Twenty years is a long time in Hollywood. Long enough to forget most box office bombs or red carpet scandals, but not long enough to erase the image of Chloë Sevigny in a hotel room in 2003.
We’re talking about The Brown Bunny.
If you weren’t there, or if you only know it as a punchline, it’s hard to describe the sheer, unadulterated chaos that erupted at the Cannes Film Festival when Vincent Gallo’s road movie premiered. People didn't just dislike it. They loathed it. They booed the opening credits. They walked out in droves. Roger Ebert, the dean of film critics, famously branded it the worst film in the history of the festival.
Then came the scene. The scene.
A ten-minute sequence of unsimulated fellatio between Sevigny and Gallo. In a "legitimate" movie. Starring an Oscar nominee.
The industry collectively lost its mind. Her agency, William Morris, reportedly dropped her (though Chloë later clarified she actually left them because her agent was replaced). People predicted her career was over. Dead on arrival.
But it wasn't. Honestly, it might have been the smartest move she ever made.
What Really Happened With The Brown Bunny?
The plot is deceptively simple. Bud Clay, played by Gallo, is a motorcycle racer driving a van from New Hampshire to California. He’s sad. He’s lonely. He’s haunted by a girl named Daisy, played by Sevigny.
For the first hour and a half, basically nothing happens. Bud drives. He looks out the window. He meets women at rest stops and gazes at them with a weird, hollow intensity. It’s "slow cinema" taken to a punishing extreme.
When he finally reaches Los Angeles and meets Daisy in a house that feels like a ghost town, the movie shifts from a boring travelogue into something raw and uncomfortable. The explicit scene isn't filmed like porn. There’s no upbeat music, no flattering lighting, no "action." It’s clinical. It’s desperate.
And then, the twist.
You find out Daisy isn't actually there. Or rather, she can't be. The film reveals that Daisy died years prior after being raped at a party—an event Bud witnessed and did nothing to stop. The encounter we just watched? A manifestation of his grief, guilt, and pathological inability to move on.
Suddenly, the "pornography" takes on a different weight. It’s a portrait of a man trying to find intimacy with a ghost.
The Feud That Defined a Decade
You can't talk about The Brown Bunny without talking about the war between Vincent Gallo and Roger Ebert. It was legendary.
After Ebert called the film a disaster, Gallo went on the offensive. He called Ebert a "fat pig with the physique of a slave trader." He famously claimed he had put a "hex" on Ebert’s colon.
Ebert’s response was a masterclass in shade: "It is true that I am fat, but one day I will be thin, and he will still be the director of The Brown Bunny."
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He also quipped that watching his own colonoscopy on a monitor was more entertaining than Gallo's movie.
But here's the thing: Ebert eventually changed his mind. Sorta.
Gallo went back to the editing room and chopped about 26 minutes out of the film. He cut the endless shots of bugs hitting the windshield. He tightened the pacing. When Ebert saw the new cut, he gave it three stars. He admitted that the explicit scene, in the context of the new edit, actually worked. It felt "honest."
Why Chloë Sevigny Did It
People always ask: Why? Why would an actress who was already a fashion icon and an indie darling risk everything for a movie that looked like a vanity project?
For Sevigny, it wasn't about the shock value. She’s always been an artist first. She grew up in the 90s NYC "Kids" scene. She wasn't afraid of the "unseemly."
"I put my faith in Vincent," she told Dazed years later. "I believed in him as an artist."
She’s also been very vocal about the fact that she and Gallo had been intimate in the past, which made the scene feel less like a "stunt" and more like an extension of their real-life history. She wanted to push boundaries. She wanted to reclaim herself from the "It Girl" label that the media had slapped on her.
What’s wild is that the scandal actually helped her.
Right after the movie came out, she got her first major studio offer: David Fincher’s Zodiac. Then came Big Love on HBO. Instead of being cast out, she became even more sought after. She proved she was "brave," a word Hollywood loves to use for actresses who do things that make people uncomfortable.
The Legacy of a Disappearing Act
Is The Brown Bunny a good movie?
It depends on who you ask and which version you watch. The 92-minute theatrical cut is a melancholic, strangely beautiful look at American loneliness. The original Cannes cut? Probably a slog.
But its importance in film history is undeniable. It pushed the conversation about what "art" is allowed to show. It challenged the line between performance and reality.
Key takeaways from the Brown Bunny era:
- The "Cannes Effect" is real. A bad reaction at a festival can define a film's narrative for decades, regardless of the actual quality.
- Context changes everything. The sex scene without the "ghost" reveal is just explicit footage; with the reveal, it’s a tragedy.
- Career "ruins" are often myths. If you have talent (and Chloë has it in spades), the industry will usually forgive a "scandalous" artistic choice if it keeps people talking.
If you’re planning to watch it today, don’t go in looking for a thrill. It’s a sad, quiet, and deeply awkward film. It’s about a man who is essentially a hollow shell.
If you want to understand Sevigny’s career, you have to look at this movie as the moment she stopped being a "cool girl" and started being a formidable artist who doesn't care if you like her or not.
Next time you see a "controversial" movie on a streaming service, remember that The Brown Bunny did it first, louder, and with much more vitriol from the critics. Check out her later work in Zodiac or We Are Who We Are to see how that "risk" in 2003 paved the way for the fearless performer she is now.
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