"You’re a miracle, or I’m just hallucinating from starvation." ~ Hank
After watching Swiss Army Man, I want to take a poll and ask people what they would do with a farting corpse. It’s a bit morbid, the idea of stumbling across a corpse in real life, but for directors Dan Kwan and Daniel Scheinert it’s the start of a zany adventure. In fact, the entire plot for Swiss Army Man can be summarized in the phrase, “farting corpse.” It sounds like a playing card in Cards Against Humanity, and the irreverent humor found in the film is of a similar nature as the popular party game.
Swiss Army Man (2016) opens on a small island where the marooned scraggly-bearded Hank (Paul Dano) is prepared to hang himself. He hums a shaky tune to himself, but before he takes the final step, Hank spies a corpse (Daniel Radcliffe) washed ashore. Hank stumbles to the body and presses his ear to the dead man’s chest for signs of life. He hears a soft rumble and then—the corpse releases a sad, squealing fart.
The film is kind enough to let the audience know whether they should exit the theatre four minutes into the action. The surrealistic drama and whacky comedy only increases from the first fart, which can be either enthralling or repellent. (Considering I continued past the four-minute mark, you know what I thought.) One fart leads to another, and soon the corpse expels enough gas to be turned into a human jet ski for Hank to ride. They land on a new beach, though still far from civilization, and wander off into the woods. Their adventure leads Hank to learn amazing things about the corpse: its name is Manny, he can karate chop logs like a ’90s action toy, his mouth works as a water faucet, and he is the perfect human version of a Swiss army knife.
Swiss Army Man never ceases to entertain, but I always felt like I was waiting for it to transition from a surrealist segmental comedy to a coherent production. From what I gathered, the story seems to be about resurrection. Literally, Manny rises from the dead to perform incredible acts of flatulence and become reacquainted with the world. Metaphorically, Hank escapes his physical and emotional island where he feels utterly isolated from society and incompetent in every social skill imaginable (most of which seem to circulate around the art of romantic interaction.)
But there’s a difference between a film’s intentions and its actual achievements. Manny is resurrected into this world less like a Swiss Army Man and more like a Swiss Army Baby, because Hank has to retrain the corpse on everything from sexual urges to mating rituals to…well, actually, most of their conversations somehow wrap back to rules of acceptable social behavior toward the opposite sex.
Swiss Army Man is a fascinating movie, but it feels like it handles more grandiose themes than it’s ready for. The acting from Paul Dano and Daniel Radcliffe is superb, and I loved how a good portion of the soundtrack was Dano and Radcliffe singing non-lexical syllables acapella. It’s memorable for how quirky it is, but don’t be surprised if you feel like Hank and Manny have more revelations during their adventure than you have watching them.
Rating: B- | 2½ stars
