Courtesy of TIFF
TORONTO, Canada—Conspiracies are everywhere in Poolman, although the greatest mystery might be how anyone involved was attracted to this tidal wave of dire kookiness. Aiming for ramshackle neo-noir comedy in the vein of The Big Lebowski and Under the Silver Lake, Chris Pine’s star-studded directorial debut (premiering at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival) spins convoluted webs that are both nonsensical and humorless. It’s difficult to remember the last time a wannabe-zany film worked this hard for so few laughs.
At rundown Los Angeles motel The Tahitian Tiki, Darren Barrenman (Pine) tends to a tiny pool with the meticulous care of an artist. Listening to opera via his vintage discman and archaic headphones, latticed fingerless gloves worn on hands that wield a skimmer, he goes about his duty in the early morning sunshine with a Zen calm that he additionally exhibits during his frequent meditations at the bottom of the deep end. During those quiet, closed-eye sessions, he has puzzling visions: tree branches swaying in the light; standing in a cave while wearing a suit that doesn’t match his scraggly long blonde hair and graying beard; and hearing about “the secret thing” and other oblique enigmas from a talking lizard. The last of these is somehow related to Darren’s belief that there are “humanoid shapeshifters” walking among us, not that it ultimately matters.
As conceived by Pine and co-writer Ian Gotler and embodied by the leading man, Darren is a collection of weirdo-isms. He’s an origami artist who gives out his creations as gifts, and he’s simultaneously a crusader, incessantly appearing at city council meetings (577 in a row!) to put on detailed presentations (aided by posterboard supporting materials) about the need for more trolleys, a new bus schedule, and an end to rampant urban development. At these hearings, he’s accompanied by his therapist Diane (Annette Benning) and her director husband Jack (Danny DeVito), who’s making a documentary titled “David and Go’Lie’Th” about Darren’s efforts to revitalize L.A. Jack and Diane are Darren’s Tahitian Tiki neighbors and friends (and, strangely, named after John Mellencamp’s hit song), and also in his life are his right-hand man/gofer Wayne (John Ortiz) and his quasi-girlfriend Susan (Jennifer Jason Leigh), who has a habit of sleeping with other people.