Ahoy, squirts! Quint here. Nearly caught up on these Sundance reviews.

I’m not well read on Michael Chabon. He’s one of those authors I keep meaning to just dive into whole-hog and I keep getting distracted by other books and graphic novels.

So I can’t write this review as someone who knows the novel. I can’t compare the two, but I can tell you that I greatly enjoyed this film and it hit close to home on a lot of levels.

No, not the gay stuff. I know what you guys were thinking, but I don’t want to have sex with Peter Sarsgaard… okay, I do, but in a totally hetero way.

What hits close to home is a smaller character in the film played by Mena Suvari. We follow our lead Art (played by Jon Foster) as he spends a summer working at a bookstore. Before he meets the main boyfriend/girlfriend duo of (Cleveland and Jane) played by the heart-stoppingly beautiful Sienna Miller and the likewise handsome Sarsgaard, Art hooks up with his boss played by Suvari. He hooks up with her all over the store, crazy sex everywhere.

When that relationship breaks up… well, we see a side of this girl that wasn’t exactly on the surface before. Let’s just say I came out of a relationship recently and the girl portrayed in this movie is so shockingly like the girl I broke up with that I was taken aback.

We’ve all had that moment with a film where you suddenly look over your shoulder looking for the guy observing and stealing your life. I know in my heart that this character existed long before my ex, but fuck me, guys. It really was freaky. Kraken even shot me glances every time Suvari did something crazy or mean, holding in laughter since he had front row seats to my crazy break-up.

So, I connected to the movie in that way. I’m also a big fan of DREAMERS and this is like an all American version of that story. All three main characters are charismatic, sharing an electric chemistry you hope to find in any movie with a romantic angle, especially one about a triangle.

The supporting cast is great, too. Suvari plays her character for all its worth, going the extra mile in every aspect. Nick Nolte plays Art’s dad, a cop with huge ties to the underworld. He’s a shady cat and pretty damn frightening.

The adventures our trio go on range from the super sexual to extreme violence, robbery, craziness of all sorts. There’s a slow build of sexual tension between Foster and Miller and at the same time there’s even a sexual tension between Foster and Sarsgaard.

It’s an odd movie, but one that I was with every step of the way. I saw many films at Sundance that lost me at points, even movies I liked a lot, but this one of the ones that kept my attention from beginning to end.

It’s a multi-layered exploration of reaching manhood. There are many different rights of passage our lead has to go through… from taking responsibility for his own actions, focusing on the long term impact his carefree summer will have on his life, gaining independence from his controlling father.

This one isn’t for those who want to check their brain at the door, but it’s also not stuck up its own asshole. It’s one of those rare complicated movies that is also very entertaining. At least I thought so. The IMDB rating is pretty poor on it, but what can I say? I dug it.

Only a few more stragglers to clean up and I’ll be rid of Sundance… finally! Keep an eye peeled!

-Quint
quint@aintitcool.com