Billed as a campy comedy for all audiences (the press material is oddly eager to point out you don’t have to be gay to like it), Wasabi Tuna is more like a train wreck. One where the train has careened off a cliff and onto an active minefield. And is leaking poison gas. And is somehow breeding nihilist werewolves. It’s that bad.
Where does it go wrong? Start with the atrocious editing that includes more establishing shots than actual film. Then add the sense of humour confusing ‘camp’ with ‘vapid,’ the lazy scriptwriting resolving love stories without introducing them, using flashbacks to resolve storylines, and Anna Nicole Smith, who plays herself but is only slightly more convincing than the quartet of Anna wannabes in drag that chase her around the city.
Midnight movies have always embraced stupidity, over-the-top performances and a belief that the more amateurish the production, the more enjoyable the result. But please don’t say that we have to settle for a movie where the two best performances come from the twin brother of T.S. from Mallrats and the guy from The Big Hit who wasn’t Marky-Mark or Lou Diamond Phillips.
The lesson here is not to watch movies under flimsy assumptions. The idea that Tim Meadows is due to be in a good flick–IT WILL happen some day–should never have been used to justify watching Wasabi Tuna. To any who may have watched it through my influence, I apologize.