COWBOYS
This endearing and empathetic modern-day western of a bipolar father (Steve Zahn) on the run with his transgender son (Sasha Knight) through the open air of Montana and headed for Canada is beautifully captured by writer-director Anna Kerrigan. Her story of love, understanding, and acceptance from a parent to a child is smart and sincere, while being told through complex characters who are authentic when facing their own faults. Known for being funny people, Zahn and Jillian Bell both show a different side that audiences will be pleasantly surprised by.
Zahn’s warm, layered performance is one of his very best, and Bell is terrific as the mother who’s angry at her husband and even more so at herself as she struggles to come to grips with her child not feeling comfortable in their own skin. Focusing on gender-identity issues from a fractured family’s perspective, Kerrigan’s original, unexpected journey goes down a path of a lovely rebirth that comes not a moment too soon.
MATERNA
Jade Eshete, Kate Lyn Sheil, Lindsay Burdge, and Assol Abdullina deliver solidly emotional performances in a heavy yet draining drama where a frightening event on a NYC subway unexpectedly joins these ladies’ lives together. However, it’s ultimately irrelevant as it’s not about what happens on the subway but how each of them got there that co-writer/director David Gutnik is interested in barely telling. The heart of the narrative is the delicate and difficult relationship between a mother and child and the lasting influence it has on them.
As we learn about each of their backstories and the emotional weight they carry on their shoulders, not all of them are involving nor give us enough to form some kind of actual connection. Gutnik clearly shows his characters are not one-dimensional, though what’s the point if there’s difficulty in caring about them. The acting is compelling, but what remains is a sense of incompleteness where not much resonates and nothing gets resolved.
Brandon Vick is a member of The Music City Film Critics’ Association, the resident film critic of the SoBros Network, and the star of The Vick’s Flicks Podcast. Follow him on Twitter @SirBrandonV and be sure to search #VicksFlicks for all of his latest movie reviews.
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