In my mind, there were two possible options for the topic of my final Obiter Dicta article. I could write a sentimental, well-written article waxing poetic about my nine years of post-secondary education and the great memories associated with my time as a student at Osgoode Hall; alternatively, I could write a review for a 1996 movie that scores a paltry 5.6 out of 10 on IMDb.
Having chosen the latter, I spent the day watching Thinner, an adaptation of Stephen King’s 1984 novel of the same name. I do not regret this decision; despite it being one of the worst movies I can recall devoting almost one hour and a half to, Thinner provides its viewers with memorably bad line after memorably bad line at such a frenetic pace that I’m convinced it is one big joke (and a supremely funny one at that).
I should first note that nothing illustrates the power of the internet better than my ability to find Thinner online in a matter of seconds. The fact that someone (Stephen King, maybe?) took the time to upload this piece of shit to a variety of hosting websites so that I could illegally stream it is truly an act of humanitarianism; Bono and Bill Gates would be proud.
Billy Halleck, played by some three-named actor I’ve never heard of (Robert John Burke, if you’re interested), is a lawyer. He’s overweight, looking like a white version of Sherman Klump, Eddie Murphy’s morbidly obese character in The Nutty Professor. He can barely walk up a set of stairs without passing out, and weighs in at a hefty three hundred pounds; his wife tells him to stop digging his grave with a spoon and a fork, but he has difficulty avoiding the temptation of Doritos (product placement was alive and very well in the mid-90s) and other sweet treats (or anything, really).
I will summarize the plot of this movie as briefly as I can: while driving and receiving oral sex from his wife, Billy hits an old gypsy woman with his car, killing her. Fortunately for Billy, he is connected: a police officer and judge from his town combine to rule the gypsy woman’s death accidental in the span of about one minute at a coroner’s inquest. The dead woman’s 106-year-old father is furious, and proceeds to curse Billy, as well as the police officer and the judge.
Fortunately for Billy, his curse is – at least initially – helpful: he begins to lose weight at a rapid pace, despite consuming a Michael Phelps-like 12,000 calories per day; concerned (though at this point unaware of his curse), he sees a doctor, stating that he has lost the “equivalent of a fucking suitcase.” Having learned that his judge friend is sick, Billy pays a visit to his house; he encounters the judge’s crazed wife, who says that her husband is turning into a lizard (which, presumably, is a worse curse than losing weight at a rapid pace) and convinces Billy that he and the judge have been put under a gypsy curse.
Billy learns that the curse must be removed by the person who was responsible for putting the curse in place; fortunately for Billy, he has a mafia friend that he successfully defended in an attempted murder case who is willing to help him out. The mafia friend threatens the gypsies, and the old gypsy man removes the curse because he fears that his granddaughter is in danger. This was fortunate, because Billy was “being erased” and looked frightfully thin; someone even said to him that “I worked with cadavers in med school that looked better than you do.”
I think Thinner is supposed to be some kind of lesson in morality. I just can’t really figure out what the lesson is. From a legal perspective, I took away a couple of things. First, legal work –by and large – is desk work. You sit around a lot, and aren’t totally active during the day. For this reason, exercise is important, unless you want to become fat. Because when you become fat, you hit old gypsy women with your car. When you hit old gypsy women with your car, they die. When they die, their fathers exact revenge by cursing you. When you’re cursed, you lose weight. And when you lose weight, you have to bring in mafia reinforcements. Don’t bring in mafia reinforcements. Just stay in shape. Second, it pays to successfully represent mafia types, because when you’re really in a bind they will be there for you.
At one point, Billy screams at the gypsies, saying that justice isn’t being served by slowly killing him (and the judge and the police officer). He goes on to say the following: “You know as much about justice as I know about turbine engines… NOW TAKE YOUR FUCKING CURSE OFF ME!” I don’t have much to say about this, other than to say that it was hilarious and that I wonder why Billy knows so little about turbine engines and why he thought to use them as a comparative tool in such a stressful circumstance.
When the old gypsy man removed his curse, he explained to Billy that the curse couldn’t be fully removed; it had to be transferred to someone else. This was done by cutting Billy and letting his blood drip into a pie… which would then have to be consumed by an unsuspecting person, who would die a quick and painless death. Fortunately for Billy, he knows just the person: his wife, who he suspects of cheating on him with their doctor (though I don’t know if this is actually the case; I think all these gypsy curses have gotten to Billy’s head). Sure enough, he gets her to eat the pie. She dies. Unfortunately, his daughter eats it too (we don’t see her die, but that pie is instant death so it is safe to assume she died). As his final act of insanity, Billy eats a piece of pie with the possibly cheating doctor, presumably killing them both.
So it was a happy ending, I guess. Oh, the morality thing: don’t have sex in your car while you are driving, and don’t be jealous of moderately attractive doctors who have a friendly relationship with your significant other, and also try to avoid serving Death Pie to your daughter.
I guess it’s also important to not be so critical of yourself: being thin doesn’t equate to being happy, so be happy with yourself, even if you don’t look exactly how you’d like to look. Because it’s better to be overweight and a successful lawyer than thin and a cursed, sociopathic murderer.
Thinner isn’t a great movie, and I’d be inclined to say that whoever made this movie knows as much about film-making as I know about lint-roller manufacturing. But I did enjoy it, and I’m sure you would too.