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Despite Perry's flaws as a director, Straw succeeds on the rawness and ugly accuracy of its portrayals of a Worst Possible Scenario that is sadly all too plausible.

Henson is a single mom dealt every rotten card in the book, yet still keeps a core of kindness intact, despite being drawn into a murder rap and an innocuous conflict at her bank that horrifyingly evolves into a hostage situation that's too insanely resonant not to be believed.

The performances across the board are too stellar to ignore, Teraji Henson, Sherri Shepherd, and Teyana Taylor, in particular, are so unvarnished and honest that they read more like open wounds than overstudied performances. These fine actresses connect so fluidly with their characters (and us) that they often say more when they're not speaking.

Straw's minor problems lie in Perry's need to draw attention to the performances, and the fine dialogue... it's just not needed. A prime example is the lengthy exchange between Henson and Taylor where Henson lays out everything that she's been through to Taylor. The cutaways to total strangers in seemingly every place in the city who are witnessing the stand-off are beyond superfluous --- they detract from the amazing emotion being organically generated by the actors. Ditto for the syrupy score. The guts of this film could carry a score-less soundtrack easily, as it could just as well be a decent stage play.

Straw is the work of a director and writer who seems to finally be allowing himself to trust the truth behind his work, without leaning on cliches, catch-phrases, and other gimmicks in the guise of mindless entertainment, which --- though it can be important --- is not what we need right now.

Diversion is passe... Straw is not a light diversion though it couldn't be more engaging. Let's hope there's more where this came from.

That's the final observation from private detective Harold Palladino (an Oscar-worthy --- in a just universe --- performance by David Yow) at the conclusion of A Desert, short and video director Joshua Erkman's feature length debut. That's true of the film itself at the start, which you're best going blind into, because like the tunnel of time itself, what's waiting at the end is sometimes best kept in the dark.

A Desert opens on two exquisitely shot sequences with art photographer Alex Clark lurking around an eerily abandoned cinema and then a deserted military barracks in the Yucca Valley. The composition, pacing and eye for odd details do justice to Erkman's and his DP Jay Keitel's meticulous lens and clue you in that nothing you are seeing is unintentional or meaningless, just as the excerpt of James Landis' 1963 B-flick from hell, "The Sadist," playing in all its slobbery glory on the motel room of the antagonist Renny and his girlfriend Susie isn't random either, if not a bit spot-on.

Alex is a man out of time, ditching his devices for a full-on analog road trip with a gorgeous Deerdorff 8 x 10 camera in tow, until he meets up with Renny at a fleabag motel and things go sideways.

If this all sounds vaguely familiar in a noiry/ Lynchian kind of of way, it is, until it's not. A Desert shares those sensibilities, but what lifts it into stratas you don't expect to visit are the performances, all of which are as phenomenal as Yow's. Kai Lennox and Sarah Lind, in particular, as Alex and his wife Sarah, are so natural and poignant that they ground you and unexpectedly trap you into facing the carnage that follows with a hyper-immediacy that the film as a whole doesn't always earn.

Erkman really shot for the stars with this one, metaphorically and literally. There are plenty of flashbacks and circular arcs that sometimes work beautifully and some that simply dangle, like the alluring still of blank theater screens that pervade this film, haunting you with kinder universes than the one we're ultimately left with.

Proceed at your own risk with A Desert... it's not a knock-off genre film or a quickie-watch by any means. But if you like being surprised, shocked, or just enjoy really innovative film making and beautiful images, you'll find plenty here to enjoy on multiple viewings.

Chris VanderKaay's ".ask" comes off as a DIY-left fielder skewering You-Tubers running motivational scams and hustles with a less-than-zero budget, complete with lo-fi effects. It makes the realization all the more jarring as you slowly discover that ".ask" has a much deeper, almost existential layer and that VanderKaay is not only a very talented writer and director, but a believable, quite nimble actor as well.

VanderKaay's character's hook is to tell his viewers/subscribers to keep "putting yourself out there," exhorting authenticity while actually giving away none of his own secrets, faults, or foibles, and he's failing miserably. Until, of course, he crosses paths with another YT Life Coach who's... well... more than a little sinister.

It's hard to even begin to describe the oddities (and complexities) of what happens next. It's not only absorbing, it really makes you think and ask questions about your own behavior and motivations. That's a tall order for any film.

For VanderKaay to succeed to that level of significance with a 90-minute found footage horror is remarkable. Imagine the bounty if more people did this. We should be so lucky.