Savages

Savages may come off choppy in the very beginning, but it does springboards to a really fantastical second half.

An unabashedly lurid sun-and-surf ménage-à-trois cum drug-running caper, with touches of Jacobean tragedy for good measure.

The film would have been so much more interesting if the two men had been identical twins played by the same actor-like Jeremy Irons in David Cronenberg's Dead Ringers.

Amid all the violence and profanity, Oliver Stone reveals a begrudging respect for his damned characters.

The messy insouciance wears a little thin, and by the time we get to the absurdity of the extended ending, enough is definitely enough.

The three leads are a bit on the bland side but perhaps that's the way California potheads are. Del Toro and Travolta are terrific in their more interesting roles.

Viewer agony begins right near the start, as O describes her boffing sessions with the battle-scarred Chon: “I had orgasms&#59; he had ‘wargasms.'” Yow. Haven’t Writers Guild of America memberships been revoked for less?

While the juicy performances and exciting meat of Savages are vicious fun, it’s a film whose feeble conceit undoes the pleasures of its base appeal.

Messy, violent, and often garish, but it's capably directed by Stone.

The film lends its characters some last-second self-awareness that it could have used itself, instead taking a viewpoint exemplified in O's narration, casually approaching a very frenetic life.