Things I understand about Things I Don’t Understand

After surviving an ‘experiment’ in suicide, twenty-something Violet Kubelick (Molly Ryman, inset) wanders around an emotional cul-de-sac. Her minimum wage gig at a bookstore unleashes an antisocial streak, turning her into a salesperson with no desire to make any sales. She shares an apartment in Brooklyn with an artistic pair who are only slightly less unhinged than she: the performance artist Gabby (Meissa Hampton) and struggling musician Remy (Hugo Dillon). Fiercely intelligent — unlike most movie suicides, she knows to cut her wrists along the length of the vein rather than across — Violet’s grad school thesis, a study of people who’ve had near-death experiences (she refers to them as “near-deathers”) prompts a meeting and eventual friendship with terminal cancer patient Sara (Grace Folsom). All the while, poking at her conscience, a brooding bartender/would-be boyfriend named Parker (Aaron Mathias) and a psychiatrist whose laidback drollery flows through deadpan delivery, Dr. Blankenship (Lisa Eichhorn), gently rattle Violet’s cage, forcing her to examine some ugly personal baggage she’d much rather sweep under the rug.

    This is the framework of Things I Don’t Understand (2011), writer-director David Spaltro’s new comedy about self destruction, loss and cancer. As in his first feature, . . . Around (2008), Spaltro orchestrates a bluesy atmosphere surrounding characters caught momentarily out of sync with everyone and everything else. He treads perilously close to the narcissistic whining of some Woody Allen and Henry Jaglom films, out on that dicey plateau where underlined confusion collides with the protracted adolescence of the privileged and their sundry insecurities. Spaltro’s dialog, however, is mostly genuine and believable, his characters true-to-life creations trudging the rocky urban streets to some kind of epiphany. For what it’s worth, Jaglom has never made a film as coherent, enlightened or as funny as this.

Above: David Spaltro and Molly Ryman go over a scene; click to enlarge. “Sometimes an actor and director become working soul mates,” says the director, “and they choose to collaborate on multiple films. This is somewhat of a mysterious phenomenon. It is hard to say what exactly makes the actor/director relationship ‘pop.’ They inspire each other. They trust each other. They just ‘get’ each other. Whatever it is, it’s fascinating.”

    I’m sure it’s no coincidence that ‘Violet Kubelick’ will remind some of us of the equally promiscuous and self-destructive Miss Kubelik played by Shirley MacLaine in Billy Wilder’s The Apartment (1960). With her pricey coiffure, meticulous makeup, tasteful wardrobe, trendy wit and elevated IQ, Ryman’s Violet appears to have her act together. At first it’s difficult to grant her any sympathy — isn’t she too smart, too pretty, too cool? She contradicts the common gloomy image of a suicide, as Spaltro’s screenplay wisely recognizes the superficial trappings used by troubled people to camouflage their broken hearts and fatigued, racing minds. And Molly Ryman, whose ‘indie’ career has so far consisted of just a handful of shorts and three barely-seen features, has crafted such a rich, full-bodied character that, if we’ve any compassion at all, our defenses should crumble once Violet’s quiet desperation emerges, usually on mornings after nights of blackout drinking, or being shunned for casual sex by the philosophical mixologist. (Her line, “You just don’t want to fuck me,” slaps the ear with the anguished melancholy of someone who knows rejection all too well.)

    Seasoned with enough characters to fill a good novel, the script challenges its cast and director to overcome the dozens of limitations facing the (very) independent production. Not without its technical gaffes (the audio dips in a couple of spots) and minor flaws, Things I Don’t Understand occasionally lapses during its final act by trying to tie up a few too many loose subplots. (The story of the bartender and his wife, for example, holds enough of a plot for its own movie.) Regardless, everyone works diligently on cramped sets and isolated exteriors — where Spaltro and cinematographer Gus Sacks guide the camera softly and thoughtfully, never obtrusively — to mine the human condition, and are rewarded by an ensemble of mostly unknown actors evidently willing to go the distance.

    This speaks volumes for the talent, charisma and passion of the director, who, at the very least, holds an innate gift for casting. Grace Folsom transforms the cancer patient Sara into a fount of inner beauty and peace prevailing over her disease, evolving into a perfect counterpoint and friend to Violet. Supplying a touch of broad comedy relief, Meissa Hampton and Hugo Dillon appear like a trendy downtown couple ready for their own sitcom, the latter gambling with the film’s low key tone by approaching scenes as if shot out of a cannon. Give him props, however, for delivering the line “This vagina’s got balls!” with unyielding conviction. Last but certainly not least, Spaltro pulls a casting coup with Lisa Eichhorn as the psychiatrist. She had prominent roles in John Schlesinger’s Yanks and James Ivory’s The Europeans (both 1979), while readers of this blog may remember her best as the woozy Maureen ‘Mo’ Cutter in Ivan Passer’s Cutter’s Way (1981). Her Dr. Blankenship in Things I Don’t Understand comes off as guarded and steely-eyed but far from humorless, a sense of empathetic irony quietly resonating in her restrained expressions. Combined, they make the would-be suicide’s recovery story palpable and strangely appealing, tucked away into a private corner of Brooklyn that’s bursting with life.

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