Under the Silver Lake (2018)

 ☆ ☆ ☆ ½

Under the Silver Lake (2018) – D. R. Mitchell

Really, the only interpretation that explains this unusual movie is that Andrew Garfield’s Sam is having a psychotic break from reality!  But it takes a while to come to this conclusion. At first, he might be just a little lost, not unreasonably attracted to Riley Keough’s mysterious Sara, who invites him for a tryst and then suddenly disappears. He turns detective -- and the film echoes other wacked out L. A. neo-noirs, such as The Long Goodbye (complete with topless neighbour out on the balcony) or The Big Lebowski. However, the clues that Sam uncovers begin to take on some serious conspiracy theory overtones: mysterious messages embedded in the lyrics of songs by a local rock band, someone sending signals via hobo codes, the strange beliefs of a zine artist (played by Patrick Fischler, seen previously at David Lynch’s Winkie’s diner) that prophesise events that may come to pass. Then, David Yow (from the Jesus Lizard) appears as the Homeless King and Sam stumbles on clues that make no objective sense which are nevertheless co-opted into the growing narrative and incomprehensibly validated by what the camera shows us. Given a bizarro solution that fails to add up or to reveal any deeper themes (except to Sam, perhaps), some reviewers complained that this makes the film essentially meaningless. That may be true but if you are willing to follow Garfield’s slacker anti-hero from party to party, “random” encounter to encounter, you may enjoy the film, even if you end up discovering that you’ve just wasted your time trying to figure it out.  Intriguingly, a quick google search suggests that director David Robert Mitchell (It Follows, 2014) has embedded some hidden messages in the film itself – but chasing these may lead you down rabbit holes not far from those entered into by those slipping into the netherworld of psychosis.