I'm tempted to call Vincent Gallo's The Brown Bunny a love it or hate it cinematic experience, but that's too black and white a categorization for a film that exists in a gray haze the way this one does. Certainly, if you're predisposed against it, if you dislike Gallo, it will not win you over. If you're open to it, you may or may not like it, or may or or may not love it. You will have to invest something of yourself in it. It's an intensely personal work of art, but that doesn't mean that Gallo's putting his heart in a display case. Indeed, he's said there's very little of himself in the film, no more than what might seep into any artist's work; it's just a story he wanted to tell.

One of the ways that it is intensely personal is in the sense that few people had any input on the film; Gallo is credited with writing, directing, photographing, editing and composing some of the music, among other things. And starring, of course, as Bud Clay, a motorcycle racer haunted by memories of love. The film is Gallo's vision, unadulterated, and that's a rare thing to see in a medium as inherently collaborative as filmmaking. Does it lend the film more artistic credibility? No, but it does offer one the freedom to judge it on a different level than other films; in that way way, it's more like a painting or a song. Is it indulgent? Continuing along this same line of thought, that's like asking if a musician singing a song he wrote about a broken heart is indulgent. It might be, but don't confuse indulgence with narcissism.

It is also personal in that it is so singularly focused on Bud Clay that the film nearly becomes unflinchingly subjective. If you're open to the film, you may well find yourself in the driver's seat of Bud's van, watching the bugs hit the window and the windshield wipers brush away raindrops for minutes of a time, and you'll feel a pervasive sense of loneliness (you know the feeling: it's the one you can't help but have when the sun sets during a road trip). If you're not, you may wonder why you're watching this travelogue when you could be doing something more worthwhile, like watching the bugs splatter on your windshield as you drive home from the theater.

I make no bones about being a big admirer of Vincent Gallo. His first film, Buffalo 66, remains one of my personal favorites; I saw it many times when it was in theaters, and since then it's become sort of a critical gauge when I meet people: "So, what do you think of Buffalo 66?" I've read endless interviews with him, and don't think I'm too out of line when I say that feel that I know where he's coming from. He's a classic tortured artist, full of equal parts bile and heart, and the outrageousness of his personality is matched only by the sincerity of his work. One could accuse him of playing a dirty trick on everyone and making a film whose sole purpose is to show its director receiving oral sex from an actress he used to date on the big screen; Gallo's certainly said things that would substantiate that. But then, on the other hand, you have the movie itself, which is clearly coming from a place far beyond the reach of a mere rabblerouser.

The plot, which almost requires that subjectivity to work, is in essence, a journey from point A to B, after which the screen cuts to black. Bud Clay travels across the country; he loses a motorcycle race, packs his bike into the back of his van and heads West by himself. He's lonely, and now and then he makes sincere attempts at human contact, none of which satisfy him. He stops at a gas station and meets a sweet girl behind the counter. Her name is Violet. He asks her if she'd like to come to California with him, and she, for some reason, decides that she would. Maybe the wounded look in his eyes awaken some maternal instinct in her. He takes her by her house so she can pack her bags, and while she's inside, he changes his mind and drives off. She's better off for it, no doubt, but it's fairly certain that he's not doing it for her sake.

He keeps driving, taking brief stops to get gas or to ride his motorcycle on the Bonneville Salt Flats and disappear into a flickering mirage. Later on his trip, he finds girls named Lilly and Rose, but the one he's looking for is Daisy, his childhood sweetheart, his one true love. She's back in Los Angeles, which is where he eventually ends up, and where the movie ends. To reveal what happens along the way would require delving beneath the surface of the film; there is very little in the way of occurences, and even less in terms of exposition; what there is comes at the end, giving the film its meaning and taking it all away in a single stroke, turning a story of longing into one of regret. More than that I won't reveal; you'd be better off expecting a film in which very little happens and hopefully being surprised by how much is actually there than hearing about everything here and trying to anticipate what Gallo wants you to feel.

Although I will talk about the sex scene, which everyone already will be anticipating. It's not an out-of-the-blue moment; in fact, there's very little shocking about it. It takes place in a hotel room in which Daisy (Chloe Sevigny, who I think must be the bravest actress of all time) and Bud meet when he arrives in Los Angeles. The scene between them begins as a conversation and slowly, very slowly, grows increasingly intimate. By the time anything graphic occurs, it feels natural and honest. It's also one of the saddest and most depressing I've seen in a long time. It is, most definitely, not pornography; it is not designed to provide false thrills or to arouse the audience; everything that I dislike about porn is countered in this encounter.

I'm now going to discuss, in very general detail, what happens after that scene. I won't be spoiling anything, but it is the last scene in the film, and I I would suggest waiting until you've seen the film before you continue reading. I'm only bringing it up here because this is a critique of the film, and as such, I want to discuss the one aspect that didn't work for me.

After the sex scene, Bud and Daisy have a long talk in which they remember hurtful things. In grainy flashbacks, we see everything they're talking about, and I think this undermines the hypnotic pace Gallo's achieved up to this point. I would have preferred to just see a long take of the two of them, laying on the bed and talking; what they say is strong enough to conjure images in my head, and actually seeing those images took me out of the moment, made me aware of the technique. Although I have a sneaky suspicion that, had the scene gone unobstructed, Gallo's performance might not have been strong enough to carry the scene.

But that's it; that's the only problem I had with the film. It kept me from completely loving it, but not from embracing it. I have acknowledged multiple times in this review that The Brown Bunny is not for everyone, and having done so, I will go on to say that it's a special film. Had someone other than Vincent Gallo made it, would it have received any sort of acclaim? That's beside the point; no one else would have made it. This is one of the few instances in which the director's name at the front of the film -- A Vincent Gallo Production -- is a completely unarguable credit. Love it or hate it, it's his.

Postscript: Not too long ago, Gallo put the 16mm camera package he used to make The Brown Bunny up for sale on eBay; I hope someone buys it and goes on to make a different movie that's completely theirs.