There
were active oil wells on Venice Beach up through the 1970s. Granted, there is a
mini-tech boomlet underway now, but the hipster colony’s primary industry has
been scenesterism since the last wells were decommissioned in the early 1990s.
Skateboarding private detective Steve Ford definitely considers himself a part
of that funky scene. Yes, we will have to spend time with an annoying
self-styled Bohemian in Mark Cullen’s alleged action-comedy Once Upon a Time in Venice (trailer here), which opens this
Friday in New York.
Mark
& Robb Cullen’s screenplay is so episodic, it could use a prescription for
Ritalin, but eventually it decides its driving Macguffin will be Ford’s niece’s
beloved terrier, who gets dognapped by junkies and bartered to Venice’s drug
lord, Spyder, with whom Ford has some awkward history. Spyder offers him a
deal. If he recovers the money and the drugs his girlfriend Lupe absconded
with, he can exchange them for Fido. Of course, there are numerous intertwining
cases and subplots, such as the spectacularly pornographic graffiti plaguing a
real estate developer charmingly referred to as “Lou the Jew.”
This
film is almost unwatchable. None of the jokes land, but some of them face-plant
so hard we have to feel embarrassed for the big-name case, who have all
appeared in vastly superior films, including Bruce Willis (Unbreakable) as Ford, John Goodman (Argo) as his surf shop buddie, Jason Momoa (Road to Paloma) as Spyder, Stephanie Sigman (Miss Bala) as Lupe, and Famke Janssen (Rounders) as Ford’s personality-less sister-in-law. They all find
themselves in the unenviable position of trying to pull off gags involving sex
addicts-anonymous support groups and transvestite hookers doing straight
characters’ make-up at gun point.
