‘The Canyons’ Falls Flat

A few nights ago, I grabbed a bottle of wine and sought The Canyons on Amazon Instant. After reading The New York Times’ unflattering account of the movie shoot and watching the flashy, dub-stepped trailer, I was intrigued.

The low-budget production is helmed by Hollywood heavyweights: American Psycho writer Bret Easton Ellis and director Paul Schrader, who wrote Raging Bull and Taxi Driver. They managed to pull Lindsay Lohan from her downward spiral long enough to shoot a full-length film, and paired her with porn star James Deen, who is making his non-adult film debut.

Those three factors alone suggest a raw and provocative outcome. But in the end, I was only shocked at how utterly boring the movie was. Having watched American Psycho, The Rules of Attraction, and Less Than Zero, I’m a little familiar with the Bret Easton Ellis oeuvre. Rich, white people have sex, do drugs, and someone is probably killed. Throw in heaping spoonfuls of amorality, emotional detachment, and cynicism, and that’s a wrap.

The problem with The Canyons is that it brings this down to its basest, least clever level. The characters just exist, with no particularly redeeming qualities. Greed and power are their only motivations. With uneven acting and stiff  dialogue, the characters are rendered both insipid and sad.

Deen is competent as the controlling, steely-eyed Christian, a trust-fund baby who likes filming sex romps with his girlfriend Tara and random people they meet online. Lohan tries to turn in a decent performance as Tara and does succeed in injecting some emotion into the film.

But it’s not enough. I still wondered how Lohan went from Mean Girls to The Canyons. I still wondered why everyone in the movie swore that Tara was the most desirable woman on the planet. With Lohan’s overly plumped and made-up visage, the suspension of disbelief seemed a tall order.

Glee’s Nolan Funk plays Ryan, the other part of the lust triangle. At first he seems the most comfortable actor on screen, but as the character demands more intensity, he falters. Then there’s other filler characters, sex, stalking, sex, crying, secrets are revealed, someone gets stabbed, stalking, roll credits.

With a 22% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, I thought this was going to be so bad it was good, a la Showgirls or a Lifetime movie. But it’s worse. It’s a bad, boring flick that takes itself too seriously.

With that said, The Canyons is a good-looking movie. Cinematographer John DeFazio does a commendable job with the lighting, setting the mood beautifully. (I was more intrigued by his work than that of any of the actors.) The locations, namely Christian and Tara’s mansion and Cynthia’s green bungalow, are a decor addict’s dream, while Lohan’s wardrobe adds personality. But they’re not enough to distract from the emptiness on screen.

Perhaps the best story about The Canyons is what happened off-screen, rather than on. But again, it’s not enough. The Canyons tries to push you to the edge. In the end, it’s the film that falls flat.