Tusk is one of the weirdest movies ever made, and that's because it features a plot about a man who is forced to "become" a walrus for another man's sick pleasures - and also because it features Johnny Depp as a bizarre character called Guy Lapointe, who is - for all intents and purposes - downright ridiculous. It's one thing casting Johnny Depp in a Kevin Smith movie as a form of "watch bait" (he's not really in it for very long but hey, put his name on the poster and watch the pundits come in), but casting him as a bizarre ex-cop from Quebec with an insufferable accent garbed in awful make-up who feels plucked right out of a low-budget sketch show... well, it's just not the done thing, is it? A few points for Depp, somewhat, given that he actually agreed to play such an innately insufferable role in a low-budget horror flick (it flopped). But it's the kind of role you give to an actor who has a bit of innate goodwill with the audience; right now, Depp has fallen from grace and desperately needs to show the world that he can act for real. Playing Guy Lapointe didn't give him the opportunity to do so. At all.
Sam Hill is an ardent cinephile and has been writing about film professionally since 2008. He harbours a particular fondness for western and sci-fi movies.
