The Boring Identity

First there’s a man in the sea. You are supposed to believe that he’s dead, drowned. But since it’s the main character, the film would only last like 2 minutes, so it’s not likely that the dude is dead. And you’re right – shocking!

So out of the water with him and if you didn’t know it, he’s a bit dishy. Although he has bullet holes in his back and apparently an electronic gizmo that switched on tells him his bank account number. This comes in handy 30 minutes later when he manages to waltz into a Swiss bank and ask for the way to his personal vault.

Fortunately he bumps into a woman who’s just as annoying as him so they get along just fine. She has a hard time working with her accent. One minute you’re sure that she’s from Germany, the next an American accent flows by – and then back to the German one. Confused? Mr Boring isn’t. Or perhaps he’s too caught up in her boobs to realise the discrepancy.

He doesn’t know who he is. In the vault, he realises that he has gazillion passports so he’s torn between all these names and identities and which lingo should I be speaking in? He goes for the American (oh my gawd, surprising!) and his codename is Mr Boring.

She’s clingy. She just doesn’t want him to leave her in the middle of metropolis where she has access to all comfortabilities that life could ever offer. The dialogue is sparse but it could have gone something like this:

She: Oh darling, don’t leave me here.
He: But I have to, honey. Because I’m the strong and silent type.
She: But you are dishy. Where will I ever find another dishy man who’s into my boobs?
He: I dunno. You’re a bit of a honey pot yourself, but y’know. I have a gun and all.
She: I know. And it’s a huge turn on!
He: You think?
She: God yeah! O-Ville here I come!
He: Right. You lost me there.
She: HUGE gun and I’m into…
He: Okay!
She: And people die in your trail and that’s kinda hot as well and I’d like to follow you to the end of the world because you’ve been working out.
He: Alright, let’s get a hotel room.
She: Score!

In the hotel room, he washes her hair – excuse me? This is supposed to be one of those very sensual scenes where the women audience comes in the middle of the dark theatre and their boyfriends pretend not to know that their girlfriends are turned on by this hunk doing mushy stuff.

And then he dyes her hair. Who wrote this script?! Mr Boring aka I’ve been working out non stop since I was 10 years and I’m a masculine super macho hero helps shallow girlfriend to massage dye into her hair. Unless his true identity is a hairdresser, I don’t believe this. And what the hell happened to her arms? Is it completely impossible for her to dye her hair on her own?

There are two jokes in the film. And they’re not remotely funny. The first one is in the hotel room. He’s been up all night wiping the darn room clean of finger prints. Well, Sherlock, why didn’t you just wear gloves? Then Boobie-Girl wakes up and can’t believe that Mr Dishy is not in bed with her. Horror-stricken for a nanosecond, then she sees him sitting across the room. The joke: she asks if she can walk on the floor or if she’ll leave footprints. And they laugh and laugh and laugh and you…don’t.

The second joke is all about identity. And it’s an intellectual one so perhaps not everybody in the audience will get it. When he finally manages to dump Boobie-Girl, he does this and that and when I woke up he was on his way to an exotic island. He walks into a bar slash restaurant – and there she is! Working her tail off and looking delicious doing it. The dialogue goes something like this:

She: working working working in a deserted bar slash restaurant
He: Excuse me; you look like you’re working hard for the money.
She: I work hard for the money – I think this was a song from Flashdance?
He: Me too. Not sure, though.
She: Me neither.
He: Can I get a drink?
She: Oh. Do you have some ID?

And then they laugh and laugh and laugh and she runs into his arms and they hug and hug and hug but don’t kiss – and you go into pukeville overdrive.

Did you get the second joke? I mean, it’s so intellectual – identity crisis throughout the film and then she turns it all around by telling a joke: do you know who you are now? And by the way, you look so young so I need to see ID before I serve you a beer. The joke just works on multiple levels. It took my breath away, I tell ya.

Let me know if you thought it was a good film. I may be biased because I like contents rather than appearances.