When people say they “hate L.A.,” this is what they mean. Written, directed, and starring Chris Pine, today’s film is about a knockoff Big Lebowski who gets in over his head while being given license he didn’t earn. The flakiness of Pine’s character is hardly endemic of real-life Los Angeles, and yet it somehow epitomizes the vision of El Lay we have in our heads, a land replete with overindulged manchildren into surfing, slacking, hacky-sacking or anything that avoids “real work” or growing up.
And even then, it should be noted that our “hero” -for lack of a better word- does hold down a job. He’s a Poolman, carefully tending to the unexplored area-rug size volume of blue that exists right outside his trailer next to the motel it belongs to. Every morning, Darren Barrenman (Pine) escapes the eyesore where he resides to become an outdoor moving eyesore in an outfit and look that one might expect of hermit who has given up on society, like Tom Hanks in Cast Away. Outside his trailer door, he walks three feet to his job, where he carefully checks the PH balance and skims all 30 square feet of the surface for any stray leaf.
Then he writes a letter to Erin Brockovich. No, I’m not making that up. After that, his routine includes taking a homemade diorama to bother city council about bus schedules. Again, not making that up. Somehow, he has a job and a girlfriend, although the latter (Jennifer Jason Leigh) wants a commitment from him. You’d think a zero like “DareBear” could do nothing but commit as there’s not much in his life to recommend, but he’s too busy tilting windmills -or the slacker El Lay equivalent- to do otherwise.
His enablers include the folks who run the motel, Jack (Danny DeVito) and Diane (Annette Bening). Diane also doubles as Darren’s therapist. Both are, essentially, Darren’s live-in parents. The important thing here is Darren is a grade A flake, emotionally invested in only two things: his pool and his daily diary submitted to Erin Brockovich. In “I work around water and do origami,” Darren sums himself better than I could.
Well, a movie needs a plot, and Poolman decided to pick the plot from Chinatown. Not only is Chinatown namedropped about a dozen times in the film, the “mystery” (regarding water usage) begins when June Del Ray (DeWanda Wise) shows up at Darren’s trailer door to enlist his help in nailing city council chief Stephen Toronkowski (Stephen Tobolowsky; that name couldn’t possibly be a coincidence, huh?)
Fans of genuine mysteries, heck, fans of Chinatown will step in at this point and ask, “WTF?! Why would you ask this guy to do anything?!” And you’re not wrong. The film never answers that
question to any satisfaction. Not in a little way. Not in a big way. And the rest is … well I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again … Chinatown for morons. Darren’s detection quest is a mix between constant comic relief and a cringe-worthy depiction of SJW. While it personally amounts to hippie therapy, Darren’s lobotomized Jack Nicholson gives a bad name to anybody seeking to improve the world we live in.
While I didn’t loathe Poolman – I could see genuine attempts at off-beat humor here- this is a film that really gives a bad name to SoCal. I have no doubt this is what outsiders think of Californians and you’ve given them fodder for life. Poolman is like a sad window into what happens when Bill & Ted grow up and realize the band is a never and their lives are meaningless. Try to imagine Alex Winter as Bill, middle-aged, without Ted, and struggling to make sense of a world he doesn’t understand by writing daily letters to Erin Brockovich and you’ve got a good idea of what this film is all about.
There was once a Poolman named Darren
Who wrote daily letters to Erin
Then a femme fatale
Moved his world, y’all
By which I mean: it shifted to the other side of barren
Rated R, 100 Minutes
Director: Chris Pine
Writer: Chris Pine, Ian Gotler
Genre: Chinatown for morons
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: Chris Pine
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: People who love to hate Los Angeles
