UNCLE JOHN (A-minus) - This sweet, affecting -- but disturbing -- story travels along two tracks. In a Midwestern small town, John (John Ashton), a carpenter, is dodging the police and the town gossips after he murders a local goon, Dutch, and expertly disposes of the body. We don't know his motivation. Meantime, the nephew that John raised, Ben (Alex Moffat), toils at a youthful ad agency in Chicago. (The streets of the city are empty and have a specious gleam to them, as if those scenes were shot on the cheap in a studio.)
Those two narrative tracks don't merge until deep into the second half of the film, when Ben takes a road trip to visit John on the farm he grew up on. Until then, newcomer Steven Piet sets things on simmer, methodically building a story piece by piece -- John starts to get harassed by Dutch's drunken, no-good brother, Danny (a disheveled Ronnie Gene Blevins), who suspects John offed his kinfolk; and Ben tries to woo a new colleague, the exotically cute Kate (Jenna Lyng), who resists the idea of getting involved with a co-worker.
The movie has a lived-in improvisational feel, driven by actors who know their craft. The dialogue between Kate and Ben is refreshingly organic, as is the old-man banter between John and his mates at the corner cafe. Ben and Kate toss off quaint one-liners that could have been workshopped in John's garage; Kate tipsily invites Ben into her apartment and says, "Welcome to my humble adobe."
And the principal cast is impeccable. Ashton (a veteran of '70s police procedurals and the"Beverly Hills Cop" series, in a role of a lifetime) is haggard and jumpy, stooped over with the weight of the world on his back. Moffat, square-jawed and broad-shouldered, has a Matthew Perry aw-shucksness about him that's endearing. Lyng has a model's build and a nerd's gait, and she imbues Kate with a heavy spirit. Blevins, looking like Peter Sarsgaard's evil twin, reeks of desperation as the hapless menace
Worth noting, too, is the somber, and at times tender, piano score by the team of Adam Robl and Shawn Sutta, which cranks up the tension when Kate and Ben show up on the farm and Danny drops in to lay some psychological terror on John. Piet paces this like a veteran, methodically building, over 113 efficient minutes, to a climax involving all four characters and a bookending violent confrontation.
This is a stunningly assured debut. Piet and writing partner Erik Crary exhibit a Duplass brothers indie sensibility with a dash of noir. "Uncle John" tells a timeless story of love and evil, like an old-fashioned murder ballad.
10 CLOVERFIELD LANE (B) - A trio of fine performances takes this subdued thriller much further than it deserves to go, before the whole experiment explodes into a crazy mess. That's not surprising, considering that this film is billed as a spiritual successor to the 2008 found-footage screamer "Cloverfield." Both are from the production house of J.J. Abrams.
Mary Elizabeth Winstead ("Scott Pilgrim vs. The World," "Smashed") stars as Michelle, who wakes up after a car crash chained up in a dungeon in the home of Howard Stambler (John Goodman), a survivalist who has sealed off his home from the outside world where, he insists, an apocalyptic attack has rendered Earth uninhabitable. A third resident soon pops up, Emmett (John Gallagher from "Short Term 12"), and before long, he and Michelle are plotting ways to escape.
Goodman tears into a meaty role of a gruff apparent madman holding these youngsters hostage. Winstead is all doe eyes, alternating between panic an pluck. (Apparently, her resume is heavy on scream-queen roles.) Gallagher's boyish charm goes a long way.
The screenplay from a trio of writers (including Damien Chazelle from "Whiplash") is crafted like a corny chamber-room drama intended for the stage. The tension builds nicely until the inevitable break-out attempt.
And that climactic showdown sends everything that comes before it careering off the rails. It's as if it were edited onto the end from another genre. It feels like a cheap gimmick and a cheat.
Fans of pulp fiction might applaud the maneuver. But it's an unfortunate waste of what could have been a fine thriller.
BONUS TRACKS
"Cloverfield" revels in shimmery '60s pop, with this obvious theme song popping up right in the middle of the film -- Tommy James' "I Think We're Alone Now" (we were tempted to go with Tiffany again):
Ah, hell. Let's have a battle of the bands. Here's Tiffany's jeans-jacket/synthesizer version from the '80s:
And over the closing credits of "Uncle John," Chuck Jackson with "Since I Don't Have You":
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