Review: Skincare

Image courtesy of IFC Films.

Music video director Austin Peters' latest feature, "Skincare," is an engrossing Los Angeles neo noir about... beauty products. It starts out as a story about a skincare guru with the aspirational name of Hope Goldman (Elizabeth Banks) but eventually transitions into a thriller about a battle between two skincare businesses, a shady sidekick, and an attempted murder.

Hope's dream has long been to launch her own skincare line and she's close to that point when the film opens. She has just filmed a segment on a TV talk show with a slimy host (Nathan Fillion) and her assistant, Marine (MJ Rodriguez), is excited that she too will be taken on the ride that is Hope's burgeoning success. However, Hope is alarmed to learn that another skincare business owned by a dismissive man named Angel (Gerardo Mendez) is opening a similar outfit in the same plaza where she's located.

Hope tries to convince her landlord - to whom she owes money - to not allow another skincare operation to open in the same shopping center - but when that plea fails, she begins to receive sexually explicit phone messages, emails, and texts, while her face pops up on the bodies of porn actresses on websites and emails are sent out to her clientele with inappropriate messages.

Hope believes that Angel might be behind the smear campaign in an attempt to steal away her business, which is exactly what happens. So, she enlists the help of a sleazy life coach (Lewis Pullman) to spy on Angel as well as a mechanic who has a crush on her and some possible criminal associations. Things, as they say, get out of hand.

While on the surface "Skincare" gives off a cheery vibe - at least, at first - due to Hope's attempt at pleasing every possible client with whom she comes into contact, the film eventually settles on a neo-L.A.-noir vibe that makes it feel more like "Mulholland Drive" or Bertrand Bonello's recent "The Beast." There's often a sense in the film that something is going on beneath the surface of the film - and the city - on which we can't quite put our finger.

This is a film that had little in the way of advance reviews or acclaim - but it's a pretty solid late summer sleeper. Banks is convincing as a woman veering into desperation, while Pullman's life coach is amusingly sleazy. There are some twists and turns, and although the film ultimately ends up in a place that you might see coming, the journey to get there is engaging and intriguing. This is a solid little movie that deserves a bigger audience.