There’s a lesson to be learned here: Fear whimsy. A tender emotion that seduces like a bright tropical orchid, it also carries a deadly cargo of noxious sap that’ll poison an artistic career quicker than you can say “Curly Sue.” First-time director Hutton becomes the latest to feel the awful destructive power of winsomeness gone bad in this saccharine tale of bonding between an eccentric small-town girl and her retarded adult pal. Don’t be suckered in by the talented cast or any positive feelings you may have for Hutton as an actor; this is a virtually unwatchable movie. Moonstone Entertainment is promoting it about as enthusiastically as a dead rat in the walls and its theatrical opening is probably just a token gesture to spare the responsible parties the embarrassment of video-only release. Enumerating all of Digging to China‘s flaws would take more space than I have. A major article of indictment, though, would have to be Karen Janszen’s lobotomized, cliché-sodden script. It’s never clear whether Janszen’s gauzily nostalgic, The Wonder Years-y story is targeted directly at children (as its faux-naive tone suggests) or at world-weary adults pining for the loss of their innocence. The bittersweet tang of childhood whimsy comes from the very fact that it’s fleeting. To exalt it, as Janszen often seems to be doing, as an enduring virtue or a viable form of alternative reality is a sweet, sad lie and the font from which most schmaltz flows. Then there’s Bacon’s spellbindingly awful performance as Ricky, the sweet-natured young retarded man who helps 10-year-old Harriet (Wood) come to grips with the death of her alcoholic mom (Moriarty). My enthusiasm for Bacon’s work has always exceeded the critical norm by a degree or six. His tooth-and-nail climb from the teen-idol slough of Footloose and Quicksilver to his current status as a respected character actor has been a pleasure to watch. So it’s nothing less than mortifying to see him floundering so helplessly here. The most charitable explanation I can imagine is that Bacon massively over-cribbed for his role, studying dozens of mentally handicapped people, then incorporating every single twitch, tic, and grimace into his performance. The result is an indescribably bizarre St. Vitus’ dance that’s a lot closer to There’s Something About Mary than Rain Man. Based upon Bacon’s solid recent track record I’m provisionally chalking up this fiasco as an honorable case of reach exceeding grasp. Hutton, though, gets less slack. This may be a rookie effort, but Hutton’s been around movies his whole life and should’ve learned a trick or two by simple osmosis. Movies this dimwitted, poorly acted, and tonally inconsistent don’t get made by good — or even latently talented — directors. Hutton should take a cue from our movie-loving prez and beg us to forgive this “inappropriate” episode in an otherwise creditable career. Time to move on.
This article appears in January 24 • 2003.