Wild Tales is wild, and it's also one of the more refreshingly entertaining foreign language films to be nominated for an Oscar in quite some time. While the Academy voted for the artistically savvy but dreadfully dull Ida, Wild Tales shrugged its shoulders and declared it's going to be balls to the wall crazy and badger don't give a shit what you think.

Written and directed by Damián Szifron, Wild Tales is a series of short stories strung together with no relation to one another, other than they are often absurd, dark and hilariously off-the-wall. To describe them in detail would take away much of the fun, but let's just say if you aren't hooked before the opening credits even appear on screen, then this movie isn't for you.

And this movie isn't for everyone. Infused with dark humor where nothing from plane crashes to murders are off limits, Wild Tales will either work for you or it won't. Anthologies are rarely any good, but Szifron manages to make the most of the concept with a witty script and thoroughly entertaining stories.

The first three stories--about a bunch of strangers on an airplane, a waitress who encounters a man from his past, and a road rage incident that spirals out of control, respectively--are by far the best of the bunch. If there's a weakness in Szifron's final product, it's that he came swinging out of the gate and then holds back for much of the rest of the movie.

The fourth story, about a demolitions expert whose life falls apart due to the most minor of incidents, is not bad but certainly less interesting than the stories that preceded it. The fifth, about a hit-and-run cover-up, feels out of place as it lacks much of the dark humor laced throughout the rest of the movie.

But Wild Tales surges back to life with the final story, about a wedding that is either the worst or most entertaining wedding you'll ever see. It's different from the rest in tone and pay-off, yet equally gratifying in its own absurd, unpredictable way.

It's hard to describe Wild Tales without going into too much detail, but suffice to say it is one of the more entertaining movies I've seen in recent months.

Review by Erik Samdahl. Erik is a marketing and technology executive by day, avid movie lover by night. He is a member of the Seattle Film Critics Society.