Justin Kirk and Gretchen Mol in Puccini for Beginners.___________
Two out of four ain't bad. That's roughly my score for the four segments that make up The Dead Girl, writer-director Karen Moncrieff's feature on the life and death of the unfortunate title character that is finally getting a Chicago run beginning this Friday. The movie—in which characters are randomly connected through the murder of the title character—is a complete downer ( and the entire thing seems to be shot in shades of dung ) , but it has many moments of acting bravura that help to elevate it beyond its gruesome subject matter. Audiences that love tough, flinty, unforgiving movies—Requiem for a Dream, Dancer in the Dark or Last Exit to Brooklyn, say—may find a lot to admire in The Dead Girl.
Moncrieff, who herself is an actor with a lot of TV drama credits, previously wrote and directed the indie Blue Car and proved with that film that she's going to make movies for actors who crave chunky, memorable parts. In The Dead Girl, Moncrieff has assembled a dream cast that includes everyone from Givonanni Ribisi to Piper Laurie. The four segments of the movie ( which is basically four short films that eventually circle back to the first one ) are set in and amongst familiar, gritty southern California locations—a wasteland of cheap motels, filthy truck stops and endless dessert where it's easy to imagine a serial killer having no trouble going undetected for years.
Arden ( Toni Collette ) takes a walk out into this bleak vista one morning to escape the brutal taunts of her vicious invalid mother ( Laurie ) and finds the decomposing body of the murdered girl. Collette, who seems to be either in a trance or mildly retarded—it's never really clear—steals a necklace off the body and hides it. After reporting the death and being featured on the news, she agrees to a late-night rendezvous with a grocery store bagboy ( Ribisi ) . Ribisi, playing another of his disturbing characters ( and who is like the younger generation's Brad Dourif ) , soon has talked a willing Collette into recreating a fantasy S&M version of what might have happened to the murdered girl.
I wasn't sure how the picture could recover from this creepy, off-putting vignette but it slowly comes back in the second segment in which Leah ( Rose Byrne ) , a young woman in the coroner's office who does the autopsy, is secretly hopeful that the body is that of her sister, who disappeared years earlier. A burgeoning romance with cutie pie Derek ( James Franco ) and her need to have closure in order to move on with her life, however, are circumvented by her mother's ( Mary Steenburgen ) determination to not give up hope.
Then the movie kicks into high gear, thanks to a riveting performance from an almost unrecognizable Mary Beth Hurt as the sour, religious wife of a man who disappears for days and nights on end, leaving the wife to tend to one of those forgotten storage facilities ( not unlike the one in Silence of the Lambs ) . The mostly silent husband endures the taunts of the wife, who suspects that he is having sex with prostitutes and, perhaps, something much more sinister.
Finally, we arrive at the story of the poor put-upon dead girl, Krista ( Brittany Murphy ) and it is here that the film—which details the last days of this pretty but tough little cookie—reaches its emotional height. Krista's story is told through flashbacks after her estranged mother ( Marcia Gay Harden ) comes to identify her body and try to find out what happened. It's an all-too-familiar hard-luck story of a pretty runaway teenager who quickly descends into prostitution and drug abuse. But Harden's performance, and those of Murphy and Kerry Washington as Murphy's lesbian lover and friend, redeem the familiarity of the material.
By that point, the movie's theme of despair and human venality commingled with desperate loneliness might seem overwhelming. Certainly in the hand of lesser actors Moncrieff's bleak movie would be a complete buzz-kill. But with these wonderful performers, The Dead Girl offers some unforgettable moments and it's enthralling to see actors throw all caution to the wind in creating such desperate characters.
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Samantha leaves the opera-loving Allegra after nine months because she's not sure she's really a lesbian and wants to try men again. Allegra ( Elizabeth Reaser ) , bereft but available, quickly falls into an affair with Philip ( Justin Kirk ) after warning him that she's a lesbian at heart. To prove it, she can't resist a simultaneous affair with the daffy blonde investment broker Grace ( Gretchen Mol ) , who really wants to be a glass blower. Then Allegra discovers that Philip and Grace are exes.
This is the set-up for Puccini for Beginners, a brittle relationship comedy that tries way too hard for sophisticated screwball. It's been written and directed by Maria Maggenti, perhaps best known for her previous indie effort, The Incredibly True Adventure of Two Girls in Love. Puccini is set in the New York world of arts and letters ( where everyone's a writer or professor, or has artistic aspirations ) but for all the erudite blather, none of the characters or their various 'wacky' relationship troubles are particularly involving.
Though the movie is acted by a pretty, gay-friendly cast it never catches fire. I am always happy to see Kirk ( familiar from his work as Mary Louise Parker's ne'er-do-well brother on Showtime's Weeds and as the lead in the film version of Angels in America ) and Jennifer Dundas, as Reaser's best friend, in anything. However, even they can't do much with such wilted material. Based on the evidence, the film's tagline—'A love triangle of operatic proportions'—is, to put it kindly, a bit of an overstatement.
Film Note: Couples looking for a gay-themed date movie for Valentine's Day will be happy to read that Facets will be screening soulMaid, a self-described campy, sexy twist on the Sleepy Beauty fairy tale. The film is a collaboration between local gay filmmakers Jeff Maccubbin, Jeffrey McHale, Dan Mohr, and Joe Steiff. The movie screens at 7:30 pm on Wednesday, Feb. 14, at Facets ( 1517 W. Fullerton ) . Tickets are $5. The trailer is available at the website of the film's production company, www.splitpillow.com
You can find my archived reviews at www.windycitytimes.com or www.knightatthemovies.com . Feedback can be left at the latter Web site.
