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Young filmmaker Mitchell Haven (Tygh Runyan) makes a movie based on a
true story about the accidental deaths or suicides of crooked politician
Taschen and his mistress Velma. For his female lead, he casts Laurel
(Shannyn Sossamon), a virtual unknown who has only made one movie before,
which was nothing but a cheap joke, and who doesn't even consider herself
as an actress. He thinks he has discovered a woman with star potential
though ... and he falls in love with her and the two of them soon start
having an affair. His love for his star also affects Mitchell's work
though, as he writes more and more scenes for her into the scriptmuch to
the dismay of all his other actors, especially his one name actor,
Cary Stewart (Cliff De Young), who plays the crooked politician who was
originally the center of the movie. As if that wasn't bad enough though,
there is also an insurance agent on set, Bruno Brotherton (Waylon Payne),
who was originally hired as an advisor, but who also has his own motives
to work on the film, namely to find out where the money (a cool 100
million Dollars) the real Taschen and Velma have embezzled has gone. Why
does he look for the money on a movieset you may ask - because Laurel, the
woman who plays Velma and who has turned her director's head, actually is
Velma, unbeknowest to anyone but Brotherton and herself though. Everything
ends in disaster when Brotherton, in a drunken state, decides to confront
Laurel/Velma and Mitchell with the truth, and accidently shoots
Laurel/Velma dead in the process, upon which Mitchell grabs Brotherton's
gun and shoots him dead ... and only in the end of the film we learn that
the film's framing device, an interview Mitchell is giving to prominent
blogger Nathalie Post (Dominique Swain), who has done her own research on
the Taschen and Velma-affair, is actually conducted in his prison cell ... In
reading, this film might sound like a disappointingly straight-forward
thriller with a central plottwist - the fact that Velma and Laurel are one
and the same person - that's far-fetched beyond believability. On film
though, director Monte Hellman makes a fascinatingly labyrinthine work of
art out of his ridiculous premise, a movie that cleverly plays with its
different levels of reality (the actual truth, the truth on the filmset,
the film within the film and so on) and leaves large chunks of its own
story open to the audience's own interpretation, which makes the film
quite a rewarding experience, especially when coupled with Hellman's
subltle, almost spartan directorial effort. All that said though, the
film is good but not perfect, as it does have its shortcomings especially
in the casting department: Tygh Runyan is just too flat for the lead-role
and doesn't really carry the movie while WAylon Payne as his main nemesis
seems a bit too hard-edged to remain believable throughout. Still, the
film is at least worth a look ...
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find Road to Nowhere at adultvideouniverse.com
