QUEEN OF EARTH (B) - Alex Ross Perry stumbles a bit with this relentlessly downbeat tale of a woman having a post-breakup mental breakdown during a visit to the lake house of her childhood friend.
Perry emerged as an important new voice in cinema with "The Color Wheel" in 2012 and "Listen Up Philip" (our No. 6 film of 2014). His latest is a dalliance with the problematic Joe Swanberg, who is listed as a producer and whose influence shows in the style of the dialogue -- bratty, haphazard, and bordering on self-indulgent.
Elisabeth Moss is powerful as Catherine, who worked for her famous artist father, tamping down her own ambitions, landing on the doorstep of her old pal, Virginia (Katherine Waterston, "Inherent Vice"), in the wake of the suicide of Catherine's depressed father. Catherine herself is fragile and gradually unraveling mentally, as Virginia struggles to be patient with her guest. This visit is contrasted with Catherine's visit around the same time the previous year.
Perry alternates between the present and that previous visit to the lake house, when Catherine brought her now-ex, James, who grated on Virginia to no end. (The flashbacks are signaled by Catherine's stark pixie haircut and inclination to wear makeup.) This time, James is gone (though he might be on the other end of the phone at times), and Virginia's lake-house neighbor, Rich (Patrick Fugit, full grown since "Almost Famous"), hangs out a lot, annoying Catherine.
Catherine is highly protective of Virginia -- not wanting the men to call her "Ginny," because that's her thing -- mainly from muscle memory, as she's in no condition to take care of Virginia. Rather, it's Ginny who dotes on (and worries over) her wreck of a friend. Waterston seems to be under strict orders to mope a lot and to train her worrying Bambi eyes on her co-star.
During the week, Catherine sketches Virginia's portrait, and the point Perry's trying to make is obvious: these two "best friends" have trouble really seeing each other, getting each other, caring about each other. He plays with an unrelenting sense of dread amid the bucolic setting. He's treading in the territory of early Polanski, including the paranoia of "Rosemary's Baby." (He is, however, clumsy with a scene in which Catherine hallucinates amid a crowd at a party.)
A spare, tinkly piano on the soundtrack lends this a vague horror vibe. At one point Virginia is seated next to Rich and reading a book called "Madness & Women," although we can't be sure, at that point, that Catherine isn't hallucinating that scene. This is dry storytelling, without the classic horror payoffs. The bits of humor land nicely here, including this quick little exchange when Catherine is startled seeing Rich in the kitchen in the morning, not recognizing him from the year before.
Catherine: "Sorry, I'm not good with faces and names."One intriguing thread in the movie is the conflict between Rich and Catherine. Rich calls her K the whole time, oblivious to the fact that her name starts with a C. He revels in pressing her buttons, to the point of immature sadism. Fugit wields just the right tone as a playful spoiled brat. Catherine eventually lashes back in an epic climactic speech: "You click your tongue and you revel in the affairs of others. ... You are why there is no escape from indecency and gossip and lies."
Rich: "So, you mean, like, people?"
But there's a big head-scratcher here: If the women are such old, dear friends, then why does Virginia allow Rich -- who's just a casual hang-out -- to be around constantly? Why not just go goof off at Rich's place next door?
And that gets to the hangup with the movie. It seems to be essentially about how women let their unhealthy relationships with men interfere with their female friendships. And this, from the perspective of a male writer-director. "Queen of Earth" has something to say, and it has dialogue that quite often crackles. Perry is working with a Big Idea, but he's not in complete control. This is either a harmless misstep or a female story in the wrong hands.
NORTHERN SOUL (B) - Gritty is a word to be used sparingly, but this coming-of-age-story set in a British northern industrial town in the early 1970s wears the moniker well.
Writer-director Elaine Constantine has crafted a labor of love, a valentine to the notcturnal underground clubs that shunned the mainstream music and instead sweated to the heavy American soul songs that DJs dug out of obscurity. She uses the metamorphosis of teenage John (Elliot James Langridge) to tell an authentic tale of youthful exuberance, male bonding and life lessons in a grimy, dead-end town in Lancashire. (The accents are thick; best to use subtitles.)
Factory-line workers John and his buddy Matt (Josh Whitehouse) -- along with a few older ne'er-do-wells -- transition from schoolboy duds to wide flair pants and disco shirts and jackets, and they are determined to ditch the dull local youth dance hall (where Cliff Richard is still the rage), open their own venue, and spin the coolest R&B on the planet. Fueled by amphetamine, they take the area by storm and zero in on toppling the region's biggest DJ, Ray Henderson (James Lance), who protects his reign by masking the labels on his 45 RPMs so that rivals can't identify the artist and song and track the record down.
Constantine spent years fussing over the production, casting mostly no-name actors (though Steve Coogan makes a cameo as one of the square adults) and shooting them in natural (dim) light, while the roiling soundtrack throbs relentlessly. The characters gradually deepen and the speed-fueled odyssey starts spinning out of control. Numerous dance scenes, with proto-disco moves, exude pure joy.
In many ways, this is a traditional period piece. It borrows a lot from "Saturday Night Fever" and a little from scattered American touchstones such as "American Graffiti" and even an echo of "Animal House." Constantine hits all the familiar notes -- drugs tearing pals apart, the OD, a chaste boy-meets-girl story (Antonia Thomas is sweet as the love interest), rebellion against parents, the hokey reunion at the end -- but she manages to take a 40-year-old memory seem fresh and urgent. A few naive moments can't overshadow a heartfelt, tender tale that is as tactile as a needle in a vinyl groove.
BONUS TRACKS
The two-disc "Northern Soul" soundtrack is fantastic, 54 songs you've either never heard or haven't in ages. Pick it up.
The unofficial theme song of the film, Frankie Valli with "The Night":
Lou Pride, "I'm Com'un Home in the Morn'un":
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