Tusk

Another wild ride from Kevin Smith, who, let's be honest, has a knack for serving up absolute lunacy. From dark humor to downright idiocy, he covers the spectrum in this one. The film's theme is twisted, to say the least. And while that wouldn't be a problem in itself, I found myself desperately waiting for something to jolt me awake for the most part. As for the rest of the movie, just forget about logic. Even a layman like me can tell you that some of the stuff just wouldn't fly. And then came Johnny Depp as Guy Lapointe, and it all went downhill from there. I initially thought I'd toss it a generous three stars, but two will more than suffice. / Lesson learned: Justin Long might've just found his life's role. (05/05/2024)

Luckily I didn't trust the trailer too much either, so I'm not very disappointed, I was expecting it. Tusk is a kind of unfunny, tedious and uninteresting drama, in which nothing really happens for an hour, only after that we are shown a walrus in its full glory, which looked decent, but the lack of gore and not showing the course of the whole operation seems unforgivable to me. The annoying and unlikeable characters only add to the bad experience of the film. Bollocks. 30%. (03/12/2014)

The premise alone is calling for immediate cult status, the execution, on the other hand, swings between a madhouse and a philosophical circle of recovering alcoholics – but there is something about it. Kevin Smith plays a rather impressive game between the victim and his sociopathic captor that does not lack a proper dose of morbidity, plus the wonderfully ignoble motivations of the villain, but he also ruins everything with comedy reliefs and the performance of Johnny Depp, which belongs to a completely different story. A more serious, and consequently more violent take on the material could have resulted in a horror gem, but what we have is nothing but provocative bizarreness with a wannabe message and dodgy humour, though with some strong moments and a brilliant idea. (15/09/2019)

“It's good to cry. It separates us from the animals. Shows you have a soul.” I can understand any rating for Tusk, as it is a highly unconventional film, in both the good and bad sense of the word. The premise itself is very bizarre, winking at The Human Centipede (which I haven't seen, though, so I can't fully judge), and makes you wonder what was going through Kevin Smith's head when he wrote the script. Reflecting on Howard's motivations, the overall atmosphere of the film and the fate of Wallace, I find Tusk incredibly twisted in places, but also sad in a way. I mustn't fail to mention Johnny Depp's eccentric detective with a (slightly altered) face – his conversation with Howard was just as weird as the rest of the film. - PS: "I've only ever known a human to be an ocean of shit." (21/03/2021)

Tusk shares something in common with The Human Centipede, although it's definitely not as explicit. Still, there is excellent use of masks and costumes. Unfortunately, there are also a lot of unnecessary scenes or scenes that are just plain silly - Johnny Depp has one of the worst roles I've seen him in here. Above all, his character unnecessarily forces the film to be overly funny, which didn't really suit it. The beginning was relaxed, but Depp's character ruined it all, and his storytelling unnecessarily dragged it out. Kevin Smith didn't completely impress me this time, but Tusk isn't exactly a disappointment for me either. (21/01/2015)