Choke (2008) Reviews

• Not sure how to feel about it

  Wolf30x2008-10-01

  This movie left me in a strangely ambivalent state after I watched it, because I'm not sure if I'm judging it on its actual merits, or my expectations. Having been a fan of Chuck Palahniuk's novel, I was expecting something brash, frenetic and perfectly offensive, but in a good way. The problem is that while the novel was blunt and vulgar, spelling out every bit of Victor Mancini's sexual exploits in almost academic detail, the movie stops a bit short of pushing the edge and instead leaves a lot of it up to suggestion. Another reason that I'm not sure how I felt about it is because the director took a unique approach to the work that I'm still trying to decide if I liked or not. You see, Chuck Palahniuk's novels have a very distinctive narrative style to them, and in Fight Club (also based on one of Chuck's books,) director David Fincher emulated it perfectly. I'm talking mostly about Chuck's usage of repetition with lines such as "I am Jack's colon," Choke's director, Clark Gregg chose not to emulate this and instead brought the text of the book to life without mimicking it's distinctive narrative. So if you're a fan of Chuck's work, this may bother you. On the other hand, it does help Choke stand out on its own merits and not feel like it's trying to build off of the success of Fight Club. So for those of you who haven't read the book, how does it stand? Well as I said before, considering how much more graphic and indecent this movie's source material was, I think the movie missed out on a lot of its potential. I almost feel like Clark Gregg went too easy on all of the characters making them come off as sympathetic when they worked better as being completely hopeless. It's also not as funny as it could have been, since a lot of Victor's (the protagonist's) interactions with everybody from the sex addicts, to the people in the historic reenactment village to the people he pretends to choke for, were all summarized too much, and had much more potential for comedy. Overall i'd say this movie is alright, but could have been done better.

• Chewed The Book, Swallow The Movie?

  loganx-22008-11-14

  The only Chuck P. book I own. It's a very funny book, about lust and salvation, and here it is on screen in...pretty good form. That is to say I was a little disappointed, with the ending in particular, which strikes a very different tone (not terrible, just different)....but that's neither here nor there. Choke is the story of Victor, med-school dropout who takes care of his 70's radical mom now suffering from dementia and dying after years of drug use and mental instability. In order to pay for her upkeep, Victor pulls double duty at his two jobs, one as an employee at a Colonial American theme park, and two, choking on food in restaurant, so that those who save his life, will feel obligated to help him out with cash from time to time. Who would save someone's life, only to let them die, once you know their sad penniless (over exaggerated) story? Victor targets the wealthy and affluent, "You don't wanna get saved by some waiter", he says in one of many direct addresses to the audience. The broken 4th wall, reminiscent of Fight Club, is taken directly from the book, and one of the films stronger techniques. In the hospital he meets, a young doctor, who assists him in translating his mother's diary, which leads to shocking questions about Victor's origins, and his father or lack there of. Victor goes to sex addict meetings usually just to have sex in the bathroom with fellow addicts. While his best friend Denny, a chronic masturbator, begins taking his first shaky steps to recover, which involves romancing a Stripper and collecting rocks for each day his sobriety, "idle hands are the devils playground". The sex addiction and the need to save his mom, are the twin turbines that propel this film, and by the end they are both so clearly intertwined it escapes being exploitative. I enjoyed this version of Choke, which was kinda of like Choke-Light, but still very funny, if only slightly missing the aim of the novel; the heady and vulgar mix of the sacred and the profane. That is to say, important sub-plots, and main-plot points get muted; we know why Victor chokes, there are more reasons than I stated above, but we don't get to see the people who fund his faints here, as we do in the book, and so that aspect of the story, seems a little disconnected. As do Denny and the rocks, another vital story element for me, got put on the back-burner here. Denny replaces one fetish with another, and most of the rooms of his house are filled with rocks. (Actually they shot this ending, you can see pictures online, but decided against it, before release.) Okay, but everyone always says the book is better than the movie, I know, I know, I just had to get that out. What's left of Choke though is commanded by Sam Rockwell, who is only improving as an actor, and Angelica Houston who needs no intro. While it's not as conceptually taught as I would have liked, its still really, really funny, and at a few moments, a bit moving (Ive got a personal soft spot for movies with visits to the demented in hospitals; The Savages is especially hard to watch), at least for me. It's an allegorical sex comedy, but it's also a very accessible one, considering the weirdness of the material. It's a more personal story than "Fight Club", and almost an opposite ideology, "building anything", versus "tearing down everything", but told in the same sardonic writerly tone, weave come to expect from Palahniuk. In the end, I just wanted more, but it was fun, and the story was brought to life, mostly just as I had imagined it when reading. Also it's got the funniest and perhaps the only funny, "rape" scene, ever filmed (it is and it's not what it sounds like).

• Its like drinking a warm Coke from a punctured can without any fizz

  bmrao19802010-07-08

  What would have happened if David Fincher would have made Fight Club as a comedy involving insomnia? The product would have been something like Choke. The movie is bearable and there is not much skin exposure given the content of the movie (and its source material) but that is also the problem. Its like the makers of this movie picked up all the feel-good moments and left everything else out. That defeats the purpose, IMHO, of adapting a Chuck Palahniuk novel. I bet anyone who has read the novel by Chuck P. will agree that the movie does not do any justice whatsoever to the very first chapter of the novel. I understand that it would have been difficult to capture it on film but even if it was hinted by the film that all the times that Ida was driving around young Victor, it was when she had escaped from the institution, it would have made the scenes more powerful. Ditto if they would have cast a kid who could carry more than one expression on his face!! It is a dumbed down, powerless version of the source material and can only be classified as a missed opportunity. I mean, one can't be expected to chug on a warm fizzed-out Coke in the same way as a chilled freshly opened one! There is just a right way to treat certain stuff and in case of Choke...well, you get the point! I hope someone adapts Diary or Lullaby next, and does it in the same dark way Fight Club was done - the way Palahniuk's novels should be treated, IMHO.

• Consistently amusing low-budget treat

  Robert_902008-08-10

  As of writing, Choke has not yet been given official distribution, and will not get it for about another month and a half at least (depending on your location). However, I managed to see it at the annual local film festival. I'll bring this review up when the film gets a wider release, but for now here is my initial opinion. Choke is the story of sex-addicted loser Victor Mancini (Sam Rockwell). Victor's main concern in life is to keep his demented mother (Anjelica Huston) alive and in hospital. He does this in the hope of finding out the truth about his strangely absent father. To pay the bills, he pretends to choke on his dinner in fancy restaurants and plays off his saviour's heroism for financial gain. I think the majority of readers here are at the very least aware of the existence of Fight Club, the only other major movie aside from Choke to be based off a Chuck Palahniuk novel. Most of the people who will seek out Choke will do it mainly because of the connection to either Fight Club or the Choke novel (or both, as the case may be). Of course, I'll have to play the comparison game here, but it has to be said - Choke is a very different beast to both its source novel and its spiritual predecessor, Fight Club. Anyone who's read Palahniuk's writing will know that his books are frequently dark, very twisted and somewhat humorous. Words like "diseased" and "cancerous" come to mind. It's this same feeling that infected both the Fight Club and Choke novels and made them perverse joys to read. Palahniuk's touch even translated perfectly in David Fincher's adaptation. With Clark Gregg's adaptation of Choke, the stylish darkness is traded for a far more conventional "quasi-independent comic" approach. Strangely enough, this seems to suit Choke even better. After all, Choke is first and foremost a comedy. At a guess, I'd say it's roughly 80 per cent faithful to the original novel (more on that later) with a large number of jokes lifted from the novel. The laugh factor was a strange thing. On one hand, the laughs managed to stay more or less consistent, with none of the jokes falling flat. On the other hand, I personally didn't feel like anything was too funny. Everything raised a genuine chuckle but as for anything approaching "struggling-to-breathe" humour, there wasn't much there. It makes me wonder what's better, a comedy with consistent chuckling or sporadic bursts of hilarious moments. Not too sure. Regardless, the film manages to be an enjoyable experience. First-timer Gregg manages to handle his duties (which include writing, directing and even one very amusing bit part) with confidence, balancing comedy with drama effectively. The acting is impressive to say the least. Rockwell manages to nail Victor perfectly, yet it's Brad William Henke that manages to steal several scenes as Victor's friend Denny. Another treat is the score, which is an interesting blend of different styles. Choke not only manages to be an entertaining comedy, it also becomes a very good example of how to streamline a 300-page novel into a movie that's just shy of the 90-minute mark. The only problem with it depends on whether or not your sense of humour agrees with the film's, but if this film was already on your "to-see" list, that shouldn't be too much of a problem.

• Good for a 90 minute film -- Better and fuller if it was 2 hours

  mpoloz402008-09-03

  I had the opportunity to view the film Choke at Columbia College Chicago for a screening which held a Q&A with the main actor of the film, Sam Rockwell; so being that I read the novel before as well, I would like to share my take on the film. No synopsis here; read the one that IMDb's. If you have read the Palahniuk novel Choke, then you should expect that this 90 minute film cannot hold all of the sexual intensity (and comical vulgarity) that the novel had the space to provide for. Do not get me wrong--this film is very funny and Sam Rockwell is, as usual, superb in the anti-hero role that he's played so well in other films. My one (and major) problem with the film is the fact that it was 90 minutes and wasn't pushed to be a 2 hour piece. I felt that there was so much more to delve into psychologically that Choke the novel did with sex addiction and the story and idea (will not spoil here) of who the character Victor Mancini was or thinks he is. Rockwell's great acting did a lot to pick up this slag, I do have to mention. One thing I did like, which was also done with the ending of Fight Club (another Palahniuk novel) is that (again, will not spoil here) the finish to the Choke film was more satisfying then the deus ex machina endings that Palahniuk sometimes (well, many times) does with his stories. Kelly Macdonald, who is wonderful in anything that she is in, as well as the other supporting actors and actresses kept the story alive and in a wonderful way. The pacing of the film as well as the narrative was very much "Palahniuk" and this is a pace and narrative that is one of a kind and most interesting to view; which is aside from the usually predictable flow of the other films of today. I did give this movie a 7/10 but I still believe that it is a movie that should be seen by anyone who likes to laugh, especially at things they don't think they would laugh at. Also, because the overall story is hilarious and is satisfyingly unique and the acting makes the film whole, too. And did I mention Sam Rockwell was great?