Review: Tusk

City Paper grade: C

Starting as a spitball podcast premise and ending as a feature film, Kevin Smith’s latest is proof that ideas are rarely as glorious as your best friend says. Inspired by a bizarre online listing the director and longtime collaborator Scott Mosier came across and cheered into existence by their “SModcast” audience, Tusk begins in the classical Smith sense, with undergrown man-children laughing at their own jokes. Wallace (Justin Long) and Teddy (Haley Joel Osment) run a sophomoric podcast called the “Not-See Party,” focused on the world of inane viral content. After a work trip to Manitoba proves to be a bust, Wallace prepares to pack it in, but not before coming across a cryptic handbill, promising fantastical tales to anyone who will listen, in a bar bathroom. The author of the posting, a mysterious wheelchair-bound man named Howe (Michael Parks), wows Wallace with his rich adventures, but it becomes clear that he’s interested in more than just fireside chats. To go into further detail would be a disservice, but just know that Smith navigates the tricky discipline of body horror with uncompromising zeal, while getting some nationalistic licks in at the expense of both Yanks and Canucks. Despite these strengths, plus confident comic turns from Parks and Johnny Depp, it never transcends its original status as fuel for an elongated B.S. session. It feels like a drawn-out version of a inside-joke stoner convo, because that’s exactly what it is.