Jam

My title is a reference to Season 2, Episode 13 of the classic sitcom "Taxi" in which the mediocre aspiring actor Bobby Wheeler is describing his latest mediocre theater gig. Bobby says:

"Stall. It's an experimental play about 12 people stuck in a stalled elevator. It raises an age-old question: which is the greater agony-- to be stuck in an elevator or to be watching a show about being stuck in an elevator?"

While "Jam" isn't quite as apocalyptically awful as that, I couldn't help but associate with Bobby's underwhelmed audience while I was watching "Jam" an experimental film about 12 or so people stuck in a traffic jam.

The premise, believe it or not, was interesting, and for a low budget production it was remarkably glossy in its cinematography and editing. Then where did it fail? There were just too many characters that I hated. And I'm not talking about hating the obvious villains like the snobby socialite on the day of her plastic wedding (she was actually one of my favorite characters); I'm talking about hating the characters whom we're evidently supposed to like.

Therein lies the fatal flaw of this film. Its setup is so cartoonishly obvious, bad guy here, good guy there, that if we don't happen to agree with the allocated bad guys and good guys, the experience is annoying. I'll give you an example so you know what I'm talking about.

A lesbian couple is having a baby in the middle of the traffic jam. The script spends 5 seconds establishing that they are the "good guys" by showing a snobby rich housewife snub them in their time of need. So the lesbian couple proceed to an RV and demand entry because the pregnant one needs to lie down. The occupants of the RV have a good reason for denying entry (I won't spoil it), but the lesbians are enraged and commence kicking in the door of the RV, and even after they are allowed in they treat the RV owners like dirt (and of course the RV owners are back woods hillbillies so we too are supposed to assume they are dirt).

My point with this example is that the film draws HEAVILY on stereotypes, and I mean HEAVILY. Lesbians = good because they're persecuted by society. Hillbillies = bad because they are ignorant criminals. Rich people = bad because, well, they're rich. And so on.

30 minutes into the film I found myself so aggravated that I had to take a break and go watch Fox News so I could get more of a fair & unbiased picture. Ha.

Note to all filmmakers: stereotypes are funny within the context of thick satire. For example in "Edward Scissorhands", the syrupy thick satire of a candy colored surburbia was hilarious because the entire town became the antagonist to Edward, the deer-in-the- headlights protagonist. Or in possibly the greatest satire ever, "Catch-22", the U.S. Air Force was mercilessly skewered as a tangle of beauraucracy where generals acted more like Wall Street CEOs than military men. Very effective and funny. But the use of stereotypes fall flat when they are thrown in just because the filmmakers are too lazy to have proper character development. That seemed to be the case here.

I hated almost every character, especially the ones I was obviously supposed to like. For that reason, "Jam" never got out of first gear.

After seeing so many mediocre movies in a row, this was definitely a breath of fresh air. To describe it I would say it's one of those off-beat films not driven by a plot but by characters. It reminded me a lot of The Breakfast Club in more ways than one.

As far as the actors, all of them were great and their characters were well defined and easy to relate to. In Fact, another movie to compare this to might be Glengary Glen Ross. It's not the story but the cast that make these films fun to watch. Jam had a great cast.

While I just compared Jam to two classics, I wouldn't necessarily rank it in that category, but I do think it certainly deserves better than it's current IMDb ranking of 5.3. I give it an 8.

You know those indie flicks that make you want to cringe? The ones where from the opening frame, you get the feeling the cast is only doing this because they owed a really, REALLY big favor to the director, the producers or somebody else connected with the production? In spite of some interesting editing choices made in the opening sequence of JAM, that's exactly what it feels like. Which is the bad news.

So what's the GOOD news?

Well, if favors were called in for this one, THANK GOD THEY WERE, because I couldn't believe the parade of actors as they were introduced. Marianne-Jean Baptiste? William Forsythe? Gina Torres? Alex Rocco? Tess Harper? Jeffrey Dean Morgan??? I had to ask myself in-between double takes: "Who IS this Craig Serling guy?"

Well, he's damned lucky, for one thing. Though it was made and released in 2006, it has the retro-look and feel of a movie made on the cheap back in the mid-'70's...which might have been the feel that Serling was going for.

On a rural road on the outskirts of Los Angeles (at least that's where I guessed it was), a cellist (Baptiste) on her way to a concert date swerves to avoid hitting a stray dog. She gets rear-ended by a guy (Forsythe) and his son, a telephone pole gets knocked over...let's just say it's the mess that starts the whole movie. Over time, we get to meet the people who inhabit the cars stuck in this jam: a bride-to-be with her two best friends and bridesmaids; a divorced dad (Morgan) spending his visitation day with his kids; a lesbian couple (one of whom is played by Torres) who are expecting their baby to come along at any moment, and a pair of ne'er-do-well crooks in a stolen RV, trying to break into a stolen ATM machine. And let's not leave out the cool elderly couple (Rocco and Harper) taking it all in stride.

The script is strictly paint-by-numbers, with conflicts and clashes that feel contrived - especially since with this kind of movie, you just KNOW that everything will somehow work out in the end. But compensating somewhat for what the script lacks, is the pleasure of watching some very talented actors 'spin gold from straw' and make it look effortless. Forsythe and Morgan shine especially as two struggling fathers in similar yet different situations...trying to deal with circumstances they can do nothing to change, while trying to stay connected to the people who mean the most to them.

Yes, this is all very 'Lifetime' movie-style stuff, and there's really nothing here to offer any kind of a challenge. It certainly isn't NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN, which Harper is really good in, or even LADY IN WHITE, which features one of Rocco's best performances. But it's an inoffensive time-waster at the very least, good for vegging out to until the next great movie comes on another channel you can turn to.

I saw this at the Boston Film Festival and it's quite a good movie.

It has lots going for it, especially two things:

A strong ensemble cast with favorites like Tess Harper and William Forsythe, made even stronger by the solid Amanda Detmer, who has charisma galore, and the sexy Jeffery Dean Morgan. Rrrrrrrrrrrr.

Secondly, it shows strong work by first-time feature director, Craig Serling. His directing is confident and efficient and watchable. His background in editing pays off here in his deft storytelling. Juggling so many story lines couldn't have been easy.

At turns funny and poignant, it was a crowd pleaser at the festival with good reason.

Writer/Director Craig Serling takes a break from "Survivor" and "The Amazing Race" to bring us this interesting slice of life that won him an Independent Spirit Ward, and deservedly so.

While it may seem jumbles, and go back and forth, it cannot be helped given the nature of the story. After all, when you have a dozen or so people trapped on a highway waiting for help, you just have to go back and forth with their stories.

And, there were some really good stories. Lilac (Gina Torres) and Rose (Mariah O'Brien) are having a baby. It will not wait, and they commandeer an RV stolen by Curt (Christopher Amitrano) and Jerry (David DeLuise) to have the baby. This was the best part of the film, as the two criminals deal with two lesbians that will not be bullied.

There were several other interesting stories as three women are on the way to a wedding, a father, who is dying of cancer is trying to reunite with his son, a man is trying to get his wife to have a baby, and another father is off with his children trying to tell them he is moving. The interactions among this cast are touching and funny and thoughtful.

Well worth the time.