“The Identical”

Rated PG for thematic material and smoking

There is a big fat negative with being a film critic, even an ersatz one such as myself. The experience under consideration actually gives me nightmares. It makes me nauseatingly uncomfortable whenever I am out of the confines of the Domestic Sanctum and “it” happens. Someone comes up to me and tells me about their favorite movie and did I not think it was the bee’s knees (?) and did I not feel a severe case of the vapors while I experience its cinematic magnificence (?) when, in fact, I want to have the memory of the film exorcised from my brain, my soul purified, and get the time back that I wasted on the humbug. And, I should add, my editor ought to send me a big bag of M&M peanuts as an act of contrition and in sympathy for my pain and suffering to fill the necessary column inches.

I am fairly sure, dear reader, you may recognize that I am now referring to such films as the one I endured this last weekend. Yes, indeed.

“The Identical” is claiming to be a faith-based film. However, it is so muddled that any amount of value and believability of this film has to be taken on faith and faith alone. The last thing I want to do is antagonize The Faithful. But, sorry, I can’t give a pass to a movie that may be a sermon on celluloid if it is a mangled mess. In regard to “The Identical,” I am an atheist.

Additionally, the allusions to Elvis Presley are frankly both embarrassing and dishonest. Elvis had a stillborn twin. It might be interesting to speculate what would have happened if Elvis was Elvis and Jesse Garon Presley (the stillborn twin) had been raised by another set of parents. (But to avoid paying royalties to the Presley Estate the producers used the cut and paste method and mixed it around so only idiots would not see the similarities. That-a-way the makers of this clunker can insult the audience and the memory of Elvis Presley and not be sued.

“The Identical” starts out with the parents of twins agreeing to give one of their two sons to an evangelist passing through town. Would parents really do that? I know my parents told me that the town butcher wanted to swap free steaks and pork chops for a year for the adorable baby me but only my big sisters considered that a deal worth taking.

So, one son becomes Elvis — I mean a rock ‘n’ roll star (any resemblance to an actual person living or dead is purely coincidental) and the other brother wants to please his adoptive father and studies to be a preacher. But Bible College Boy is drawn to music too and eventually decides to become an impersonator of that rock ‘n’ roll star with whom he has an uncanny resemblance. Needless to say they cross paths and minds are blown.

This film goes in four directions and most certainly gets lost in each way. The music is a poor imitation of the real thing. And the historical backdrop of the era is equally tone-deaf, sanitized for the sensitive. And then there is the “cut” in the aforementioned cut and paste of Elvis’ life. The King enjoyed his drugs, for example, but nary a Quaalude is to be seen in “The Identical.” And racial issues in the 1950s and 1960s? Pish posh!

“The Identical” is jammed-packed with clichés that are most significantly wince-inducing. When the plot goes this far into “The Weird” it forces film-discerning fans’ faces to freeze permanently in the wince state.

But wait! There is more!

SPOILER ALERT!

In “The Identical” the1967 Six-Day War is declared a modern-day miracle. Rev. Wade (adoptive father of the impersonator) shows his support by lighting a menorah. The Bible student/rock ‘n’ roll star impersonator (of his twin brother), is revealed to be Jewish!

Oy veh! I’m all shook up.

I grant one bow tie out of five to “The Identical” and hope no one will see this movie and admit to liking it … at least in front of me.