Movies about Big Busness assholes has been done to death in Father Geek's opinion. Several classic 30's, 40's, and 50's flicks did the subject great justice, and more recently The Insider, Network, Wall Street, In The Company Of Men, The Game, etc... have all touched on the subject matter very entertainingly. I've never really got into this kind of heavy dramatic storyline anyway. This is the kind of story the great majority of people go to movies to get AWAY from in the first place, make it badly, and well...
I've given it a few days and haven't seen anyone chime in with a diatribe on what could have and should have been a kick ass movie, so I feel it's my duty to report on the press screening of Rob Cohen's el crapo "The Skulls" that I laughed myself through last week. The only secret society we need worry about is the one comprised of Universal studio execs who greenlighted this train wreck of a movie.
Spoilers abound below.
The general gist is that Luke (Josh Jackson) is a kid who grew up on the wrong side of the tracks in New Haven and has straightened himself out to become a fine student, and champion crew team member at Yale with aspirations for Harvard Law School. The only problem is that he doesn't have the money, and will be paying off his current college loans for more than 10 years. His one chance is if the secret society of overprivileged white boys "The Skulls" invite him to become a member, because the rumour is that they pay for your graduate school. We the audience know all this because Luke decides to blurt it out to his best friend and room mate (Hill Harper) at the victory celebration for Yale's conference crew championship. As luck would have it, they do! After a ridiculous hazing episode where we meet the buff and beautiful prototype for the Aryan Nation (Paul Walker) that involves hooded robes, coffins, and stealing a weathervane from a rival secret society, Luke is accepted into the hallowed halls of the Skulls and paired with Walker as his "soul mate", charged with looking out for oneanother for the rest of their lives, because the Skulls aren't just for school...they're for life! (how this is different from a frat, we never know...oh, yea, they're secret!)
And who runs the Skulls? Why it's..."Coach!" (as the audience yelled as one) er, Craig T. Nelson, who happens to be (1st big twist) Paul Walker's dad! So the new members of the super secret society are immediately BRANDED on their wrists with a big skull, which is craftily covered up by a brand new $2000 Brietling watch, sure to keep their identity secret for life if they NEVER BATHE. Along with the watch, comes a key to the compound and a book of society rules which we are told by William Peterson, another old white guy and (ooooo!) U.S. Senator, supercede all other laws in the world. The boys are then whisked away on Italian speedboats to an island castle, for a black tie dinner in their honor, complete with nubile young hoochies for all, and each handed the keys to an $80,000 sports car the next morning.
Our hero Luke, who has had to work in the cafeteria for four years to make ends meet, returns the next day to the queries of his best friend and the gorgeous, rich, kind chiquita who lives upstairs that he hangs out with PURELY PLATONICALLY. "Are you in the Skulls?" they ask. He's got a restored '67 Mustang outside, wrist rocks that would shame Puff Daddy, and a key that could open the crypt to the Cask of Amontillado for chrissakes!!! How could he possibly be in a secret society? He's got a neon sign over his head that says, "I just knocked over a mint".
Harper's character, pissed at losing his friend to the rich white establishment, is conveniently also the editor in chief of the school paper (as well as the coxswain on the crew team...which is impossible, but let not practicality cramp the telling of such an engaging story) and decides to do an expose on the Skulls. He steals the key of Luke's soulmate, and breaks into the Skulls' building, but is caught red-handed by Walker. Cut to Luke discovering his best friend having hung himself in the offices of the paper. What happened? the police want to know. So does Luke.
Luke confronts his soulmate after he finds his book of rules in with his deceased buddies belongings. Walker admits that he scuffled with him and he accidently fell and hit his head, his death later made to look like a suicide. It is made very clear to Luke by all parties involved that his first loyalty is to the Skulls, and that the secret must be kept. Luke, of course, has a crises of conscience...and the hilarity ensues!
Teaming with his hotty female co-ed and his thievin' friends from the old days, Luke plots to steal the security tapes from the Skulls house to find out what really happened. And The Man is out to stop 'em! Everybody's in on the secret plot to get Luke! His phones are tapped! His room is wired! He's under constant surveilence! Even the Provost of Yale is a Skull. Hell, if this plot worked for Will Smith, it can work for Josh Jackson! Luke consumates his lust for his cutie gal pal in a (heaven help us) literally steamy scene in the bathroom with the shower on. He grabs the tapes, learns that his roommate was (twist #2) ALIVE when his soulmate beat feet and was later killed by the Provost on orders by Coach! Oh, the humanity! What a world. Never did trust the Provost at my college. He was kinda beady eyed...but, back to the "story".
Luke turns the tape into the cops, and finds his soulmate blaming Luke for the death of his best friend/roomie/coxswain. Motive? Noooo! don't stop to think. Cuz tha cops find Luke's tape blank after he LET'S THE ONLY COPY OUT OF HIS SIGHT. This is a Yale kid, mind you, who wants to go to law school. Obviously having never read the handbook of Conduct When the Whole World's Out to Getcha: Rule #2 Make a Copy of the Name Clearing Evidence, You Ass.
Luke gets doped up and sent to the looney bin. His new girlfriend weeps until William Peterson, a Senator who's never actually required to be IN the Senate (and who, in a daring subplot, is having a tiff with Coach, and wants to see him off the executive committee of the Skulls) helps her bust Luke out of the hospital, only to be chased by the Provost of Death (cackle cackle), and nearly shot. 'Ceptin' the cops shoot the Provost first! So the cops are good...they only sent Luke to the looney bin (for a freakin' MONTH) to flush out the bad guys...or something, STOP THINKING!! So the cops can just arrest the bad guys, right? Wrong, they just shot the only one they had on tape.
"Use the rules, Luke." (No, don't go there). Luke uses an obscure rule in the back of the book to challenge his soulmate to a duel to settle their grievences...even though he knows he didn't kill his roomie. So why challenge him instead of his dad? DOH! Thinking again, sorry. They choose circa 1780's pistoleros, pace off, and of course, Walker pops his Pops in the shoulder, after pangs of doubt about who killed the poor-little-editor-that-couldn't are realized. Then Beautiful Boy, racked with guilt about his screw up Dad trys to off himself, but Luke tackles him just in time, postponing any chance the movie might end that much more quickly.
In the next and most marvelously horrible scene, in front of a great multi-facted glass rosetta window, William Peterson says (I swear), "Luke, join me, and together we can bring about a new order of Skulls!" It is at this point I could contain my outright laughter no longer. Luke, of course, rejects the offer, and walks into the sunset with his new loaded, hottie girlfriend, late for a Dawson's Creek shoot.
Now, if that didn't make any sense to you, join the club, Baby. Pogue's dialogue is embarrassingly weak, expository, and laughable. Cohen's direction and editing are choppy and unclear. The characters have the emotional depth of a skillet and the plot is as mystifying as the Yale admissions process. Only half of the Yalies' "Boolah-Boolah!" chant will be heard in the theaters when this goes wide at the end of the month. The greatest crime, however, is that once again, a great premise (the inner workings of a secret, elite college society) has probably been soiled forever by the broad, ham-handed brush strokes of a big studio that subscribes to Details rather than to details.
Save yourself the $9 and read the Business section for insight on rich white guys who rule the world.
Sweat N' Toil
