Josh Bell
Grief, social justice, national identity, immigration policy, and fart noises are some of the big topics taken up in this week’s low-profile VOD releases.
Midday Black Midnight Blue (VOD and select theaters June 16): What starts out as a haunting portrayal of grief becomes monotonous and repetitive as main character Ian (Chris Stack) cycles through the same glum ruminations over and over. Writer-directors Samantha Soule and Daniel Talbott set a particular mood early on and never deviate from it, with an atmospheric and impressionistic representation of Ian’s distress at the loss of his girlfriend Liv (Soule). The elliptical editing freely mixes past and present, reality and fantasy, in a way that could be affecting and meaningful at 15 or 20 minutes but feels tedious and numbing at feature length. Stack wears the same vaguely pained expression on his face for the entire movie, and only Merritt Wever as Liv’s pragmatic sister offers an occasional grounded balance. Stack and Soule alternate wispy Terrence Malick-style voiceovers as their characters stare wistfully into the distance, delivering a lot of poetic musings that don’t add up to much. Grade: C
Coyote (VOD June 20): How would the existence of viable teleportation affect immigration and refugee status? That’s the complex philosophical question raised but only superficially examined in this plodding sci-fi drama. Much of the plot could play out the same way in a present-day setting, with poor young women smuggled into the U.K. and forced into sex work. Ekaterina (Therica Wilson-Read) flees a fictional Eastern European country where homosexuality is outlawed, hoping that she and her girlfriend can be reunited and start a new life in England. Instead, she ends up essentially a captive in a brothel run by the deceptively sweet Orla (Ailish Symons). Writer-director Dustin Curtis Murphy throws in a handful of intriguing sci-fi twists (including one that recalls the classic Stephen King short story “The Jaunt”), but most of Coyote just trudges through dull drama as Ekaterina slowly figures out Orla’s plans and works out a way to fight back. The implications of such radical new technology are left largely in the background. Grade: C
Surrounded (VOD June 20): For the bulk of its running time, this austere Western from music video director Anthony Mandler is a two-hander between stars Letitia Wright and Jamie Bell, whose fierce arguments are every bit as thrilling as the periodic gunfights and chase scenes. Wright plays Mo Washington, a former slave posing as a man while traveling from New Mexico to Colorado to secure a claim to a gold mine. After her stagecoach is ambushed by notorious bandit Tommy Walsh (Bell), she’s left to guard the captured Walsh while a group of men allegedly leave to find help. Wright is a formidable presence as the jaded but undaunted gunslinger, and Bell matches her as the bitter outlaw whose motivations are more complicated than they first appear. Jeffrey Donovan and the late Michael K. Williams (in his final onscreen appearance) give memorable supporting performances, but the movie belongs to Wright and Bell, battling it out with bullets and words in the stunning, harsh New Mexico landscape. Grade: B+
The Country Club (VOD June 23): It’s a shame that co-writers and stars Fiona and Sophia Robert give so much screen time in their debut feature to an irritating man-child character played by Please Don’t Destroy’s John Higgins, because it’s otherwise a solid comedic showcase for the pair. They play the Cartwright sisters, who crash a snooty Long Island country club when a clerical mix-up lands aspiring golf pro Elsa (Sophia Robert) a spot in a junior golf tournament. Fiona Robert, who also directed, gives the movie’s best performance as Elsa’s snarky sister Tina, juggling a pair of suitors and attempting to promote her fashion designs. Elsa’s top opponent is the spoiled, immature Roger Kowalski (Higgins), whose whiny, clueless narcissism quickly grows tiresome. The humor here isn’t exactly sophisticated — there’s a separate opening credit for “fart noises” — but at best it manages to combine Caddyshack with mumblecore. The Roberts have enough appealing low-key charm that they should trust themselves to carry their own movie. Grade: B-
Sin La Habana (VOD June 27): Writer-director Kaveh Nabatian explores multiple facets of the immigrant experience in this layered, contemplative Canadian drama. The story begins in Cuba, where dancer Leonardo (Yonah Acosta) and his lawyer girlfriend Sara (Evelyn Castroda O’Farrill) both long to escape to a country with more opportunities. Sara convinces Leonardo to seduce a foreign tourist from one of his dance classes, so he can secure a visa and then bring Sara over after he ditches the unsuspecting mark. Of course, nothing is that easy, and Leonardo experiences conflicting feelings after he moves to Montreal with Nasim (Aki Yaghoubi). Nasim is a Canadian citizen, but she too comes from a foreign background, as the child of Jewish immigrants from Iran. Nabatian doesn’t offer any easy answers to the characters’ predicaments, and he doesn’t present any of them as villains or saviors. They’re just vulnerable people trying to live their lives and hold on to whatever human connections they can find. Grade: B
