Valerie Flake

I just watched Valerie Flake on Sundance Channel. It was fabulous! I never sit through an entire movie, totally focused, hoping it will never end, but I couldn't get my mind away from this film for one second. The music was excellent and the acting brilliant!

Thank you for a very entertaining two hours on my Saturday afternoon! -H. Solomon, Kansas City, MO

The buzz was good. "Why can't more films be like this one," remarked an audience member as he left the Dickinson WestGlen 18 theater complex in Shawnee, Kan. after the special Film Society of Greater Kansas City screening of "Valerie Flake," the independent film from director John Putch starring Susan Traylor and Jay Underwood. The movie drew praise from several members--but not this critic. And yes, it pains me to say so, considering Underwood traveled hundreds of miles to Kansas City from California just to promote the film (and serve as featured speaker for the Eighth Annual KAN Film Festival at the University of Kansas the following day).

In his remarks before the screening, Underwood described the film as a "labor of love." He auditioned for his role as Tim, the heroine's love interest, because he was attracted to the "great script." Every movie needs a strong story, and according to Underwood this one has one. So strong, in fact, it was one of those rare occasions when both his manager and his agent were in agreement after reading the script. However, as Underwood himself remarked the next day at the KAN Film Festival, a great script doesn't always guarantee a great movie. Sadly, that seems to be the case with "Valerie Flake."

This film revolves around the character of Valerie. She's in every scene and somewhat of an enigma. She's a grieving widow who unsympathetically ridicules her dead spouse. She sleeps around (to mask her pain?) and fears commitment. And she struggles with at least one demon inside her, which she unleashes at her in-law's 40th wedding anniversary celebration.

The film is a complex character study (as many independent films are), and for it to succeed, the audience must relate in someway to Valerie. Unfortunately, Traylor failed to connect with me. She plays Valerie too blandly. She's supposed to be an alcoholic, yet she seems to be the same person drunk or sober. Most people I know change personalities at least a little bit when they are under the influence of the booze. Valerie stays in the same stupor all the time.

Traynor's blandness becomes even more apparent when contrasted with Underwood's character Tim. He's a sweet, instantly-likeable guy who's suddenly smitten by Valerie when he sees her helping the new cashier in the grocery store he manages. Granted he's been separated from his wife for eight months and is extremely lonely, but it's impossible to see what attracts him to Valerie. She's certainly not very charming, and yet within two days he invites her to live with him. By the end of the week, he proposes marriage, much to the dismay of his disapproving mother, nicely played by Christina Pickles. I could understand Valerie falling for Tim, but not the other way around.

The rest of the ensemble does a fine job. Director John Putch (son of actress Jean Stapleton) enticed several veteran actors into the cast (Peter Michael Goetz and Rosemary Forsyth are particularly effective in what amounts to cameo roles as Valerie's in-laws). The music by Kathleen Wilhoite helped set the mood for several montage sequences and the production values belie the film's meager (by Hollywood standards) $500,000 budget. According to Underwood, the film was well-received by the Daily Variety critic at this year's Sundance Film Festival, but failed to attract a distributor.

"Valerie Flake" is a slice-of-life indie which tells of a homely young woman with an abundance of sarcasm as she tries to find herself in the wake of her husband's death. The film is flawed in many ways but the most notable seems to be how her love interest falls all over himself at first sight when most men would have been running the other direction. I sat through this tedious and very ordinary drama because the Tivo guide info ranked it at 2.5 stars along side such films as "Girl Interrupted" and "The Patriot". Guess I'll be calling Tivo. Pass on this one.

I woke up one day and heard this movie on the TV. I thought here we go another pretentious emotive about being unpretentious. But I kept watching it. I recognized Susan from a lot of people I know. Some are middle age people who have gone through life and are a little jaded. She also represents a lot of younger people I know who has had something happen big or small and has let that one incident change their whole outlook.

This movie shows how certain situations or ONE situation molds a person. We all know people like that. For example a man has ONE girlfriend who cheats on him. So for the rest of his life he deals with all women like they cannot be trusted. People who let one bad experience control the rest of their lives.

Not to give anything away but it deals with the conclusion in a realistic way. People just go on in life letting that one situation define them and how they will interact with other people. I guess we call it life.

I like the lead actress, she is perfect for the part. People say she is homely. Not to me. She looks like a average looking person. People have been so jaded by letting Hollywood and the media define what is pretty that anyone who doesn't look like a starlet is considered homely. She looks just like the type of girl men marry and have kids with. There is nothing homely about her. She brings credibility to the role, because of the way she looks.

The people who interact in her life are interesting too. She has one friend, but she is not a person who is mean or nasty she is just not interested in a lot of stuff. She says things to people that people do not expect to hear but need to be told. That is one of the reasons I like people like her. No false pretense. I like that she has a good relationship with her in laws. You can see she really loves them. And they love her too.

When she tells them why she feels the way she does and acts the way she does, they have a very realistic response. Big deal. I love that, because so many people make things big deals when they really are not so life shattering. I love that point was made in the movie. But like most she was already in her comfort zone so she was not going to change.

I understood why that guy liked her right away It is the good girl ,bad boy complex. He was looking for a bad girl and he thought she was one. I had a boy boy complex so I saw the attraction right away. The problem with her sister seemed to have predated the tragedy with her husband. So that could of been about anything.

I was happy to see Mike Damone from Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Richard Romanus. He played the bartender. Looks older but sounds the same. It was a nice small part. Same goes for Terrence Howard. Nice to see he him before he became the baby faced bad boy of movies. It was a good role for me to see because even though he played Jackie Jackson years ago in the movie about the Jackson 5 he really didn't do much. This role gives a glimpse on how he could play a different character then the roles he is being type-casted in now. His voice was even different in this movie. Get another agent Terrence, now.

The only thing that annoyed me and I know people liked was that soundtrack. I just do not like that type of music and voice. It took away from the movie. It was a distraction. I am not sure what was more annoying the voice or the music. That IMO is the only downside of the movie.

Far be it from me to try to tell anyone they will or won't like a film---I've been wrong far too often. But I liked the film, flawed as it was. The script didn't always ring very realistic, but the cast pulled it off pretty well. Desribed earlier as `homely', I found Valerie (Susan Traylor) to be the kind of homely that it would be easy to fall in love with at first sight. I remember her from "Broken Vessels", too, (probably a better film) so maybe she has a nice Catherine Keener-esque career ahead of her. As for the ending, I found myself wondering how it related to the rest of the film, so I was left a bit uneasy.