Wilder Napalm - 1993
Directed by - Glenn Gordon Caron
Written by - Vince Gilligan

Starring:
Debra Winger - Vida Foudroyant
Dennis Quaid - Wallace Foudroyant/Biff the Clown
Arliss Howard - Wilder Foudroyant

ometimes bad things happen to good movies. When Glenn Gordon Caron's Wilder Napalm was released in 1993, it was in and out of theaters so fast that few people even knew it was playing. Besides my wife Dawn and myself, I've met only one person who's even heard of it, let alone seen it. And good luck finding it on video. We have the hard-to-find laser disc. It's not available on DVD, and I'm guessing there's no great rush to release a DVD, either. But I urge you to seek it out, because Wilder Napalm is a gem, filled with delights and surprises. It's a supernatural comedy of wit, depth, and humanity, romantic and sexy but unafraid of real feelings and raw emotion.

The Foudroyant brothers, Wilder (Arliss Howard) and Wallace (Dennis Quaid), are pyrokinetic — they can create fire with their minds. When we meet them, they haven't seen each other in five years, not since Wallace burned his brother's hair off at Wilder's bachelor party. They hardly speak to each other, and when they do, it's never civil. There are a couple reasons for the chill between them. One is Vida (Debra Winger), the woman who came between them, and ended up marrying Wilder. But Wallace's resentment of Wilder goes back farther than that. As children, they accidentally killed someone with their pyrokinetic abilities. Wilder stopped using the power after that. He kept it a secret and pressured Wallace to do the same. But Wallace thinks of it as a gift, not a curse. He's proud of it, and wants to go public with it and be a star.

Wallace works as a clown named Biff in a carnival that sets up in the parking lot of the shopping center where Wilder operates the Foto Qwik booth. Biff the Clown is a happily menacing guy, but Wallace is preparing to leave the road behind and become Dr. Napalm with an appearance on Letterman and a plan to land product endorsement deals, a TV show, maybe even a movie. Wilder is dead-set against it, and the tension between them only continues to build.

Meanwhile, Vida is serving the final days of a year-long house arrest. A year and a half ago, she started a fire and did some damage. She wears a bracelet around her ankle and is confined to the trailer she shares with Wilder. Vida still has a problem with starting fires, which she blames on boredom. Once Vida's free to leave the trailer, she wants Wilder to go out and do things with her, but he has to work, and that night he's committed to calling a bingo game for the Ladies' Auxilliary. Angry, Vida goes out on her own and is pursued by Wallace, who maintains that she married the wrong guy. When Wilder finds out, it sets off the first of two spectacular showdowns between the brothers that mix physical action and some real emotion.

Wilder Napalm has all the ingredients of a horror film, but it takes a different path. Written by the great Vince Gilligan, who penned many of the best episodes of The X-Files, this story is more interested in its characters and their relationships than in shocks and scares. Its quirkiness does not overwhelm the real people at its center, and although it's a funny movie, it takes those people very seriously.

As Vida Foudroyant, Winger is sexy and full of life. Vida is a woman of big passions and she is almost never still. Winger chews the role up, but is always convincing and never over the top. She makes it an even bigger shame that so few have seen Wilder Napalm, because in it, she gives what I believe to be her greatest performance — and that's saying a lot considering her impressive body of work. No pun intended, but she's on fire in this movie.

Dennis Quaid turns in one of his best performances, as well. He wallows in the obnoxious bluster of Wallace/Biff the Clown, but is just as adept at mining the pain hidden beneath it.

But it's Arliss Howard who nearly steals the show as the quiet, button-down, passive-agressive Wilder. When Vida started the fire that landed her under house arrest, she also did eighteen thousand dollars in damages and caused Wilder to lose his job. "But he never yelled at me," she says. He doesn't raise his voice or lose his temper or reveal any of his feelings — until his brother rolls into town. Wallace is able to crack Wilder's shell. When Wilder finally loses control, it's ugly, and Howard plays it as one who has little experience shouting or getting angry.

Glenn Gordon Caron creates an odd little world that is consistent throughout the movie, from the vast empty parking lot of the shopping center, which has a PA system that plays only "Moon River," to the goofy miniature golf course where Wallace gets a little carried away with his flaming. Wilder is a volunteer fireman — an effort to assuage the guilt over the fatal incident in his boyhood — and the firemen he works with sing. They're played by The Mighty Echoes, and they're a pleasure to listen to. There's a lot of music in the movie, all of it carefully chosen and significantly placed.

Wilder Napalm is one of those great little movies you stumble on and can't wait to tell other people about. There's nothing ordinary about it, the film is charmingly odd in every way, but its emotions are vivid and familiar and it doesn't cheat with them. It's a comedy, a romance, a character study, and a bizarre little family drama that's enormously entertaining.

If you've seen it, you know what I mean. If you haven't, look for it. Be diligent, because it won't be easy to find, but seeing Wilder Napalm is its own reward.

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