Conspiracy
theories are the secular religion of our time, so it makes sense they would
produce their equivalent of the messiah. It turns out the put-upon waiter at an
Egyptian restaurant is the prophesized one, or whatever. Of course, he has no
idea what that means, but it is not clear screenwriter-director Hamzah Tarzan
knows either, judging from Mike Boy (trailer here), which opens this
Friday in Los Angeles.
Mike
Boy is such a doormat, the hostess of his restaurant even shorts him on tips.
He grew up an orphan, so he is understandably psyched when his bossy girlfriend
Charlotte (she prefers to be called Lara) gives him a first edition of Oliver Twist (it turns out it was a
flimsy tradepaperback published by Penguin. Who knew?). It wasn’t such a big
deal for her because her father is an antiquarian bookseller, whose expertise
might just factor into the caper later.
Shortly
after an old Sopranos-looking
gentleman spies Boy’s horse pendant, “Agent Chris” pays him a visit. Supposedly,
two shadowy cabals have been secretly waging war for global domination.
According to prophesy, Boy is the vengeance-seeker with the Andalusian horse
necklace who will help Chris’s faction, the D’s, permanently overcome the
Russian Mobbed-up Two Bones. To avenge his murdered mother and fulfill his
destiny, Boy will have to complete a series of baffling transactions by
midnight.
Okay,
so far, so good, even though it takes the film way too long to get to this
point. Unfortunately, what follows is a series of meaningless exchanges of one
package for another, with instructions of where to go next. Naturally, the Two
Bones are following along behind him, killing the parties to his obscure
dealings, even though they should be more prepared, considering they understand
what is going on better than Boy does.
Everyone
digs a good conspiracy theory, so we all come into MB primed for a climatic showdown in its Masonic Lodge from Hell. Regrettably,
Tarzan never pulls back to give us a more macro view of the secret history
afoot. Instead, the film starts to feel like an especially dull episode of Deal or No Deal, as Boy keeps trading
one generically ominous package for another.
Hugh
Massey is not bad in the title role, but he has zero chemistry with Emily
Killian’s Charlotte/Lara. The supporting cast is genuinely colorful, but most
of them seem confused about their characters and motivations—like we can blame
them. More fundamentally problematic, the film doesn’t move along briskly
enough for a paranoid thriller.
