It's been said numerous times before, but the most frustrating cinematic failures are those that display spurts of brilliance and promise before devolving into complete crap. OutKast's new musical ""Idlewild"" is one such waste of potential, time and talent.
Set in the small town of Idlewild, Ga., in the 1930s, the film depicts the lives of lifelong friends Percival (AndrAc ""AndrAc 3000"" Benjamin) and Rooster (Antwon A. ""Big Boi"" Patton), whose lives revolve around a lively speakeasy called the Church. Percival is the Church's shy piano player, whose aspirations for the big time conflict with his family mortuary, and Rooster is one of the joint's most boisterous performers who stands to inherit its ownership.
Enter Trumpy (Terrence Howard)—a vicious gangster who guns down the Church's former owners—and diva Angel Davenport (gorgeous newcomer Paula Patton), and the plot gears of ""Idlewild"" are set in motion. Will Percival win his girl's heart and pursue his musical career despite his father's protests? Will Rooster eventually overcome Trumpy's murderous intimidation and assume ownership of the Church?
From everything that follows, apparently writer/director Bryan Barber doesn't really give a shit. He's more concerned with piling on visual gimmicks (there's a constant tendency for inanimate objects to speak suddenly), the most egregious clichAcs possible (try not to shake your head when a Bible helpfully stops a bullet meant for Rooster), and other eccentric touches that likewise serve to distract from the thin storyline.
Although Barber, who directed many OutKast music videos, can stage a musical number with great panache, he doesn't fare so well maintaining a coherent, intriguing plot. It's not that the film needed anything beyond its tried-and-true gangster movie trappings, but Barber's scattershot writing and directing results in a film as jumbled as it is bustling with energy. After a diverting set-up, ""Idlewild"" falls apart scene by scene.
Barber's interminable conclusion eradicates any goodwill the film generated from its upbeat opening—it only serves to underscore how much he values style over substance. It's a shame, too, because nearly everyone in his colorful ensemble (which also includes too-brief appearances by the likes of Ving Rhames, Faizon Love and Patti LaBelle) gives a solid performance. Big Boi has little range but lots of exuberance, Benjamin shows some definite potential and unsurprisingly, much of their featured music is decent.
Howard and Patton make the strongest impressions: It may not be possible for Howard to give an uninteresting performance, and he definitely gives Trumpy more flair and nuance than the character must have had on paper. Still, the ravishing Patton is the real find here; she delivers an astonishingly assured debut performance, and her early scenes with Benjamin evoke an authentic tenderness that is all the more maddening when Barber repeatedly bungles it later.
Ultimately, despite some excellent performances (musical and otherwise) and splendid cinematography, ""Idlewild"" is a massive disappointment. Barber falls back on clichAcs instead of trying to subvert or skewer them, and his weird attempts for originality are often more distracting than anything else. Until the lazy denouement, the film was merely an ambitious, messy failure; after it, Barber insults our intelligence and reveals how disingenuous it all was. ""Idlewild"" could be politely described as a fiasco. That's not to say that Barber isn't talented or capable of making a great movie someday, but after the sprawling, inept ""Idlewild,"" it is clear he's got a lot to learn.
