Fantasy, hard reality converge in ‘Ben X’

Between 5:45 a.m. and 6:33 a.m., Flemish teenager Ben X (Greg Timmermans) plays an online video game in which he identifies with a medieval hero. This jolt of fantasy is his way of escaping from what he deals with at school -- constant bullying. Ben suffers from Asperger’s syndrome, a mild form of autism, and though he’s intellectually gifted and brings home top grades, he’s imprisoned in a sensory overload that prevents him from speaking most of the time and keeps him in the grip of fear. He is, in short, a perfect target for tormentors who resent his academic prowess and set out to exploit his vulnerability.

Theater and film critic Nic Balthazar’s “Ben X” is a brilliant, harrowing first feature that plunges the viewer headlong into Ben’s chaotic existence. Ben is blessed with a loving mother (Marijke Pinoy), but she and her son are surrounded by people who are aware of Ben’s plight but are staggeringly ineffectual at protecting him.

It seems that Scarlite, the heroine of Ben’s medieval fantasy, has a real-life counterpart (Laura Verlinden), who’s impressed with Ben’s gaming skills and contacts him online. As his everyday life worsens, the wondrous possibility that he might actually meet with her propels Ben’s story into its increasingly surreal -- and ultimately unpredictable -- concluding chapters, as the escapist fantasies and harsh realities of Ben’s existence converge.

Inspired by an actual incident and adapted by Balthazar from his own novel, “Ben X” emerges as a provocative, exultant stunner.

-- Kevin Thomas

“Ben X.” MPAA rating: unrated. Running time: 1 hour, 33 minutes. In Dutch with English subtitles. Exclusively at the Nuart Theatre, 11272 Santa Monica Blvd., West Los Angeles. (310) 281-8223.

Addict in L.A. is in a real ‘Fix’

At the start of Tao Ruspoli’s energetic indie feature, “Fix,” filmmaker Milo (Ruspoli) and his partner/girlfriend, Bella (Olivia Wilde), put the brakes on their documentary project, if not their ever-running camera, to make sure Milo’s scam-artist brother Leo (Shawn Andrews) gets from jail to a court-ordered rehab stint by 8 p.m. If they don’t meet the deadline -- and raise the $5,000 required to enroll Leo in the program -- he goes to prison.

And so, the trio zigzags across L.A. on a journey that takes them through an East L.A. chop shop, an actor’s Hollywood Hills pad, a Watts housing project, the Venice art scene and other assorted neighborhoods.

Ruspoli’s empathy for the high-and-low personalities that make up our urban web -- personified in Leo’s friend-to-everyone, destructive-to-himself charm -- infuses his amped-up travelogue. But Milo’s incessant first-person-camera viewpoint prevents the film from doing more with its themes of addiction, fraternal trust and the moral limits of charity.

Yes, Milo’s camera is as much of a crutch as the monkey on Leo’s back, but when style dictates that one brother is always shown and the other isn’t, drama becomes a needed fix.

-- Robert Abele

“Fix.” MPAA rating: unrated. Running time: 1 hour, 30 minutes. Exclusively at the Downtown Independent, 251 S. Main St., (213) 617-1033.

It’s a messy drama in ‘Lake City’

A convoluted, discombobulated take on a small-town drama, “Lake City” shifts gears so often it never gets out of the driveway. Although it bears superficial similarities to such movies as “In the Bedroom” and “You Can Count on Me,” Hunter Hill and Perry Moore’s writing and directing debut is noisy where its models are quietly intense, substituting histrionics and escalating plot twists for insight and empathy.

There’s not much to Sissy Spacek’s turn as a rural mother whose wayward son (Troy Garity) comes home to roost, but she’s played similar roles often enough that she seems at ease in a barely written part. The same can’t be said for Garity, who spends most of the movie in a slack-jawed stupor. As a (sorta) recovering addict trying to run away from his troubles, Garity looks as if he’s perpetually trying to remember where he left his keys.

Add to the mix a thieving girlfriend (Drea de Matteo), two vengeful drug dealers, one of them played by the rock star Dave Matthews, trying (and failing) to look menacing, and throw in -- why not? -- a buried trauma represented by a hermetically sealed child’s room and you’ve got an overheated, unpalatable mess that never stands a chance of congealing.

The sole bright spots are Keith Carradine’s fleeting appearances as a local gas station owner with a yen for the widow Spacek.

-- Sam Adams

“Lake City.” MPAA rating: R for language and some violence. Running time: 1 hour, 32 minutes. Exclusively at Laemmle’s Sunset 5, 8000 W. Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood. (323) 848-3500.

‘Otto’ finds life in a zombie tale

Bruce La Bruce’s visionary, allegorical “Otto; or, Up With Dead People” is the most ambitious film yet from the maker of such outrageously kinky and amusing films as “Super 8 1/2 “ and “Hustler White.” Much of “Otto” is darkly funny, yet it acquires surprising poignancy and meaning.

Otto (Jey Crisfar) is a gay German youth who arises from his grave and hitchhikes to Berlin, where he encounters Medea Yarn (Katharina Klewinghaus), a pretentious filmmaker who dresses in black and who regards Otto’s insistence that he is a zombie as a heroic protest against industrialized society’s assault on the environment.

To her he’s perfect for her opus “Up With Dead People,” in which the world has become so toxic for humans it’s ripe for a takeover by gay male zombies.

“Otto,” which is in English, deliriously intermingles sex and entrails but is also imaginative and witty. There’s an aura of German decadence, and cinematographer James Carman’s images have an Expressionist feel.

As Otto wanders around Berlin he begins recovering fleeting memories of his brief life, which takes the film in a wrenching personal direction. “Otto” is sardonically kicky, but it’s also lots more.

-- Kevin Thomas

“Otto; or, Up With Dead People.” MPAA rating: unrated. Running time: 1 hour, 24 minutes. Exclusively at Laemmle’s Sunset 5, 8000 W. Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood. (323) 848-3500.

A ‘Special’ kind of superhero

With his broad, untroubled face and thick New York accent, Michael Rapaport has made a specialty of playing slow-witted characters, sometimes lovable and sometimes brutal. In “Special,” he finally gets a chance to play someone extraordinary.

Les is a humble meter maid (or, as he might put it, parking enforcement officer) until he enters a trial for a drug that is intended to suppress self-doubt but instead seems to turn him into a superhero.

Or maybe not. It’s not long after Les, a shy, lonely type, starts levitating off the ground that the film hints that his transformation might have less to do with superpowers than psychosis. After he foils a convenience-store robbery, Les becomes convinced it’s his duty to stop crime, so he dons a spray-painted silver suit and takes to the streets. His antics draw the attention of the Exiler brothers (Paul Blackthorne and Ian Bohen), a pair of entrepreneurs who aren’t keen on seeing the drug they developed fail in the public eye.

Their attempts to sideline Les grow increasingly menacing, but Les’ inability to see them as real villains, rather than the super variety, ends up putting him at greater risk.

Written and directed by Hal Haberman and Jeremy Passmore, “Special” is a low-stakes charmer, nicely acted by Rapaport, who never looks down on the character’s delusions.

-- Sam Adams

“Special.” MPAA rating: unrated. Running time: 1 hour, 22 minutes. Exclusively at Laemmle’s Sunset 5, 8000 W. Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood (323) 848-3500.