Joe Versus the Volcano (1990) (soundtrack)
This is perhaps the most wrongfully maligned film in all of movie history. Everyone I meet hates this film, aside from the lead singer of Abney Park. He wrote a song about it. I’ve watched this film too many times to count. It was my favorite stoner film for a long, long time.
Stoner film? A movie you watch while you are high. Forget Cheech & Chong. Forget Heavy Metal. Forget Dude Where’s My Car. All of those are good. None of them end with a guy jumping into a volcano with his true love. A movie featuring Fish as the native chief who shows Joe which path he has to follow.
The crooked road. The crooked road that he takes to work. The crooked road that mars the plaster in his apartment. The crooked road is everywhere in the film, as is Melanie Griffith who shows off her acting chops by credibly presenting several different characters with the same face.
The New York accent that always sends him down the wrong path. Poor Joe. Repeatedly sent the wrong way by people who use him, yet he always manages to find something of value everywhere he goes.
The mistake everyone makes is taking this movie seriously. It’s not serious. The thing I find most mystifying is that anyone would try to take a film seriously that starts with Once Upon a Time and ends with …And They Lived Happily Ever After. It’s a fairytale. The best fairytale. Try reading Mother Goose or the Brothers Grimm and then get back to me. None of them can hold a candle to this movie.
They just pay me to drive the limo, sir. I’m not here to tell you who you are.
Marshall, performed by Ossie Davis written by John Patrick Shanley
Postscript
I started following the band Abney Park because of their use of a soundbite from this movie in one of their songs:
This isn’t the best mix of the song. Neither of the versions on the album Taxidermy are the best mix of the song. I have a copy of the version I prefer but it was only available on their website back in the days when I paid to have access to their full library. I haven’t given them money since back in the day when Building Steam was new.
