Lovesong

Lovesong is an intimate relationship drama, lovingly told, the kind of indie that hangs not on the script or dialogue, but on the beauty of the images and the mostly silent performances of its leads. And while the story is intriguing and the actors good, it never really rises up to become something memorable.

Lovesong is, true to its title, a bittersweet love story about two best friends, Sarah and Mindy. Sarah married young and now finds herself isolated as a single mother who only has a toddler to talk to, her husband travelling around the world. She calls her friend Mindy who immediately, like a breath of fresh air, arrives to reassure her, tell her that she's a good mom and to urge her to have fun. The two friends along with Sarah's daughter go an impromptu road trip. But while discussing their past some tension comes up and the two end up pushing their relationship into a more romantic capacity. Things go a bit awry and the movie picks up three years later just as Sarah's relationship is dissolving and Mindy is about to get married.

Writer/director So Yong Kim keeps things simple and naturalistic for her leading ladies (no makeup and a distinct lack of over the top reactions). The two main actresses Jena Malone and Riley Keough both work with her very well. But while the two have a soft chemistry that suits the style of the movie it isn't the kind of burning passion that would have made this film really stand out. And everything feels too subtle, too subdued. I liked this movie well enough while I was watching, but I also have the distinct feeling that it won't exactly stick in my mind.

Still worth watching.

Lovesong (2016) was co-written and directed by the Korean-American filmmaker So Yong Kim. It stars Riley Keough as Sarah, a young married woman who might as well be a single mom. (Her husband is away for months on business.) Sarah lives in a beautiful home, in a beautiful setting. She has a great daughter, Jessie, played at age three by Jessie OK Gray, and at age six by Sky OK Gray. (I assume they are the director's two daughters.)

Enter Sarah's old friend Mindy (Jena Malone) who lives in New York City. They haven't seen each other for years, but they're still good friends. We get a sense that they're more than good friends, but director Kim is discrete about these things. After spending the night together, Mindy leaves for NYC. The women don't meet up again until three years later.

There was a good movie in here somewhere, but it never made its way out. Both women are moody, taciturn, and passive. As an example, it apparently never occurs to Sarah that she could do more with her life than be a mother to Jessie, and wait for her husband to return home. How about leaving Jessie with a sitter and volunteering for a political cause or for a library? Nope. She just sits home, takes walks, and sulks.

Mindy doesn't appear to have any thoughts at all. She makes an offhand comment about work, but she never says what she does and how she does it. She certainly has a gamine-like charm, but we don't see anything else to recommend her as a friend or as a person.

This is the movie to see if you want a story about two attractive women who don't really connect with each other or with the world. Otherwise, find a better movie and watch that one.

We saw this film at the excellent Little Theatre, as part of the wonderful ImageOut Rochester LGBT Film Festival. It will work well on the small screen.

Lovesong is one of 22 films that had their New York State premiere, or their East Coast premiere, at ImageOut. My compliments to the ImageOut Programming Committee for their great success in bringing these films to Rochester.

This movie was just kinda under everything--underwhelming, under developed, under communicated, etc. If you're going for slow naturalism you still need a heartbeat, but this script is too lethargic to hold attention. At the end of the day it felt padded when it could have made a really poignant half hour short film...

...or rather it would if the plot and characters were laid out better. The main character is as passive as other reviews say. I can sympathize with a woman winding up in a mundane, boring life where motherhood doesn't feel like her end-all-be-all and her husband has essentially abandoned her. It's a very real-world situation. But she does nothing to improve it. Maybe, MAYBE, her attempt to improve it is by going to her love interest's wedding in hopes of running away with the bride...but I have no idea as very little character motivation is ever established. We don't even know why it ends the way it ends, and instead of feeling indie and human and ambiguous it feels like we just wasted a bloated ninety minutes to watch yet another disappointing end to a LGBT story.

In that way it felt extremely dated. Essentially the same story can be found in numerous LGBT books and films that were made in the 80s, 90s, and even 00s. It's 2020, dude. Do something different.

The first thing one needs to know is that the movie has a strong autobiographical element to it. On the DVD, in the 'extras', the writer-director explains that she had similar experiences growing up, some with boys and others with girls, that is what prompted her to make this movie. She is married and has kids, the two little girls who play the same character at age 3 and age 6 are her daughters.

I came across this movie on DVD from our public library. After seeing a couple of Jena Malone movies recently, I wanted to see if I had missed any and this one came up.

Plus we also like Riley Keough. She plays Sarah, a young married woman with a young daughter and a husband that has to be away from home too much for business. Then her old friend visits, Jena Malone as Mindy. At a gathering later they say they have been knowing each other for 17 years so they must have grown up together from their preteen years. They have some low-key time together then Mindy buys a bus ticket to New York. They don't see each other for another three years, when Mindy is getting married.

The movie has all the feel of an independent, low-budget movie. It has a couple of strange scenes that both my wife and I thought were very odd. Some dirty jokes at the pre-wedding party that seemed way out of place for the audience.

Overall both Malone and Keough handle their roles very well but the movie itself is just so-so, a slice of life of two old friends who aren't quite sure if they love each other more than they love their spouses. I suppose things like that happen in real life.

I haven't seen any of So Young Kim's other movies, but I am going to make an effort. I understand the varied responses of others here, and make no excuses; it is different for me, and this love story really is a Lovesong, one played in the background over several years, which rises from piano to sforzando, and back to quietness. Remarkably acted and directed, Riley Keough and Jena Malone are just perfect in the depiction of their barely suppressed love for one another. The film both delighted and depressed me, but it has become one that I will buy to keep. I do agree with a review of Lovesong by Justin Chang in "Variety" on 25 Jan 2016: "There's a remarkable truthfulness to the film's acknowledgment that people often make enormous decisions rooted not in fear so much as uncertainty, even laziness, as well as a comfort with their lives as they've lived them until the present juncture." What is left unsaid is the consequences of those decisions, that we are left to look out the window and consider. Well done.