I came across this independent movie on Amazon streaming. Tired of watching post-election news I watched this instead.
I was pleasantly surprised at how well made and well acted it is for a movie made with crew and cast with hardly any movie-making credentials. The core story centers on a 20-something girl who, as the movie begins, receives an unfavorable diagnosis. Confiding only in her teen sister she decides to travel to Sequoia National Park and to a location called Hanging Rock and presumably end it all.
Traveling by bus she meets a 20-something man who is headed to a volunteer job to build things for the less advantaged. They connect to some extent and he eventually gives her a ride in the rental car he is picking up.
Meanwhile we witness some really strange family dynamics back home between sister, dad, estranged wife, and wife's new boyfriend. It actually all works pretty well and isn't trite at all.
In a really good movie the whole first 80% to 90% of running time sets things up for the ending, but the way it is all tied up into a satisfying ending is always the payoff. The filmmaker is a juggler, with lots of balls in the air, and has to catch them all in a satisfying manner. Here the payoff is just mediocre, perhaps all the filmmakers are saying is "change what you can and try to know the difference", borrowing from AA. But to me the ending doesn't do justice to everything that was set up in that first 80% to 90% of the movie. I wanted more.
Still I found it suitably interesting and entertaining for a difficult subject.
I was pleasantly surprised at how well made and well acted it is for a movie made with crew and cast with hardly any movie-making credentials. The core story centers on a 20-something girl who, as the movie begins, receives an unfavorable diagnosis. Confiding only in her teen sister she decides to travel to Sequoia National Park and to a location called Hanging Rock and presumably end it all.
Traveling by bus she meets a 20-something man who is headed to a volunteer job to build things for the less advantaged. They connect to some extent and he eventually gives her a ride in the rental car he is picking up.
Meanwhile we witness some really strange family dynamics back home between sister, dad, estranged wife, and wife's new boyfriend. It actually all works pretty well and isn't trite at all.
In a really good movie the whole first 80% to 90% of running time sets things up for the ending, but the way it is all tied up into a satisfying ending is always the payoff. The filmmaker is a juggler, with lots of balls in the air, and has to catch them all in a satisfying manner. Here the payoff is just mediocre, perhaps all the filmmakers are saying is "change what you can and try to know the difference", borrowing from AA. But to me the ending doesn't do justice to everything that was set up in that first 80% to 90% of the movie. I wanted more.
Still I found it suitably interesting and entertaining for a difficult subject.