That '70s Drift: Missed Connections

SPACE STATION 76 (B+) -  Patrick Wilson ("Angels in America") is a depressed, closeted captain of a gloomy crew aboard a refueling satellite in this spoofy '70s version of the future.

With an apparent nod to Buck Henry's failed 1977 sitcom "Quark," a handful of 40-something actors (mostly from TV, and including Jennifer Elise Cox who played Jan in the Brady Bunch movies) wrote their first film together and chose one of them, Jack Plotnick ("The Mentalist"), to direct it. They have come up with an offbeat but surprisingly touching story of failed romantic relationships and longings for home.

No one here is happy. Ted (Matt Bomer) is henpecked by his nasty wife, Misty (Marisa Coughlan), and he has daydream visions of a floating, busty naked woman. Their daughter Sunshine (Kylie Rogers) is alternatively neglected or manipulated by misty, especially when Jessica (Liv Tyler) shows up and tries to make friends with Sunshine. Jessica is physically unable to have children, and Misty pounces on that weakness. Donna (Kali Rocha) ignores her own crying infant while she cheats on her husband. Wilson's Captain Glenn mopes around, pining for former colleague Daniel; you expect the Elton John song to bust out at any time, but it never does. We do get plenty of era-appropriate Todd Rundgren. Plotnick wistfully splashes "Hello, It's Me" and follows it up with a sweet scene in which Ted switches off his living quarters' gravity so Sunshine can float around to Neil Sedaka's cheesy "Laughter in the Rain." Keir Dullea, the icon from "2001: A Space Odyssey," has a fun cameo as Jessica's father who struggles to work his video phone; it's broad shtick that still manages to drive home Jessica's deep-seated melancholy.

Jessica is drawn not only to Sunshine but to Ted. She has trouble communicating with the morose Captain Glenn, who makes a couple of deadpan suicide attempts, foiled by the space ship's technology. He eats glumly in the cafeteria, shunned by colleagues as he sits under the garish brown/orange design on the wall (perfectly invoking those ugly San Diego Padres uniforms of the era). Misty pours her heart out to Dr. Bot, a robotic therapist (and gynecologist), whose limited recognition software can barely process trite platitudes as she riffs hilariously. Every once in a while, intentionally crude graphics show asteroids hurtling toward this collection of misfits.

The kitschy sets work well as an homage to the '70s and that decade's idea of futuristic space travel. Artificial intelligence sits side-by-side with top-loading VCRs. The meta presentation provides genuine laughs with an undercurrent of true Gen X-istential angst. 

LIFE OF CRIME (B) - A perfectly serviceable crime caper from the Elmore Leonard files, in the capable hands of Daniel Schechter, who last surprised us with "Supporting Players."

John Hawkes and Mos Def (aka Yasiin Bey) carry this familiar tale of a pair of low-level gangsters kidnapping a rich guy's wife for ransom. The problem here is that the rich guy has just filed divorce and doesn't care if he ever sees his wife again. The film, set in Detroit in 1978, has just enough style and grit to recall that era's modern noir.

Tim Robbins and Jennifer Aniston are well cast as the estranged couple, Frank and Mickey. Frank is using his apartment buildings as a tax dodge, and he is spending time with his young mistress, Melanie (a delightfully impish Isla Fisher). Mickey is snatched from her kitchen by Louis (Hawkes) and Ordell (Mos Def), the same characters from Leonard's "Rum Punch" (which was turned into Quentin Tarantino's "Jackie Brown"). They keep her at the home of a neo-Nazi, and they treat her well; Louis, in fact, develops a tender rapport with Mickey.

The actors save this from devolving into tedium, and Schecter keeps the momentum rolling forward. The rest is clever Leonard plotting. The punch line at the end is expertly delivered.