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'Palindromes' provokes with dark humor

Here's one glimpse at the sort of land-mine content that makes for comedy in Todd Solondz's engineered-for-offensiveness "Palindromes": Teenage Aviva gets pregnant and her mother is trying to persuade her to have an abortion. (The girl is thrilled to become a mother; the mother seems motivated by her own vanity as much as her child's welfare.) Mom, earnestly insisting that there's nothing wrong with ending the pregnancy, urges Aviva to think of it "like it's just a tumor." This gets a very big laugh.

Wellspring 'Palindromes' 3 out of 5 stars Director: Todd Solondz Starring: Jennifer Jason Leigh, Ellen Barkin, Richard Masur, Matthew Faber, Will Denton, Angela Pietropinto, Valerie Shusterov, Hannah Freiman, Rachel Corr, Sharon Wilkins, Run time: 100 minutes Release date: April 13, 2005 Rating: Not rated, but there are strong images of sexual acts, a murder, etc. See showtimes On the web Official movie site View the trailer    Trailers require Quicktime [an error occurred while processing this directive]

The scene pokes brutal fun at the most simplistic versions of both sides of the abortion debate, and one can imagine many viewers leaving their seats in disgust. Yet this is just the iceberg's tip in a film that even by Solondz's standards is intensely provocative. (After his kind-hearted child molester in "Happiness," this auteur has a reputation to maintain.)

"Palindromes" makes both liberals and conservatives look like fools, but spends most of its time on a caricature of Christian charity. Our heroine finds herself in a home for, well, youths who for one disability or another have been rejected by society; the group's banal goodness is turned into a grotesque — a boy-band-style musical number about Jesus is particularly cringeworthy — and naturally we learn there are sinful secrets lurking in the foster home's dark closets.

If the content weren't challenging enough, the filmmaker throws some narrative experiments in as well. Every reel or two, Aviva is played by a different actress (or, at one point, actor). It's hard to say that this reveals some evolving consciousness on the character's part, because Aviva remains pretty dim — even as Solondz structures her journey, true to the title, to fold back into a mirror image of itself.

As with "Happiness," there is no good answer to the question, "So, did you like it?" If the movie doesn't make you feel sick and dirty, you're either naive or not paying attention. Still, viewers who can stomach it all will note that "Palindromes" is awfully, horribly funny. Funny like dead cat jokes; funny like gallows humor in which the impending execution is not just of the body but of the spirit as well.

Assuming that Solondz's soul-testing imagination is worth exploring, "Palindromes" is not his most successful trip into it. The movie's intentional affectlessness makes it less affecting than "Happiness," and its ideas aren't as convincingly dramatized as those in "Storytelling." But one thing is certain: It gets a reaction. In a world of cookie-cutter hits and instantly disposable sequels, that's worth something all by itself.