Kaboom lingers a little too long at the dorm

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      Starring Thomas Dekker and Haley Bennett. Unrated. Opens Friday, May 27, at the Vancity Theatre

      Kaboom is not without fun moments. But there's an air of desperation to this messy collection of youth-movie tropes and little to indicate that it's the 10th feature for writer-director Gregg Araki, a once-bold wunderkind now past 50.

      Like his unwrinkled cast, the movie looks swell, although a low budget keeps it limited in population and locales. Good thing Thomas Dekker—last seen as reality-TV progenitor Lance Loud in HBO's Cinema Verite—is so likable as the generically named Smith, a SoCal film student who admits to a Luis Buñuel fetish but has kept his sexual major “undeclared”. Indeed, he lusts after his lunkheaded, surfer-dude roommate (Chris Zylka) while getting down with the squeaky-voiced Brit chick (Juno Temple, daughter of filmmaker Julien) who amiably bosses him around. “Straight guys are gayer than gay guys,” she explains, reassuringly.

      Smith's best pal (Marley and Me's Haley Bennett) is a snarky “vagitarian” who recently hooked up with a vixen (France's Roxane Mesquida) who might be a witch. Smith has been having his own occult problems since he ate those psychedelic-laced party canapés and then bumped into a girl soon murdered by men wearing animal masks. And why is his haughty mother (Kelly Lynch) so vague about the death of Smith's dad? Somehow, it's hard to imagine the boy turning in that big paper by Friday.

      The film's almost formless flow is okay, and it's hard not to giggle at Araki's mash-up of clichés from horror movies, art films, and The OC. But he has already explored the nexus of nascent sexuality, pop-culture studies, and sci-fi obsession, most notably in his finest effort, Mysterious Skin. By the ending of this one, you're left with the feeling that Gregg has lingered a little too long at the dorm.


      Watch the trailer for Kaboom.

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