Yes, reading the reviews is much more rewarding. By any measure.<br /><br />This review contains spoilers. Read further anyway. It doesn't matter, even when you're intending to see the movie.<br /><br />The film begins with two people in a SUV, David and Katia, driving to the Joshua Tree Desert. Despite all their misunderstandings, they feel attracted to each other, but regularly explode in quarrels and fights. That part of the film was logical and understandable. The film is a study in how relationships can go haywire. One can have look at what they talk. Or you could listen to the silence when they should talk. In your mind, you could even speak up for them when they fail.<br /><br />But why did they cut away the entire character development? Really, I could not care less about David and Katia. What they said and how they behaved was in the end meaningless. In contrast, I rather enjoyed their nude bodies, their physical exercise and the wonderful landscape of the Joshua Tree Desert. Wow.<br /><br />The film ends with three hillbillies tailgating them on a desert road, stopping them, pulling them from the car, and raping David. Why and WHY did this happen? Out from the nothing, the film ends with a sudden conclusion, and you'll never get to know why they were targeted.<br /><br />It has been said that Bruno Dumont, the director of this film, translated a life-negating state of mind into a film. David and Katia were already outcasts in the beginning - he speaks only English and French, Katia only Russian and French - and they were rejected by the desert, a place where you have to rely on your fellow human beings in order to survive.<br /><br />"Twentynine Palms" is an ill-fated parable. I don't say Bruno Dumont is a bad filmmaker. But as a filmmaker, he forgot to counterbalance the philosophical, psychological and the tardiness parts with a credible and suspenseful story.