I liked it! It was on In Bruges level of dark comedy, as that was one that had me smiling throughout. There were definitely scenes in here that felt like they dragged on for too long and even though the film was only an hour and a half, there were parts where I was like "oh ok that should've been edited out or down some". But, still, I thought the two leads were great and I thought they worked really well with each other. And there were a lot of scenes that got me to smile - I particularly loved the one with the two of them in the car with the drug dealer antagonizing him about having a gun or not.
I also thought there were a lot of really interesting shots. I was drawn in by the cinematography alone. (As an aside - man did this guy love filming that angle where they show someone walking from behind for like five to ten seconds. There was one part where you had them really close and Lily is walking to find her mom and then when that scene resolves some random kind is walking into the party.) I'm also surprised to hear this was the director's first film because it doesn't feel like it. Part of it might be how much it is paying homage to classic thrillers because you do see the same sort of shots here you would in those. I never felt like it was too much though, and I'd love to see more movies done in this same sort of style.
As for why I'm not ranking it higher...I guess I was as drawn in by the story as I could've been. Someone before commented on "masks" and that is certainly one good way to put it, but I felt a lot of things felt very sterile. And yes, a lot of that has to do with the characters and their obsession on image. Lily and her mom and her dad. Amanda contributes the same sort of problem, but for obviously different reasons. But when the drug dealer comes in, it is almost like a breath of fresh air because finally you have someone acting like a human. He has the same issue with wearing a mask, obviously, but he feels authentic in his inauthenticity. The other characters can feel a bit like rich, out of touch, almost robots at times. And, of course, this is intentional, but at the same time it makes it harder to really get involved with them as characters. When Amanda sort of sacrifices herself for Lily at the end, I wasn't like "oh no Amanda don't!" or "can't believe Lilly pulled this off, how conniving". I was along for the writing and the cinematography and the acting, but the characters and story just felt like they were sort of there.
I still recommend it though! I was into it while I was watching it, but it falls just a bit short of being the kind of movie I'd want to watch again, I think.
In Bruges - 9/10 Thoroughbreds - 7/10 Mother - 5/10
I know I keep switching my rating for Mother around. I might be doing this a little bit until we have more films on here so I have a bigger list to compare everything to. Sorry!
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Moops? "I thought you were making up diseases? That's spontaneous dental hydroplosion."