LOITERING WITH INTENT
Metal Rabbit Media
Reviewed for Shockya by Harvey Karten. Data-based on Rotten Tomatoes.
Grade: B
Director: Adam Rapp
Screenwriter: Michael Godere, Ivan Martin
Cast: Ivan Martin, Michael Godere, Sam Rockwell, Brian Geraghty, Isabelle McNally, Marisa Tomei
Screened at: Review 1, NYC, 1/5/15
Opens: January 26, 2015
As we get on in years, we’re likely to take time out from our daily multitasking to reflect on our youths’ lost opportunities. “If only I didn’t screw up with the girl I liked so much, we could be married today,” or “If only I listened to my mother and practiced for a couple of hours a day, I could have been an accomplished pianist.” Such is the case when a group of people show up at a country home (photographed by Radium Cheung in Leeds, New York), and have a wild time dancing and drinking though at least two of the guys had come up from the city hoping for peace and quiet. The situation becomes serious when two ex-boy-friends of the home-owner vie for her attention anew. Can you go home again? That appears to be on the minds of Michael Godere and Ivan Martin, who co-wrote and star in Adam Rapp’s “Loitering with Intent,” a relatively brief ensemble piece that makes up in frantic activity what it lacks in tension. The cast perform in the roles of characters who might be considered losers, though it’s difficult to call unemployed actors “losers” when ninety percent of these brave folks are not working at any given time. There is just one “winner” on display, a surfer without much going on upstairs who, because of his good looks and ability with a board lands a job with Jerry Bruckheimer on a reality show—or so he says.
Director Adam Rapp’s “Winter Passing” was one of three features that found him at the helm. His first film dealt with an offer to an actress for a small fortune if she could ferret out the love letters that her father wrote to her mother. Once again Rapp hones in on the acting profession by highlighting the career hopes and romantic thoughts of two unemployed thespians, Raphael (Ivan Martin) and his best friend Dominic (Michael Godere), working unhappily as bartenders. When Kaplan (Natasha Lyonne), a producer, suggests that she has found money available if the two could knock out a movie script in ten days, Raphael and Dominic are on it, lying that they have been working on a terrific screenplay and heading upstate to the country home of Dominic’s sister, Gigi (Marisa Tomei). When Gigi and her friend Ava (Isabelle McNally) walk in unexpectedly, all hope for a silent ten days for writing soon vanish, and what’s more, since Gigi’s two ex-boyfriends announce their continuing love for her, battle lines are drawn.
With a spot-on performance by the always reliable Marisa Tomei, a bundle of activity, stripping with her friend Ava and jumping into a bubble bath or wrestling just outside on the spacious lawn, “Loitering with Intent” appears destined to be a fun experience. The most poignant and comic scene finds Wayne (Sam Rockwell) kneeling in front of Gigi, promising to work out his anger issues together with the immaturity that led him to leave her years back. He has the help of his handsome surfer brother Devon (Brian Geraghty), who tries to calm him down. Already the writing of the screenplay becomes nothing more than a MacGuffin, bowing to the greater needs of the romance. The cast appear to be having fun, though even at eighty minutes, the movie is overlong.
Unrated. 80 minutes. © Harvey Karten, Member, New York Film Critics Online
Story – C+
Acting – B
Technical – B
Overall – B
