‘Lockjaw’ Overview: Working Via Grief with a Syringe

Since its launch in 1995, the Slamdance Movie Pageant has been full to bursting with micro-budgeted concoctions from rising artists who receded as quick as they emerged. However the competition has launched quite a few big-deal careers. Rian Johnson (Evil Demon Golf Ball from Hell!!!), Christopher Nolan (Following), and Joe and Anthony Russo (Items) are among the many filmmakers who jumped a couple of rung on the directing ladder because of Slamdance. What’s extra widespread is that the competition is a notch on the profession bedpost for fringe, first-time filmmakers who gave it an trustworthy try to, in the event that they’re fortunate, will get to strive once more sometime. That’s what occurs when a Slamdance entry can’t fairly lay declare to a serious expertise being born.

Onto that listing comes Sabrina Greco, whose languid and intermittently fascinating debut function, Lockjaw, premiered on the 2025 Slamdance competition, which has relocated to Los Angeles from its former dwelling in Salt Lake Metropolis, Utah. The movie hinges on a promising thought. Its most important character, Rayna, spends all the movie along with her jaw wired shut after surviving a automotive accident she brought about whereas driving drunk. Six weeks after the accident, she spends her first night time out in town, dragging alongside her kinda-sorta boyfriend Mitch and their jealous male pal, Noah. Finally, the night takes an odd flip when the trio meet a magician and his artist spouse.

Whereas all that will remind us of nice mumblecore films, Lockjaw activates a cheeky conceptual hook, one which in the end does not absolutely service the notion of a lady processing her guilt via gritted, wired-shut enamel whereas her mates work up the braveness to evaluate her as harshly as she deserves. In Greco’s script, characters usually speak round their emotions, or suppress their emotions, as a substitute of simply expressing them.

The movie can be billed as a comedy, though it solely accommodates a number of chuckles, principally courtesy of Blu Hunt, who does a terrific job utilizing facial expressions, physique language, and restricted vocalizations to convey Rayna’s shifting, usually troublesome, feelings. In any other case, a troubled, usually unintelligible lady relying on others to specific her emotions or advance her character hurts our funding in her and the movie.

Symbolism That is Higher in Idea than Execution

Lockjaw

2.5
/5

Launch Date

February 22, 2023

Runtime

77 Minutes

Director

Sabrina Greco

Writers

Sabrina Greco

Forged

• 
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Execs & Cons

• The terrific Blu Hunt is as much as the problem of taking part in a personality who can barely communicate.
• Followers of micro-budgeted fare from younger, aspiring filmmakers will respect the try.

• One male character is annoying whereas the primary character’s two male mates are uninteresting, delicate emo-bros.
• ‘Lockjaw’ is languidly paced with not sufficient drama or character work to keep up a lot curiosity.
• ‘Lockjaw’ is a comedy but it surely’s not notably humorous.

Lockjaw’s opening credit are purposely a contact blurry to recommend that an city, night-crawling, ‘70s-era John Cassavetes deep dive is on the way in which. However that’s not what Greco has in thoughts, neither is she chasing the lunacy of Martin Scorsese’s frantic, darkish night time of the comedic soul masterpiece, After Hours. As an alternative, Lockjaw spends its lolloping 80 minutes circling Rayna’s issues, utilizing symbolism that’s higher in idea than execution, whereas additionally being a quite unexciting take a look at male jealousy and bonding.

It’s apparent from the outset that Mitch (the distinctive Colin Burgess, so good in Search Social gathering) is technically Rayna’s boyfriend, however Noah (Kevin Grossman) is greater than able to be drafted, if requested. The three attend the night’s pre-game at a mellow home social gathering, with Mitch keeping off the curious with completely different lies to elucidate Rayna’s jaw downside and worrying that she’ll begin ingesting once more. When Noah suggests they level-up the enjoyable by attending a magic present, Rayna jumps on the likelihood at “maximizing our night time,” whereas Mitch prefers they “reduce” their first night time out since her accident.

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Greco directs her performers to ship their dialogue with an goal in the direction of loosey-goosey, fashionable naturalism. And whereas everybody ably obliges, the vibe is terribly relaxed, particularly when in comparison with the early movies of Richard Linklater or mumblecore pioneers like Greta Gerwig and the Duplass brothers, the place even essentially the most tossed-off strains had vitality and goal.

On the reverse finish is the star of the magic present, a magician named Robert, who we first see wearing a conspicuous all-black Beat poet quantity (full with darkish sun shades) and taking pictures of bar patrons. He’s performed by Nick Corirossi as a supremely creepy and conceited customer from one other film. Robert, along with his wonderful talents as a mentalist, reads as a extra conceptual determine in Rayna’s journey via her guilt, though it is unclear whether or not this was the intent. Both method, Corirossi usually performs the image greater than the character, which renders Robert broad and ill-fitting.

Coming to Grips With Trauma Utilizing PowerPoint?

After Robert’s magic present, he and his equally off-putting spouse, Cleo (Ally Davis), take the trio again to their dwelling the place the remaining motion unfolds. Though any affordable particular person would have bolted from the house of those horrible individuals inside 5 minutes, Greco wants everybody to remain in order that Robert can present Rayna an precise PowerPoint presentation he created of her accident (fortunately, he didn’t have time to include the CCTV footage he acquired). Placing apart how weird that’s, it additionally denies Rayna the chance to return to grips along with her trauma on her personal.

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Contemplating the price range, cinematographer Neal Wynne does an excellent job lighting the nighttime exteriors of the house the place Rayna acts out by defacing Cleo’s artwork. She learns that Mitch and Noah are feuding as a result of they’re each in love along with her. By swallowing her grief greater than working via it, Rayna is pushing each of them away, resulting in some good exchanges, as when her pal Annabelle (Sally Sum) notes how Rayna and Mitch’s relationship was higher earlier than the accident. Different selection beats embody Annabelle placing on her retainer in solidarity with Rayna’s wired jaw, a gesture the latter angrily rejects.

Sabrina Greco’s Slamdance Debut Is not a Slam Dunk however Has Potential

Greco earns factors by minimizing the scope of Rayna’s victory in the direction of the tip. Whereas we’re inclined to root for Rayna, her therapy of these attempting to assist her checks our potential to remain on her facet. It is a line that the proficient Hunt straddles fairly properly as she drinks out of a syringe that often accommodates water however might typically comprise alcohol. And her “aw-shucks” response as Robert innocently and genuinely calls her “fairly fascinating” is a heat second that Rayna will rapidly damage.

Certainly, the movie’s ultimate third has the clear strains and emotional directness that the remainder of the movie may have used extra of (it additionally may have used a rating simpler than Will August Park’s random tinkling). Oftentimes, micro-budgeted movies of the Slamdance selection want a script so incisive, artistic, or uncooked that no matter little cash they spend placing it on movie doesn’t matter. Greco is a first-time function filmmaker stuffed with concepts, and that’s an excellent factor. Growing these concepts right into a strong complete the place character, story and a tasty hook work easily collectively can be a good higher factor.

Lockjaw, a manufacturing of Hurley/Pickle Productions and Mirmade Productions, premiered on the Slamdance Movie Pageant on February 22 and is presently awaiting distribution.