Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #11361 in DVD
• Released on: 2004-04-05
• Rating: Suitable for 18 years and over
• Aspect ratio: 1.77:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: PAL, Widescreen
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 98 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
Spun is an unclassifiable ensemble piece, intentionally bleached of soulfulness and high on visual invention and comic depravity. Set in northern Los Angeles, where meth freaks lurch from one motel room to another in search of companionship and a score, the film stars Jason Schwartzman as Ross, whose life is rapidly disintegrating. Fielding phone messages from his mother and trying in vain to reach an old girlfriend, Ross spends most of his time on a feverish circuit with the half-mad Cookie (Mena Suvari) and Nikki (Brittany Murphy), the dangerously paranoid Spider Mike (John Leguizamo), and a macho drugmaker called the Cook (Mickey Rourke). Director Jonas Akerlund's story is non-existent, but then again Spun is driven by the blurry, hellish energy of a life lived on speed. An obvious influence is Darren Aronofsky's Requiem for a Dream, but Akerlund is interested in nightmarish set pieces than tiny horrors of misfired nerve endings and ravaged time. --Tom Keogh

Synopsis
Ross (Jason Schwartzman) is an addict badly in need of some speed. A visit to his dealer, Spider Mike's (John Leguizamo)--where fellow "tweakers" Nikki (Brittany Murphy)--a stripper, Frisbee (Patrick Fugit)--a metalhead, and Cookie (Mena Suvari)--Mike's girlfriend--turns into an odyssey, though, when Mike can't find his stash. Nikki tells Ross that her boyfriend, crazed cowboy The Cook (Mickey Rourke), can supply whatever he needs. The two of them visit The Cook at his motel lab, and Ross quickly gets his fix. Ross, however, is put into service as The Cook's errand boy and chauffeur, with only brief periods of freedom to check up on the stripper girlfriend he left tied to his bed back at his apartment. Ross' three days without sleep reaches a feverish head when it becomes evident that two cops (Peter Stormare and Alexis Arquette) have raided Spider Mike's pad in search of The Cook.
This relentlessly crude and graphic feature from Swedish music video director Jonas Ackerlund is not for the faint-of-heart. Lightning-fast edits, sexually explicit animation, Farrelly-Brothers-level rudeness, and a pervasive sense of nihilism swirl together to create a morally empty Los Angeles of seedy housing and strip joints inhabited by corrupt cops and thrill-seeking lawbreakers. Set to a memorable score by Billy Corgan, Mickey Rourke's memorable turn paves the way for a game young cast.

Customer Reviews

Future Cult Classic
Back in Januray 2002, i found myself in Arizona right at the time that years Sundance Festival was on. With only the Grand Caynon and a few hundred miles between me and Park City, Utah, I flagged down the next passing Greyhound, and headed north.......and i'm i glad i made the effort!
From the pages of a packed listings guide jumped the little gem that is Spun. With a cast as good as any big budget tosh, a soundtrack penned by the god like Billy Corgan, Spun is the story of a gang of Meth addicted drop-out's. Written by a reformed addicted while in jail, and directed by a a top class video auetor, each scene is both darkly comic and ultimatly saddening. Micky Rourke's comeback preformance is stunning to say the least. With the Meth problem desolving todays american youth, this mesmorising debut charts it's origen and growth, from the towns and Cities of the "beautiful" Pacific Northwest.

"Spun" is rapidly entertaining
Wow, I just viewed "Spun" the other night and I thought this movie was outrageous. This is sort of a guilt-pleasure movie but you want to take shower afterwards.

"Spun" has an impressive cast of recognized actors. The film is, essentially, about a few days in the lives of a group of drug addicts. There is The Cook (Mickey Rourke, he truly makes this story worth watching), who makes the drug (speed) and sells it to Spider Mike (John Leguizamo), a dealer with a junkie girlfriend, Cookie (Mena Suvari, looking infinitely less attractive than she did in "American Beauty"). One of his clients is Ross (Jason Schwartzman), who does a lot of favours for The Cook and his girlfriend, Nikki (Brittany Murphy).

I was surprised at how funny the film was at times. It doesn't drown us in anti-drug messages, nor does it become one of those, equally tedious, drug films where you feel like the sober driver at a drunken party. The humour is dark, certainly, but funny nevertheless. A lot of it comes from a subplot about Frisbee, Patrick Fugit, who is caught by a couple of TV policemen (Peter Stormare and Alexis Arquette) and is told he will be let off if he helps them get Spider-Mike. I will only say of the resulting sequence that he does it with all the subtlety of an undercover policeman with his badge stuck to his forehead.

This is a film with a lot of energy, that seems, like its characters, not entirely sure where it is going, but determined to get there, and quickly. Although I am sure it is boring to be surrounded by people on speed when you are sober, this film almost makes you feel like you are on speed too. The director, Jonas Åkerlund, has directed music videos in the past, and it shows in his impatient filming style, as he plays around with animation, speeded-up camerawork and such like.

I'm not recommending the film for its style though, although I am sure it is the best way this material could get to the screen. I am recommending it because I liked the main characters, which I think will stick in my head for much longer than the animated sex scenes or the split screens. I can imagine an entire film about The Cook and Nikki, or Spider Mike and Cookie, or even just Ross, who absentmindedly keeps leaving a girl handcuffed to his bed for hours/days. What makes "Spun" better than those hypothetical films is that it puts the characters into their own little community, and we feel as if we are watching their everyday, speeded up, sleepless lives. Simply amazing.

Very very spun
I stumbled upon this the other day, having read no reviews and not really having much of an idea of what it was about I slapped it into the DVD player. What we have is a dark gritty comedy about a bunch of dropout meth-heads. Whilst the subject matter is ultimately depressing and really shows that the use of drugs such as methamphetamine particularly, lead to a downhill spiral, the film mixes this with a comedy gloss. It all actually works very well, the script is excellent and the use of sound especially and some of the visuals really make this an experience from start to finish, you feel as if you're on the rollercoaster of up and down with the characters. All the acting is tight with a fine cast, Mickey Rouke is superb as "the cook" and what a film to make a comeback. All in all, definitely different (in a good way), defiantly worth a viewing and definitely one that will become an underground classic.