Wobble Palace

First impressions are important. This movie has a terrible one.

I was finally able to watch this film (just yesterday) on Tubi. Although I'm from the Gen-X period, I can still enjoy a film focused on the Millennials, entitled as they are.

Which is a good description of the main male character (Eugene). That guy has way too much confidence in himself, especially considering that he's balding, out of shape, and incredibly self-centered. The girls that he's hoping to hook-up with wouldn't give him the time of day (not in real life, anyway).

And then there's Jane, the main female character. She's unsure of her stature, her career, and her relationships (aren't they all?). Yea, she's "basic"! And seeing the "retro" tech and social apps that are being used during some scenes, it almost brings a tear to my eye.

Certainly, an enjoyable film, even if some of the acting was a bit rough from the other cast members.

It's about a millennial couple in 2016 who have an open relationship. It just does a really great job at capturing our generation and that lifestyle. The characters are quirky but very real and sometimes relatable, especially from the perspective of someone who lives in Asheville. It's very stylistic but a style that's becoming a new mainstream. I really like the way the film incorporated technology. It does a great job at capturing the times we live in with technology that I think a lot of movies try to ignore or when they do comment on it, it feels unnatural. The characters struggle with things our generation can find relatable. Like struggling with labels. Wanting to be artistic, but then not wanting to be basic like those artistic people, when everything about this character is basic artistic and she does nothing to aid this cognitive dissonance. It's really funny but also kinda sad. All in all I really enjoyed it and I think it deserves more attention.

"Wobble Palace" is a great dramedy that uses millenial culture to talk about the good, the bad, and the ugly of modern relationships and how we deal with loneliness in the modern world. The movie's couple is unsatisfied with the state of their relationship, so they are always trying to find refuge by going out or trying to connect with other people instead of just finishing their love ties. But they can't, because their fond memories hold them back and they don't know where to go next. There is a line in the film that says that "Two betta fishes in the same bowl will start to fight each other, and one of them is going to die". This basically sums up most of the movie (even if in a much expository manner). The realistic characters and dialogue ooze out of the screen, but the, sometimes, inconsistent style and the vaguely political message end up hurting the overall experience a little bit.

Honestly, I just watched this because I've had an Instagram crush on lead actress Dasha Nekrasova for years (it was a bit stronger about 5 years ago but those things always live on in an underlying sense, ya know). Her profile always said she was an actress but I never got to see her in anything, until now. I was not disappointed in the slightest. I don't know her IRL but it seems like director/co-writer/co-star Eugene Kotlyarenko and her have created a way to simply display parts of their true selves through the characters in this film. Dasha's performance is raw, honest, at times intimidating, and often far more erotic than I expected.

This film is perhaps the most realistic representation of existence for 20/30something's in L.A. this decade, aside from the exaggerated bits, like for example, how quickly and consistently Eugene's character gets responses and follow-through's on Tinder, but that's all just surreal fun. A great majority of couples I know who moved to Los Angeles together (including myself) at some point ended up continuing to live with each other after a break-up, which is one of the primary plot elements in this movie. In the beginning, the film felt maybe a bit too much like a self-serving vehicle for director and star Kotlyarenko to spotlight himself as an eccentric weirdo, but as the movie progressed, it began to balance out and sculpt itself out as having more of a cohesive structure and spirit of it's own.

Then, another great surprise was seeing an acquaintance of mine Elisha Drons in there. Every moment with that man in reality is like you're living in a movie, so it makes sense to finally see him in one. His character introduction was probably my favorite scene in the whole movie. "Robes! Do you want me to do it again?..... Robes!....... Do you want me to do it again?..." Mad man, I tell you.

Any way, I'm not sure who I would recommend this to but I got a real KICK out of it. It definitely fits in nicely with the MUMBLECORE sub genre, though it's far quirkier than most of those movies, and in my opinion, better. And, it's intriguing and nice to see that the film's primary creator has his career continuing on a legit path. His recent film SPREE, starring Stranger Things' star Joe Keery (also the boyfriend of another one of my primary Hollywood crushes, Maika Monroe - what's with all the crush connections here?), looks rather innovative and has been recommended to me by several people since it's release - it is total coincidence that that film was by the same guy who made this. Very curious to check it out, and to observe Eugene and Dasha's filmography from here on out. Cheers.