Rubber – Review

What if an avalanche could think? Rubber is the answer. Director Quentin Dupieux has made the first ever arthouse exploitation film, a movie so refreshing in the grindhouse style, we haven’t bare witnessed to something this new in the genre since Herschell Gordon Lewis’ 1963, Blood Feast. Rolling through the country side, hellbent on carnage, Robert – our murderous tire – makes a strong case for us to clean up our landfills. Rubber is Maximum Overdrive without the camp.

Sure, a “killer tire movie” sounds as silly as anything Troma has made, but Dupieux shifts our expectations, the film’s intentions, and ultimately, the question of why, into an origami of existentialism. It’s a grindhouse version of a Seinfeld episode. It’s as fruitless to ask why there is a “killer tire movie” as it is to ask why would anyone want to watch it? The film does bask in its own heavy handedness early on, which set-ups a scenario that there’s just no reason to any of this. It creates free reign for Robert, the killer tire, to aimlessly murder. Using telekinetic abilities, Robert can make bunnies and heads exploded Scanners-style.

The film will bore most horror fans looking for a quick fix, as much as it will bore arthouse audiences with its cheeky violence. Rubber is a free form exploitation film, that while delivers the essential nudity and gore, flips back onto the audience, making them a participator. Can film be a work of performance art? If anything, Rubber is vastly original, but since its ultimate goal is to be pointless, it feels strangely hollow. Perhaps the craftsmanship of the film outweighs the finished product, as it’s quite inventive in the execution of scenes and camera work.

Daring and provocative, Rubber isn’t the masterpiece it thinks it is, but it’s so odd, you cannot ignore it. But it is challenging, making it a hard picture to warm up too, no matter how giddy we are seeing the tire shake as a rabbit explodes in the bloodiest of fashions.

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