Review: Giants Being Lonely

Image courtesy of Gravitas Ventures.

Grear Patterson's "Giants Being Lonely" is stylish proof that its writer/director has some talent behind the camera, but the film's meandering story and aloof characters keep the picture at a remove and a ludicrous ending takes the film down a lurid route that's not justified by anything that has gone on before.

The brief film - which clocks in at just under 80 minutes - follows the travails of several players on a southern high school baseball team, but mainly spends its time with Bobby White (Jack Irv), the star pitcher who has a consistently drunk father and manages to find his way into the beds of local women (including the coach's wife, a woman who shrinks from her explosive husband), and Adam (Ben Irving), the seemingly troubled and somewhat shy coach's son who suffers abuse at the hands of his father (Gabe Fazio).

The most preposterous element of the film is the fact that anyone would allow Adam's father to coach the team. The man is a seemingly sociopathic loose cannon who doesn't so much inspire the team members to do well on the field, but rather than terrorize them and verbally abuse them before each game starts. Imagine if Dennis Hopper's character from "Blue Velvet" were coaching your child's baseball team. It's hard to fathom how anyone would let this guy mentor their kids.

Adam is awkward, and is surprised when a popular girl agrees to go with him to the prom. He's also jealous of Bobby - although he doesn't know that his teammate is sleeping with his mother - because of the attention he gets from being a great pitcher, and during one scene Adam slips some sort of drug into Bobby's water bottle during a game. Although it makes him slightly dizzy, he still pitches a winning game. Adam is constantly abused by his tyrannical father, who forces him to undergo some type of suffering to which we are not witnesses in a barn behind their house.

Bobby is even more of an enigma. Although his father is an alcoholic, there's no sense of abuse going on in the household - just, perhaps, some neglect. Bobby wanders his small southern town, often shirtless, and strips naked in front of a group of female classmates and dives off a bridge. He ambles about somewhat aimlessly, despite his great talent at the mound. His relationship with Adam's mother seems to exist for no reason as it ultimately goes nowhere.

The film's tone bounces all around. Much like another recent odd movie about youth titled "Ham on Rye," Patterson's film feels like a Richard Linklater hangout movie during its first half, but while "Ham on Rye" dives into Lynchian territory during its second half, "Giants Being Lonely" starts to feel like a horror movie shot by Terrence Malick.

The film culminates in a dreamy sequence during which Adam hosts an after-prom party at his home while his parents are supposedly out of town. The early scenes of the party are among the film's best visual moments - the dreamy music blends with the candy colored visuals to great effect. Unfortunately, the whole house of cards comes tumbling down with a last minute plot twist (if you could call it that) and the film's final shot is among the worst narrative decisions of recent memory.

"Giants Being Lonely" - which apparently gets its title from a line from a Carl Sandburg poem - shows promise for its writer/director, but that's about it. The film has its moments, although watching it involves a fair amount of extending one's disbelief - why, for example, do all of the lead characters look like members of a 1970s southern rock band? - and the final scene, which is supposed to be shocking, is an absurd cop out. Patterson obviously has talent, but I hope it's better utilized next time around.