Remember what it was like growing up in the East Bay in the ’80s?
Ryan Fleck sure does, and vividly. The writer-director, together with partner Anna Boden, has produced a self-described “very weird” (no argument here) love letter to his former home in “Freaky Tales.” But this ode to Oakland contains more than memories. It’s not about the way things happened, Fleck says, but about the way he chooses to remember them.
Set in 1987, “Freaky Tales” is certainly creative. It is whimsically visual — think hand-drawn stick figures popping up, comic-book style graphics, or a sudden shift to cartoon mode — and it has Pedro Pascal, never a bad thing.
It’s also often heartfelt, even if it ends in a spasm of hatchet-wielding, samurai-sword-slicing, Tarantino-esque gore that, dare we say, doesn’t feel like a love letter to anything — except maybe Tarantino.
The real issue is, a lot of us don’t remember growing up in the East Bay because we didn’t. Maybe we’ve never even been there. What’s never quite fleshed out here is why this all should resonate with us — or how these haphazard moments, albeit compelling, weave together in the cohesive way the filmmakers seem to promise.
In any case, Oakland in 1987 was “hella wild,” we’re told at the start: the people, the culture, the music, and also a cosmic “bright green glow” — an electricity in the air that may be a gift from aliens, or perhaps augurs the end of the world. The film then moves, in a style reminiscent of Robert Altman’s “Short Cuts,” through four separate yet connected tales happening on one night.
We begin with “Strength in Numbers: The Gilman Strikes Back,” set at 924 Gilman, home to the Berkeley punk rock scene. A sign on the club’s door expresses its peaceful ethos: “No Racism, No Sexism, No Homophobia, No Drugs, No Alcohol, No Violence.” But try telling that to the local band of skinheads who’ve been rampaging through the joint, terrorizing the crowd.
Usually, the punk kids don’t fight back. This time, they do. Young couple Tina (Ji-young Yoo) and Lucid (Jack Champion) are among those who arm themselves with terrifying weapons, including Tina’s fearsome spiked bracelet, for a blood-spattered confrontation.
It’s at another East Bay nightspot, Sweet Jimmie’s, where aspiring female rap duo Danger Zone makes its mark in the second story, “Don’t Fight the Feeling.” Entice (singer Normani) and Barbie (Dominique Thorne) take their shot by agreeing to a rap battle with homegrown star rapper Too $hort (played here by Symba), who launches the contest in the raunchiest of ways. Normani and Thorne are engaging, but the story is short on narrative heft.
Things get deeper in “Born to Mack,” with Pascal as a once-violent debt collector trying to turn a corner. As his very pregnant wife sits outside in their car, their new life beckoning, Pascal’s Clint goes into a video store where in a back room, his last collection job awaits — or so he thinks. An unwelcome reminder of his violent past sets in motion an unthinkable tragedy. And from tragedy comes an unexpected chance at redemption.
Everything comes together — in a way — in “The Legend of Sleepy Floyd,” revolving around a real-life sports drama: the May 1987 game in which Golden State Warriors guard Eric “Sleepy” Floyd went on a scoring rampage — including 29 points in the fourth quarter — to defeat the Los Angeles Lakers. Here, the filmmakers envision an unhappy coda to the night. A band of thieves led by a fiendish corrupt cop (Ben Mendelsohn) has broken into players’ houses while they’re away. When the mother and girlfriend of Sleepy himself come home early, yet another tragedy ensues.
And then comes the finale, with Sleepy (Jay Ellis) exacting bloody revenge in a paroxysm of gore. Fans of such things will undoubtedly enjoy it; what the movie is saying about Oakland, however, remains elusive.
We won’t spoil the A-list cameo performance, but in the end, as the credits roll, this celebrity returns for sort of a blooper reel moment, cracking up the crew. It’s fun to feel everyone laughing together, and even more fun to watch the vintage breakdancing number that accompanies the credits. Clearly, the cast had a great time. But for us, there’s a sense by then that maybe you sorta had to be there.
“Freaky Tales,” a Lionsgate release, has been rated R by the Motion Picture Association “for strong bloody violence, language throughout including slurs, sexual content and drug use.” Running time: 106 minutes. Two stars out of four.
