Suspicious River
In her most startling role yet, Molly Parker delivers a chilling performance as an emotionally disturbed young woman. Leila Murray (Parker) works as a receptionist at a stale motel on the outskirts of the small town of Suspicious River. Bored to tears with her marriage and life in general, she begins to offer more personal attenton to the slack-jawed guests than the motel advertises by selling her body for the price of a room. She falls into a more intimate relationship with a particular regular played by Callum Keith Rennie, but this path she chooses as her dream escape isn't necessarily paved with gold.
Member Reviews
Eerie. Strange. Provocative. - cathyottawa
Director Lynne Stopkewich follows up her controversial film Kissed with another foray into seedy sexual waters.
Fortunately for us, she once again has the wonderful Molly Parker in the staring role. Parker is just amazing at emoting through facial expression. I felt I knew this character best when she said nothing at all.
Parker plays Leila, a small town girl who is choking on her own apathy. Stuck in an empty life, and loveless marriage, she wishes for something, anything to move her.
When a guest checking into the hotel she works at hints that he'd like to purchase sexual favours from her, she does it. And then continues to do it with several men. Why? Maybe partly just for the money. Maybe because it excites her in some way. Maybe because feeling used is better than feeling nothing at all. Maybe because it makes her feel powerful. The film lets you make up your own mind.
There is a feeling of foreboding that permeates the film. You just know something terrible is going to happen, especially when Gary, a man who becomes obsessed with Leila, enters the picture. He seduces her easily with tenderness Leila isn't used to, and comes to crave from him.
The tension builds slowly, and we are indeed taken to dark places.
This film isn't much more than a character study of Leila, and as such, it doesn't feel as complete as Kissed did. I would have liked to have known more about her, especially her marriage (why was her husband anorexic?) and gotten a more complete picture.
Still, this was a powerful performance, and a haunting tale.
Member Reviews
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Eerie. Strange. Provocative. - cathyottawa
Director Lynne Stopkewich follows up her controversial film Kissed with another foray into seedy sexual waters.
Fortunately for us, she once again has the wonderful Molly Parker in the staring role. Parker is just amazing at emoting through facial ...