Love & Distrust

Love and Distrust is another collection of short films I picked up. Mini reviews of each below.

The Summer House
Starring: Robert Pattinson, Talulah Riley
This one was one of the worst pieces of crap I've ever seen. It was like a fan fiction written by a 13 year-old girl - which isn't far off either, given that Robert Pattinson is in this. Basically it's about a girl visiting her aunt in 1969, they pick out a dress for her to wear to their moon landing party, her ex-boyfriend shows up wanting her back, she rejects him, interspersed with footage of the moon landing. The end. I'm glad this was only a short film, because if it was full length I would have blown my brains out.

Blue Poles
Starring: Sam Worthington, Emma Randall
I imagined this was one of Sam Worthington's first roles because his performance wasn't very good, but IMDB says he'd been acting for four years before doing this one. The short itself wasn't too bad though. It's a little road trip story about a guy who picks up a free-spirited hitchhiker and they fall for each other when staying in a motel. Doesn't stand out, but isn't terrible (although after The Summer House, anything would've seemed good).

Grasshopper
Starring: James Franco, Rachel Miner
In this one, James Franco plays a snooty businessman who shares a train car with a whore (Miner). He accidentally leaves his palm pilot on the train, the whore finds it when he calls the number, and they arrange for her to give it back to him. Sounds boring, but I didn't want to spoil the interesting part. I liked this one, although it was a little sad and depressing.

Pennies
Starring: Amy Adams
I bought the collection for this one because I'd already seen it online and liked it. Amy Adams plays a desperate waitress trying to make money in a short amount of time before a knife-wielding man on the other end of the phone cuts her daughter. There's a cool little plot twist at the end that completely changes the tone of the movie, and I like Amy, so thumbs up.

Auto Motives
Starring: Michael Imperioli, Robert Downey Jr., James Cameron, Allison Janney, Jim Rash, Melissa McCarthy, Moon Unit Zappa, Octavia Spencer
This one was like a short film made up of even shorter films. Directed by actress Lorraine Bracco, Auto Motives is a series of unconnected stories involving people and their cars. There's a creep trying to lure women into his convertible; a couple of robbers who lost the keys to their getaway car; a middle aged woman in a limo seducing a midnight cowboy to spite her ex-husband; two women in an RV seeking to be country music stars; a dweeb who gets stuffed into the trunk of a car after trying to run from the mob with their money; and my favourite, two car washers who work for director James Cameron, appearing as a douchebag version of himself in a big black Hummer. Apparently these were improvised, a credit to all of the actors except McCarthy and Zappa (the ladies in the RV) because their part was annoying and not funny. But this was a fun one and it was a nice surprise to see a lot more familiar faces than I thought I would (including Jim Rash, the Dean on Community!).