Choke: The Twin Engines Of Self-Destruction By Jerry Dennis

“Everyone gets everything he wants. I wanted a mission, and for my sins, they gave me one. Brought it up to me like room service. It was a real choice mission, and when it was over, I never wanted another.
-- Captain Benjamin L. Willard from Apocalypse Now

“The way I see it, you have people who own lawns and people who mow them. And they’re never the same.
-- Trent Burns from Lawn Dogs

“Maybe our generation has found its Don DeLillo”
-- Bret Easton Ellis

Two colossal black holes have been created over the last two weeks-- the suicide of David Foster Wallace and the death of Paul Newman. It has been a year of painful losses. Yet the loss of these two titans amidst a brutal financial crisis in our country throws salt over an already gaping wound. No one will ever replace the talent, range, warmth and generosity of Paul Newman who will always be the very definition of a class act. We will always be grateful for his presence. The suicide of David Foster Wallace two weeks ago was shocking. I read Infinite Jest and a few of Wallace’s essays, but I took him granted. I thought that kind of genius would always be around. Reading Elizabeth Wurtzel’s appreciation of him in last week’s New York magazine made me realize how much I did not understand his battle with depression. And if anyone knows about depression, it is Ms. Prozac Nation herself, Elizabeth Wurtzel. Depression is the most belligerent bitch out there which shreds more inner flesh than I care to admit. I cannot say I totally relate to Mr. Wallace’s battle with it, but as someone who suffers from mild depression, I have a pretty decent idea. That is what makes it all the more difficult to accept the fact that it got the better of him. If David Foster Wallace finally surrendered to it, what hope do the rest of us have? That is the ultimate black hole of despair.

Now to get to one of the points of this essay, if Bret Easton Ellis says that you are the Don DeLillo of your generation, that is pretty high praise indeed. Some would rest on that laurel alone and then fall into an abyss of mediocrity. After reading Choke when it was published in 2001, I decided that maybe it was time that Chuck Palahniuk deserved to be his own man. It is the same when people used to describe Takashi Miike as a Japanese version of David Lynch. It is neither fair to Lynch or Miike. There is no one quite like David Lynch in this world. Takashi Miike is his own brilliant beast. I am sure the womb he came from never quite recovered. He had proven himself with Fight Club, Survivor and Invisible Monsters. After Choke, he is no one’s bitch. He is an institution with a legion of loyal fans who will read whatever he writes. The writing has yet to become bland or mediocre. One of the many tragedies of Wallace’s suicide is there will never be anymore words from his beautiful mind. Chuck Palahniuk is still cranking out great work. Rant and Snuff are the works of a man who refuses to slow down or settle for mediocrity. He has rightfully earned his place on the bookshelf along side David Foster Wallace and Don DeLillo. Palahniuk, like DeLillo and Wallace before him, can make sense of the insane times we live in right now.

Clark Gregg’s adaptation of Choke is one of the better directorial debuts I have seen recently. Clark Gregg is an actor who has done a lot of television work such as The New Adventures Of Old Christine and The West Wing plus some feature films such as Iron Man and In Good Company. Gregg also wrote the screenplay based on Palahniuk’s Choke and he retained many of the elements that made the book so memorable and disturbing to me seven years ago. That is the beauty of Chuck Palahniuk’s work; it evokes a variety of emotions that stay with you long after you put his books down. It is those same emotions that make you want to pick and read those books again every couple of years. Walking into Choke, I did not expect to see something like Fight Club-- not at all. That is not fair to compare Clark Gregg to David Fincher. These are two very different interpretations of the author’s work. David Fincher is a visionary; his take on Fight Club will always be one of the great masterworks of our time. Having said that, I really like what Mr. Gregg brought to the table with Choke.

It would have been all too easy to say that you wanted to see Ed Norton or Brad Pitt portray Victor Mancini, but that would be a cop out. The part of Victor Mancini was meant to be played by Sam Rockwell. It is the second part of a one two punch of self-destructive roles that Mr. Rockwell has perfected this year. To truly appreciate his performance in Choke, you need to watch his devastating performance as Glenn in David Gordon Green’s Snow Angels earlier this year. In many ways, Victor and Glenn are the same type of character. Both men are in a recovery process for different kinds of addictions. Victor Mancini is sex addict who attends a sex addicts anonymous group led by Joel Grey’s Phil. Glenn is a recovering alcoholic who has found Jesus; he is on the wagon. It is to Sam Rockwell’s credit that he is able to portray these twin engines of self-destruction to absolute perfection. These two performances taken together reveal an enormous talent. This should not come as a surprise to anyone who watched Sam Rockwell’s performances over the years. He is a very talented actor. Confessions Of Dangerous Mind, Welcome To Collinwood, Safe Men, Galaxy Quest, The Green Mile and Matchstick Men were all very entertaining films that showed that Mr. Rockwell had screen presence. Yet to me, Sam Rockwell truly lit the screen up as Trent Burns in Lawn Dogs, one of those gems that got lost in the shuffle in the late Nineties. It is where I first noticed him, where he stood out. It was the role to judge all future roles by. With Snow Angels and Choke, he has certainly exceeded all expectations. He is allowed to shine in these roles. Victor Mancini in Choke allows for the more scoundrel aspects of Rockwell’s other characters. Yet the two characters display the dynamic range of the actor. At times, Mr. Rockwell displays a demented, dysfunctional Jimmy Stewart crossed with a pre-West Wing Martin Sheen. There is a crazed gleam in Mr. Rockwell’s eyes that suggest the Martin Sheen of Badlands, Apocalypse Now and The Dead Zone. It is this channeling that makes his role as the father in Joshua so intense to watch. His intensity is on full display in Choke. He is the glue that keeps the film together. His voice over narration is some of the freshest since Martin Sheen’s Willard from Apocalypse Now.

Victor Mancini, not to be confused with Vincent Mancini from The Godfather Part III, is a sex addict who works as an “historical interpreter” at a colonial theme park. He is a con artist who specializes in pretending to choke at upscale restaurants in order to have the person who saves him feel responsible for the rest of his life. The scam is all part of a plan to keep his mother in a very expensive private mental hospital. His Mother, Ida, is played by Angelica Huston. She suffers from Alzheimer’s disease. You can trace Victor’s sexual compulsions to his complicated relationship with his mother. The relationship between mother and son is told vividly through a series of flashbacks. Ida did a real number on Victor. Ida has no idea who he is most of the time. Huston plays the part to perfection. She is a Huston and she earned her last name long ago in Prizzi’s Honor. There is no denying that as you watch the demented Lothario in action, you see his problems. He has no problem attracting the women. Choke is the ultimate apocalyptic satire of sexual obsession-- it may be the ultimate satire of the romantic comedy. Victor has no problem finding a sexual partner at his weekly Sex Addicts Anonymous meetings. All of this takes a drastic turn when he meets his Mom’s new doctor, Paige Marshall, played by Kelly MacDonald. Naturally he wants to have sex with her. She resists at first, but she soon succumbs to his charms in order to help his Mother get better-- too insane to describe here. As luck would have it, he cannot get it up for her. For Victor, the real trouble begins when Ida mentions his paternity. He finds her diary written in Italian and Paige says she can translate it. Nothing is ever the same ever again. The film has a momentum that never lets up. As with the book, the revelations are still surprising, even if we have a hint at what they might be. Chuck Palahniuk on the page and on the screen packs a pretty mean punch to the gut.

In addition to Sam Rockwell’s and Angelica Huston’s performances, there are several standout performances in the film. As Denny, Brad William Henke, shines as Victor’s best friend and co-worker. He is a sex addict, too. They have very good chemistry in their scenes together. The two of them are the perfect foils to Clark Gregg’s Charlie who is their boss in the colonial theme park. Jonah Bobo is very good as the young Victor in the flashbacks. I developed a lot of empathy for the older Victor watching him in the flashbacks. Kelly MacDonald takes charge as Dr. Paige Marshall. Pay attention to her and all her mannerisms. As an actress, MacDonald is a brilliant con artist. Her great performances in The Girl In The Café and No Country For Old Men cannot prepare us for her portrayal of Paige Marshall. As with Helena Bonham Carter’s Marla Singer in Fight Club, you will never look at her in quite the same way ever again. Although, I do wish Bijou Phillips’ Ursula and Gillian Jacobs’ Cherri Daiquiri had more to do in the film.

Choke does not hit you all at once. When it does, it soaks into your subconscious and refuses to leave. That is power of Chuck Palahniuk’s work. I am glad that Clark Gregg offered us his vision of Choke. So far we have two visions of his work onscreen. There is no denying that Fincher and Gregg have visualized unique versions of Palahniuk’s worlds. The parallels between Tyler Durden and Victor Mancini are there. I dare to say there are parallels between Ida Mancini and Tyler Durden. As Mancini, Rockwell is an excellent Captain to have for this journey. What he gives us is honest and straight. When he describes “the circuit” to his Sex Addicts Anonymous group, it seems we are hearing it for the first time. As far as “the circuit” is concerned, you will never look at a vacant sign on an airline bathroom door in the same manner ever again. Choke works incredibly well as a satire. We are a society of addicts. It is sex in this film and consumerism in Fight Club. Is it the addiction or the recovery that Mr. Palahniuk finds so interesting? He has enormous fun satirizing both. Is he laughing with us or at us? At times, he seems like a social anthropologist. Choke works as film much better than I originally thought it would.

Jesse Peyronel is directing Invisible Monsters. I would love to see Harmony Korrine direct Rant. I would love to see Sam Mendes direct Survivor. I would like to see Christopher Nolan direct Lullaby. Diary would be perfect for Mary Harron. And everyone can come back and do stories from Haunted. As for Snuff, you are looking at the perfect person to direct it (more than anyone else). Choke, like Fight Club before it, will not have a long theatrical life, but it has the potential to develop a cult following like Fight Club. Choke is a smaller film than Fight Club. The canvas is not as wide, but that does not lessen the impact of the film. It is not for everyone, but it is there for those ready to embrace it.