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DIRECTED BY: Jordan Stowe-Merritt
FEATURING: Emma Hallinan, Marcel Jortzik
PLOT: A parent mourns the loss of her pinball-playing son—but has the kid returned as a ghost?
WHY IT WON’T JOIN THE APOCRYPHA: We had retired this section explaining why individual movies wouldn’t make the List after we completed the first 366 entries, but Tommy stirs us to revive it. What in the world are our readers thinking in constantly promoting this pedestrian British hokum for inclusion on our sacred List? Are you all a bunch of idiots who just don’t get the mission of this site? Our own correspondent even stated that Tommy was “like something out of a bad acid flashback” with a “non-stop assault of insane imagery” resulting in a film that was “bizarre to the point of self-parody.” I’d like to know what the hell movie he was watching! These complaints are not to impugn the movie itself, which is well-enough-acted and shot (if way too short for a feature presentation)—but it’s nowhere close to one of the weirdest films of all time.
COMMENTS: In 1969, the cacophonous British rock and roll band the Who dropped a double-album-length “rock opera” about a messianic deaf, dumb and blind kid who could miraculously play pinball. In 2017, a team of fellow Brits dumped this faithless adaptation in which (spoiler alert) you never even see the title character. That’s right, apparently this revisionist version of Tommy takes place after the deaf, dumb and blind kid has turned into a dead, dumb and blind kid. And there is no pinball in the film whatsoever! It comes from a no-name director and is performed by a (capable) cast of unknowns, but with no cameos from the Who or “rock ‘n’ roll” celebrities (which would have been a great idea.)
Instead, this time the story focuses on a couple who are grieving the death of the woman’s son in a new house that may be haunted. It’s a cut-rate affair, with just two main actors, two main locations, and no vintage pinball machines in sight—they obviously blew their entire budget just getting the rights to the IP. And, at about 20 minutes in length, it’s actually less than a third of the length of the original album. There’s not even much weirdness to be found. Sure, there’s a de rigueur ambiguous horror movie ending that saves you the trouble of having to spend money on a spectral special effect. And there’s the fact that the couple here buy their bananas in bag form (thanks to sharp-eyed YouTube commenter grilledcheese2084 for picking up on this and commenting “WTF, who buys bagged bananas?”) An even more subtle dollop of surrealism occurs after Ryan leaves the pub and races home to check on Lucy: if you look closely, you’ll notice that he’s driving on the left side of the road. This was probably accomplished by reversing the film in post, but however they did it, it adds a subtle note of unease that was desperately needed.
And, of course, Tommy‘s weirdest choice is to use none of the Who’s original music at all. A bold gambit, for sure, but one I can’t say I entirely agree with.
Still, despite those meager surrealist touches, the entire thing is a slapdash slap in the face to Who fans. Who can believe Pete Townshed and Roger Daltrey (who made such an impression as Franz Liszt) would have allowed their psychedelic phantasmagoria to be turned into what is little more than a YouTube short, a “Tommy” adaptation in name only? The pinballcentric material is inherently strange enough that it could have produced a really weird movie, in the right hands. Maybe Hollywood can do a proper reboot someday? I’m not sure who would be capable of helming such an effort; the late Ken Russell would have been perfect. But as it stands, this Tommy is not only deaf, dumb and blind—but also lame.
Tommy recently came out in a 4K UHD edition from Shout! Factory—are these guys desperate enough to release anything?—despite the fact that you can watch it for free (split into two parts) on YouTube (see below). I seriously doubt that you’ll see anything different on that disc, but if you’re foolish enough to spend good money on it, be our guest!
WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:
![Tommy - 50th Anniversary Edition 4K Ultra HD + Blu-ray [4K UHD]](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/41LfWZpsiwL._SL500_.jpg)
