Amazon.com
Kill the Moonlight is a feature with a soundtrack so awesome that the movie should probably be a music video. The DVD is actually accompanied by a CD, featuring many previously unreleased songs by Beck. (Beck's close association with Hanft during the making of this movie inspired Beck's hit, "Loser.") In line with director Steven Hanft's L.A. slacker aesthetic, this film flaunts a slow-moving plot and footage that looks as if it were shot in the 1970s, replete with muscle cars, hot chicks lounging around apartment complex swimming pools, and multiple garage gigs and house parties. The protagonist, Chance (played by Thomas Hendrix), aims to earn enough cash working crappy day jobs to fix his Camaro's engine for the upcoming stock car race, but is doomed to failure. Chance is a major loser, repeatedly accepting the lamest work opportunities, like roadside cocaine sales and chemical spill clean-up. His growing dependency on Vic's Formula 44 cough syrup eventually results in his passing out at the wheel and crashing his beloved car. Although the plot is painfully remiss, Chance and his friends, who are also brain-dead, emit redneck glamour associated with the San Fernando Valley outside Los Angeles, similar to that of hicks from the Deep South. In this way, Hanft foreshadows Harmony Korine's love of eccentric white trash; even Chance's father is uncannily similar to Werner Herzog's character in Korine's
Julien Donkey Boy.
Kill the Moonlight stylishly highlights how podunk the outskirts of Los Angeles can be, with "totally rad" results.
—Trinie Dalton
Product Description
A twisted mid-90s comedy disguised as a 1970s drive-in film, KILL THE MOONLIGHT is the story of Chance--fish hatchery worker, toxic waste cleaner and aspiring racecar driver, whose goal in life is to fix up his Camaro and follow his dreams of championship glory. Director Steven Hanft captures the West Coast slacker vibe with laconic pacing, bizarre humor and a stock-car-racing hero, who also happened to provide the inspiration behind Beck's 1994 hit, "Loser." Samples from the film appeared in the song, and clips from the film were part of the "Loser" video, also directed by Hanft.
The DVD includes a recent interview with the director and is packaged with the long out-of-print original soundtrack CD including 3 exclusive Beck songs and 3 previously unreleased tracks by the band Loser, featuring Beck and Steve Hanft.
