Tetherd Cow Ahead: The Movie (TCA Films in Association with Echo of a Duck’s Quack) 2hrs 20.

Kate Beckinsale, Helen Hunt, Bob Balaban, Robin Williams, Matthew Modine

Well the hype has led us to expect big things from this summer’s number one blockbuster Tetherd Cow Ahead: The Movie, but does the multi-million dollar, no-holds-barred bio-pic extravaganza live up to expectations?

No-one can accuse producer Landon Flanagan (The Unusual Thing) and director Raymundo (Wild Oats) of taking the easy options with this thriller-cum-psychodrama based on the allegedly true blog of the enigmatic ‘Reverend’ Anaglyph. Bringing any such material to the screen is a challenge, and if there’s one thing that can be said in the film’s favour it is that it succinctly captures the aimless meanderings, disjointed musings and baffling asides of the source material.

The Reverend Anaglyph (Balaban) is a gun-totin’, cigar smoking dapper con-man with a penchant for wearing perfume, who through a series of unlikely accidents comes into possession of a ‘Radionic Machine’ which is believed by some to bestow mysterious powers on its owner. When The Reverend travels to New York and meets leather-clad machine-gun wielding assassin-for-hire Jill (Beckinsale), the extent of those mysterious powers becomes plain. I don’t want to give too much away here, but it is sufficient to say that you’ll be wanting to hang on to your vital organs (especially kidneys and bladders) for these scenes.

It is when evil mastermind Anne Arkham (Hunt) enters the picture that the action ramps right up. In a memorable opening dialogue volley, Arkham (she refers to herself as ‘The Atomic Bitch‘), manages to offend pretty much every known minority group, but still gets a laugh.

A highlight of the film comes soon after with Arkham and Jill duking it out, each attempting to assert superior sexual prowess. The two femmes fatale quickly forget their differences and join forces when the perfidious saltimbanque Joey Polanski (Williams, looking remarkably young on screen) enters the story.

Polanski, and his drooling henchman the cryptically named Jedimacfan (Modine), turn out to be the real villains of this piece. With their odd mannerisms and incomprehensible motivations they bring to Tetherd Cow Ahead the kind of menace that can only be truly appreciated in the knowledge that this is all based on true events. Frightening.

Polanski and Jedimacfan have evidently struck some kind of deal with clandestine US Military interests to create bizarre ‘incidents’ across the country, including the abduction of dairy cattle and the stealing of a nuclear submarine. Anaglyph, Arkham and Jill have their hands full dealing with this unhinged duo, as do the audience, the whole film having gained by this point about as much clarity as a Ken Russell thick shake. The action spans four continents before the key players finally arrive in Australia for the final showdown.

It has to be said that this is not an easy film to like, let alone comprehend. At almost two and a half hours long it is tempting to suggest that Raymundo could have removed the excruciating Polanski/Arkham karaoke scene and the turgid narcissistic ice-skating sequence with Jedimacfan and the stunted fruit-vendor ‘Pasquale’ (a surprise cameo by Tom Cruise). There are moments of existential transcendance for sure (Jill’s chilling semantic reduction of a Jehovah’s Witness’s spiel, Arkham welding Jedimacfan to a cyclone fence), but the net gain is that you leave the movie feeling like you’ve eaten a-half-a-dozen donuts, a couple of pounds of cinammon apples and a giant serving of cheese fries. Still, maybe that’s what’s expected of a big summer movie release.

Performances in the film are, overall, of a high quality. There are no Oscars here, but there’s an awful lot of Method. The music, by Glasgow thrashers ‘Half a Bladder’, is unsettling but catchy. Mr Leu Shan’s costume design is off-beat and engaging in a cross-dressy sort of way, and the digital effects by Simple Graphics Man are competent if a little two-dimensional.

See it with an undemanding friend.

☆☆☆