“Being here with you reminds me of what I was like before my suicide.”

ZombieDog’s rating: Slightly better than you think it would be.

ZombieDog’s review: I would say one of the aspects of a good cult film is that it’s completely unapologetic in telling an unconventional story. It goes without saying that you have to find actors who are willing to play along, and, more often than not, willing to work for less with no guarantee of success. This acting on a wire can be liberating because you simply have nothing to lose.

Wristcutters: A Love Story is an independent film that had $1 million budget and a lot of unique ideas. At its core, it is a love story.. that so happens to take place in the afterlife. Our lead character, Zia (Patrick Fugit), committed suicide after his long-term relationship ends. To his surprise and disappointment, he winds up in an afterlife that is just a little bit worse than the life he left. The colors are muted, nobody can smile, and there is garbage everywhere. It feels like a place that you wouldn’t want to wind up in, yet it wouldn’t drive you crazy to be there.

Here Zia winds up working at Kamikaze pizza and has to share an apartment with an annoying roommate. However, everything changes when he meets somebody from his previous life who tells him that his girlfriend also committed suicide. Zia takes this as a sign that he can find her in this afterlife and convinces his buddy Eugene (Shea Whighan) to go on a road trip.

This is the heart of Wristcutters. Honestly, when Zia is in the city working his crappy job and hanging around in crappy bars, it doesn’t really feel that different from regular life. It’s only when we get out of the city that we see this new reality for what it is. It’s not to be envied, yet there is something meaningful in what they’re pursuing and the effect it’s having on them and the people around them.

We also begin to learn that this reality is completely different because there are little anomalies everywhere. For example, in their car there is a black hole underneath the front seat. Also, miracles can and do occur — but only if they mean nothing. The logic of this world is strange yet somehow beautiful.

Around this time they pick up a hitchhiker named Mikal (Shannyn Sossamon) who immediately trashes these guys for finding anything redeeming about this place because, “it’s hot as balls and filled with assholes.” She also lets them know that her quest is to find the “People in Charge” (PIC) since she’s there by mistake as she didn’t kill herself. Eugene and Zia think she’s crazy as it would be like looking for God in your born life. However after arguing about it for a little while, they realize it might be a possibility.

This is a beautiful aspect of this movie where the reality of the world they live in isn’t set and is also not known. It changes based on their perspective and we start to realize that even though it’s a punishment, there’s also something to be valued in just being alive, no matter what form it is.

This heavy character-driven movie is a movie about redemption, just not in the way you would think. What’s more, when we finally do encounter the “People in Charge,” it is not entirely clear they know what they’re doing. They have problems of their own and reveal the universe to be less than a precise mechanism and more like a hodgepodge of whatever sticks together.

I would call Wristcutters a cult movie primarily because of the subject matter. More than that though, it feels like a passion project for Croatian director Goran Dukic. This was his first full-length movie — and a decent attempt at that. At first you feel like there’s a heavy dose of guerrilla filmmaking by just filming wherever they can set the camera up, but he does wind up using the money in effective ways. The movie is well cast without a doubt and when special effects are used they propel the story forward. If I had to summarize, I would say that he does a remarkable job at world building by just driving around in the desert. Through the character’s eyes there is a lesson and that is reality is what we make it.

So is this movie good? Hell yeah! (No pun intended) I would recommend this movie on storyline alone. There’s so much more though, it’s perfectly cast and the dialogue is spot on. It does have an art film feel to it in some places, but I stick by my assertion it’s a full-on cult film. The director was also able to nab a few decent stars: a young Nick Offerman, Tom Waits, and even Will Arnett of Arrested Development fame. Some of the subject matter can be gruesome, but it’s handled in subtle yet powerful ways. We know why they are there, but the movie really isn’t about their choices in a previous life. Heads up though it will shock you in some places. I would recommend late-night solo viewing.

More movies about the afterlife:

• Defending Your Life (1991)
• Made in Heaven (1987)
• A Matter of Life and Death (1946)