Everything Went Down

I caught this film at the SENE Film Festival in Providence this weekend. It won Best Film and Best Score at the festival. It's about a college professor who loses his wife and can't quite get past his depression. He finds his way back into the world through the music of this down- on-her-luck rock singer. The movie documents his healing process through their unfolding friendship. There are some truly lovely and deeply moving scenes, and everyone in the audience I saw this with was quietly sniffling by the end of the movie.

I thought it was a great film, small and intimate and spirited and heartwarming. The two lead actors were very good – the lead actress, Kate Tucker, is a singer and songwriter from Nashville, and according to the director (in his Q&A after the movie) she was a first-time actress. You wouldn't know it from this performance, she was very good. Just a magnetic on screen presence. The director said that the male lead was a professor of acting at a university in Canada. He too was excellent – very tortured and sympathetic. His character goes through the ringer in this movie.

The film was a musical, but a very untraditional musical. It had live music, non-live music video-like sequences, and the use of songs in place of a traditional score. All of the songs, by Kate Tucker, forwarded the movie's storyline. To be honest, I've never seen a musical quite like it. The ways the film used music were quite original and unique. The closest thing I could relate it to would be the Irish film "Once" which was out a few years ago. If you liked that movie, it's safe to say you'll like this one too. Like that film, it has some low-budget, rough production values, but they just add to the real-ness of the storyline and the intimacy of the movie.

This film is definitely worth seeing if it plays near you.