug Liman's youthful dark comedy centers around a group of disparate L.A. characters, ranging from a jaded checkout girl trying to score some extra cash, to a couple of television actors who get coerced by a peculiar cop, as their typically ordinary lives deviate from the norm and bring a lot of unexpected results.
Some people who watch this film will mutter to themselves "I've seen this before." Well, Go is not a blatant rip-off of any movie in particular, but it does have some very strong similarities to Pulp Fiction.
Directed by Doug Liman (Swingers), we follow the exploits of Ronna (Sarah Polley), a super-market cashier who helps complete a drug deal, profits going to her co-worker (Desmond Askew) who need the money to pay the rent.
Like that film, it tells a collection of loosely interlinked stories, and other similarities include the role of drugs in the plot, a scene with sinister sexual potential, and another one which appears as if it's going to feature a dead body in a car; but the movie lacks Tarantino's unique sense of style and outrageously constructed dialogue.
It tells the story of Ronna (Sarah Polley) and Claire (Katie Holmes), the story of Simon (Desmond Askew) and Marcus (Taye Diggs) and the story of Adam (Scott Wolf) and Zack (Jay Mohr).
These stories all end together, and on the way sometimes mix with a character named Todd Gaines (Timothy Olyphant) who deals in drugs, and a policeman named Burke (William Fichtner).
Definitely an entertaining movie, that sometimes seems to be inspired by the great 'Pulp Fiction'..
Both movies were about lifeless young people doing drugs and partying, but at least that film was kind of funny, this is nothing but a massive hour and forty minutes of pure nothingness, literally.The characters are as about as mind numbing as they get.
I've known drug users and dealers, and others like the characters in this movie.
so it was just so easy to appreciate and relate to them, which probably affects my score.Pulp Fiction is another great movie, and I don't really see why it is being compared, "Go" stands on its own merits, it's a totally different story..
Film is influenced, as many have noted, by Pulp Fiction (both in story-telling structure, as well as subject matter - drugs, petty crime, generic mobsters who are more thoughtful, talkative and forgiving than the real thing).
From the director of "Swingers" comes a unique little film about the life-altering adventures of three main groups of people over the period of one night.At the center of the movie is Sarah Polley, a very talented and beautiful young actress who doesn't get top billing, but is definitely what makes this movie worth watching.