Movie Review: Swiss Army Man

In buddy comedy Swiss Army Man, Daniel Radcliffe plays a magical farting corpse who rescues Paul Dano's shipwrecked loner from certain death. Yes, that old chestnut.

They say there are only six kinds of stories. Well, they finally found a seventh.

Then again, Swiss Army Man, despite its unconventional premise, is a traditional hero’s journey.

There’s the ‘call to adventure’, which is when the lonely, desperate Hank (Paul Dano), shipwrecked on a deserted island, spies a corpse (Daniel Radcliffe) being washed up onto his beach.

There’s the ‘refusal of the call’, where Hank briefly decides to ignore his new island-mate and proceed with his planned suicide, even though the corpse begins vibrating with motion-achieving flatulence.

And, of course, there’s ‘crossing the threshold’, which is when Hank abandons his grisly plans and rides the magical farting corpse like a jet ski to the mainland, using its enchanted erection as a compass.

George Lucas has admitted he cribbed much of Star Wars’ template from Akira Kurosawa’s The Hidden Fortress. You could argue Swiss Army Man writer-directors Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert (they go by ‘Daniels’) are themselves pulling from Kurosawa’s Ikiru (if that film’s lead character had rediscovered life’s meaning through the transformative power of cutting the cheese).

In a season of overwhelming sameness at the cineplex, Swiss Army Man rides in on a wave of relief. It’s a thoroughly exceptional viewing experience, though not nearly as alienating and unpleasant as you'd assume from its shorthand nickname. (Google “farting corpse movie” and only one option appears.)

Its success relies on the full-throated commitment of its stars. Radcliffe further sheds his Harry Potter with another unconventional role, yet still uses his boyish wonderment to great effect, once his corpse, Manny, regains the ability to speak and re-learns humanity (from 'fear' to 'love' to 'fart etiquette'). Dano is similarly excellent as a detached loner hiding from a complicated past, and who might have disconnected from reality in befriending a dead body (one of his explanations for Manny’s perceived return to the land of the living).

Their bromantic two-hander segues seamlessly into regular ol' romance, but the necromantic homoeroticism isn’t played as a joke; rather, the genuine sweetness of Hank and Manny’s relationship is what keeps Swiss Army Man relatable, and from floating away like a bloated dead body to a place of total inscrutability. Want to describe Swiss Army Man without resorting to “farting corpse movie”? Call it a love story.

This marks the Daniels’ first feature, following a series of shorts and idiosyncratic music videos, including the memorable “Turn Down For What” (which also centered on a possessed boner, suggesting Swiss Army Man’s childlike sense of humour is far from an anomaly). They’re seemingly taking cues from another music video graduate, Michel Gondry, right down to a sequence in which Hank and Manny rebuild classic film sets and re-enact a shadow-theatre version of Jurassic Park (a’la Be Kind Rewind).

However, there’s a dark, self-critical undercurrent to their picture that elevates it above other Gondry-lite efforts, such as the execrable Me and Earl and the Dying Girl. As we learn of Hank’s failed romantic pursuit of a woman (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) back in civilisation, we begin to see him as a twisted variation on the “friend-zoned” protagonist of a romantic comedy, taken to its logical extreme. He questionably remakes Manny in his own image, meaning, in many ways, Swiss Army Man is a love story about a deranged dude and himself. Now that’ll inspire some self-reflection on the arthouse attendees.

Thankfully, you need not engage in crippling personal psychoanalysis to enjoy Swiss Army Man, which, superficially, is a very funny, deeply strange and undeniably singular flick.

Cinematographer Larkin Seiple captures Hank and Manny’s jungle retreat with mystical reverence. The soundscape is entirely unique too, derived from Hank and Manny’s guttural noises. Meaning: Swiss Army Man could also be classified as a musical, jet powered by fart jokes and singalongs.

I fear by listing its attributes I’m only turning more people away. This is indeed a cinematic jambalaya – and I recognise that’s a dish not for all tastes. It was for mine.

4/5

Swiss Army Man is rated M for crude humour, sexual references and coarse language.