Review of LOL (2012) by Zoran S — 12 Sep 2008

Rare is the American independent film that has anything meaningful or observant to say about relationships. And so I was pleasantly surprised to see that LOL had more in common with the spirit of the films of John Cassavetes and his observant dissections of relationships instead of the drivel of the aforementioned films. No, I am not suggesting that Joe Swanberg is a filmmaker of Cassavetes's caliber. Rather, what I saying is that in LOL, Swanberg mainly limits himself to presenting a series of emotionally complicated and observant scenes about relationships. In other words, instead of a detailed plot, the film is content to drift through a series of scenes that aim simply to obverse.

In particular, Swanberg observes how men of a certain generation (in their late 20's and early 30's) use technology as an escape from engaging with their relationships. While this is not a terribly original insight, it does produce some wonderful, funny, and sad scenes: the awkwardness of phone sex, preferring to surf the internet to watching your girlfriend undress and change in front of you, and in general the obsessive need to check your email rather than engaging with the people around you. I found myself laughing at many of these scenes early in the film, but became distraught by them eventually as the characters merely repeated their awkwardness and obsessions.

Most people, I imagine, would be bored by the film's repetitions and moreover its rather "cheap" looking digital video aesthetic. However, I felt that the look of the film was appropriate for the subject matter. Most scenes are shot in awkwardly framed close-ups without clear establishing shots beforehand. The effect is to produce a form of abstract intimacy (or paradoxically a "distant" intimacy) with the characters in the film. Somehow this mirrors the relationships in the film: the men and women in the film, in other words, who are in intimate relationships and are also totally distant from one and another.

LOL is no masterpiece to be sure. In fact, I hated certain parts with a passion. The footage of people making funny noises seems more appropriate to the crappy world of Miranda July instead of the rest of the film. Still, the film has an emotional complexity and intelligence to it that is lacking in most recent American independent cinema.