Love & Debt

I was moved by this indie about a family fighting to find their way back to one another when debt splits them apart. You'll likely find the humanity reflected between the people who owe money and those going after them as interesting as I did. I found the mother daughter relationship especially touching and was particularly impressed by the teen daughter's acting skills. A good watch, I recommend it.

I just used the word "soulless" for a show a couple of days ago. Weird. If I could figure out some clues this and and that other had in common in the clues I saw before I watched them to know what to be in the look out for to avoid another with this very flat, no values, no beliefs, no interest or humanity feel some shows have nowadays! Some just seem to have no entertainment value and no redeeming qualities to balance with that. Although this one was less terrible than the other. I was trying to decide between 4 and 5 stars and decided I could go up to 5 in comparison even if that did seem to high.

Love and Debt tackles a lot of familiar issues with humor and heart. The central issue of debt expands out to the lies/half truths it breeds, intimacy issues necessarily follow and a family trying to negotiate the "normal" growing pains of time and age ruptures at the seams. But we get to see the other side of the coin through the debt collectors eyes (wow, collections callers are people too? Who knew???) which adds a lovely surreal absurdist kind of take on this whole bizarre system of money and "success." Filled with engaging performances, the film strikes the perfect balance of laughter and sincere depth.

Overall it was an ok movie, not bad and not good either, just ok. But it could have been so much better, like lots of other American movies it couldn't decide if it wanted to be a comedy or a drama. Too bad because it was so boring at times. And then this debt collector character, so unrealistic, so soft.

This movie is about struggling with situations, personal limits and issues avoided or ignored within the family. It's also an opportunity to see things from an insider perspective, without passing thru all of it. For those who's looking for a fun movie, this is not the one. It's a fiction movie, where real life situations are represented in an unhappy way, like it actually is: the family suffers, broken people go wrong ways, kids suffers and are forced to grow. The plot happens inside a family. If you're still reading this, this movie can be entertaining and inspiring. An invitation to hope in this broken world we live in. It's a fiction movie with real life lessons learnt.