Tarnation (2004) For lack of anything better to do, Frank fell in love with the girl. It was easy. After all, he was drunk every night and prowling the Quarter for stray oxycontin to trim down the much of the rest of the time. With its tricky time-release, many dumb kids were ODing on the stuff down on Bourbon and Canal streets—in touristy places like the House of Blues and the Absinthe Hotel (now refurbished into a daiquiri-to-go place) or the Hog’s Breath. They ODed because they’d think they’d gotten ripped off for a couple of Advil or Correctol when they didn’t feel any effects right away. Then they’d go and buy some Xtacy or a bunch of shots of jaegermeister and when both the liquor and oxy got into their system together: Bam! They were worm-food. The solution was to eliminate the time release. Most of the young guys found the best way was crushing it up and snorting it. But, a few had been cooking it down and shooting it up. For one local gay couple, though, this had proven deadly—a lethal injection, in fact, considered a homicide, because one of the two was a little skittish around a needle and needed help from his pal. Now it was up to 12 from OP to decide whether the accident was more of a death by misadventure or even an assisted suicide… Of course, Frank had been recently annoyed by such soap-opera plights since renting Tarnation, the debut documentary by Jonathan Caouette (Available May 17, on Wellspring Media), about his odd upbringing in a family rife with abuse and insanity. Frank is reminded of the Dogme95 films of the last decade, especially those of Harmony Korine (Gummo 1997)—lots of raw footage spliced together MTV style, leaving one with more impression than plot. Think Atomic Café (1982); stock footage documentary has been done to death. Though tired of the shock value of domestic gay men (pillow talk is passé no matter whose doing it), one can still be intrigued by the honest grief as Caouette learns of and deals with his mother’s lithium overdose. And be downright fascinated by the child Caouette taping himself dressing up and acting the roles of an abused woman and other impromptu (?) characters. But always, there is a caveat: A lack of production values is not the easiest road to great film. Often as here, it looks simply like that: a lack of production values. Understandably, the film encompasses 20+ years of Caouette's home videos. But that topped with some digitally toned or cascaded shots doesn’t make a film any more watchable. It is an hour and a half of throwaway effects and “just-so” titles reminiscent of Barbara Kruger. And, inconsistent text size is annoying and looks more sloppy than artsy. If you like to watch families bent by drugs, alternative lifestyles and poor mental health, turn in to Dateline or 60 Minutes, or Maury, Jerry, Montel or Jenny Jones (;or better yet, consult your own home movies, while listening to Marianne Faithful or “Wichita County Lineman.”) Frank on the other hand was sick to death of “poor wittle me”-style documentary (and thinks a less-kind reviewer would wonder how much push-button emotion is fallen from the exposition of pure documentary and turned into simply a promotional tool for Caouette's acting career.) This assumption is supported by the conclusion which is decidedly nothing-but too played-out for the camera. After all, we’ve all got crap to bear; the TV dinner of life comes with a lot of gristly chicken and only a tiny, flaccid brownie. So Frank was going to continue to use the oxy to smooth out the end of the night (when he was out of money or decent bars to hit) and its transition into a sleepless-hung-over day at the station. With a blissful waking coma as the whiskey seeped out of your pores in the sultry tropical humidity, you could do without food and sleep (really, sex too!) much longer than those dumb crank-cases did on the crystal, Frank thought. It didn’t just keep you up; it mellowed you out for a longer haul. Meth kept you up but did little to help you tolerate the horribleness of daily existence. Anyhoo, Frank didn’t give a rat’s ass about ODing. Since Iris or Jeanne had passed, he’d come to enjoy mixing his vices. She/They’d found his general lack of vice to be a weakness when they were seeing each other. So he now piled them on in stacks.