Bellflower

Bellflower is a strange film. It's beautifully made; every washed-out or color-saturated shot is gorgeous. Evan Glodell, who wrote, directed, and stars in the movie, has made an impressive and memorable feature debut. Woodrow (Glodell) and his best friend, wild man Aiden (Tyler Dawson), are building a flamethrower, and have plans for a custom-built muscle car that will rule the desert if and when the apocalypse occurs. Then Woodrow meets tough, pretty wiseass Milly (Jessie Wiseman) in a club, driving her from California to Texas for their extended first date. Meanwhile, Aiden has his sights on Milly's friend Courtney (Rebekah Brandes). When Woodrow's relationship deteriorates, it sets him on a rapid tailspin of despair and destruction. At first, Bellflower seems like a treatise on male bonding and the "bros before hos" dictum. On the surface, whether the events depicted are filtered through Woodrow's warped perspective or not, the storyline is profoundly dumb. It's telling that the film opens with a quote from Lord Humongous from The Road Warrior. Woodrow and Aiden don't idolize the reluctant hero Max, but the movie's psychotic villain. They are petulant man-children, clinging to a violent, childish, misogynistic, and masochistic post-apocalyptic nightmare fantasy, which Glodell wholly embraces in order to critique it. The effect is jarring and enthralling, and Bellflower is the kind of film that you keep thinking about.