Review: One Night Only
Uncertain Terms | Nathan Silver | USA | 2014 | 75 min
Micro-Wave Cinema Series, 4070 Vilas Hall, Sunday, April 26, 7pm»
To those of you who enjoyed Stinking Heaven at the Wisconsin Film Festival a couple of weeks ago, you now have another chance to catch a film by Nathan Silver on the big screen, thanks to the Micro-Wave Cinema Series. Uncertain Terms, the film Silver made immediately prior to Stinking Heaven, will be showing this Sunday. To those of you who aren’t familiar with Silver’s work, Uncertain Terms is a great place to start. To those of you who are, this film further delivers on his ever-increasing promise as one of America’s great new indie filmmakers.
The film begins with Robbie (David Dahlbohm) getting away from the city, in an effort to evade the frequent ringing of his phone and the reason behind all those calls, which is initially unclear. He ends up at his aunt’s house (his aunt played by the simply sublime Cindy Silver), a secluded home in the country that she manages as a refuge for seemingly wayward pregnant teens. As Robbie interacts with the women in the house, everyone’s lives inevitably get more complicated, as the film heads toward a rather unexpected conclusion.
When it comes to story, Uncertain Terms falls right into place with Silver’s other features (Stinking Heaven, Exit Elena, Soft in the Head) as a tale of misfit domesticity and what happens when a new human element is introduced to that home situation and upsets the established order. This film is also no different with respect to its characters and its acting: both feel quite natural. I’m not sure how much improvisation went on during the shooting of this film, but if his other work is any indication, I would say quite a bit. Both Silver and the actors have incredibly sharp instincts for shaping these performances, which are sometimes heightened but never mannered. I came away from Stinking Heaven thinking of its characters as very complex forces, and how compelling the emotional physics of their interactions were. Albeit in a quieter way, the emotional physics of Uncertain Terms are equally as compelling. Perhaps here more than his other movies, we get an excellent sense of the radius in which these characters move and live. Characters aren’t about to take a long road trip in these films, even if they could. A short, head-clearing drive is as much as they can hope for. Their emotional states fence them in from any greater escape, and Silver conveys this in a very palpable way.
Particularly for those of you who know Silver through Stinking Heaven, the aesthetic of Uncertain Terms may come as a surprise. Stinking Heaven’s gritty home video look and 1.33 aspect ratio have more in common with Exit Elena, whereas Uncertain Terms is in 2.35 and looks serenely polished by comparison. Silver seems to move between 1.33 and 2.35 (which he also used in Soft in the Head), and he does so with expertise in both. Silver and cinematographer/editor Cody Stokes start the film with a well-staged and relaxed long take of one of the girls walking, with a surprising reveal of her pregnant figure before cutting to the next shot. It is a beautiful, assured composition—one of many found in this film. The impact of the cutting in this scene and throughout the film is outstanding, even with (and sometimes because of) its deliberately clipped feel.
Late in the film, there comes a shot staged from Robbie’s POV as he is driving down a road. Most shots of this ilk would focus on the road. Silver and Stokes instead choos to focus on the dirty windshield and keep the road itself out of focus. It’s a brief yet pivotal moment in the film. In a more mainstream film, that shot would have been focused on the road ahead, the crystal-clear possibility of it. Silver’s film gives us that road ahead, but reminds us of the spotty vision through which we sometimes see it.
As with its title, Uncertain Terms is dense with meaning, but not heavy with pretention. It is the work of a director with a distinctive style and articulate voice, and it is exactly the kind of work Micro-Wave exists to provide the filmgoers of Madison. As with all Micro-Wave screenings, the filmmaker will be present—via Skype in this instance—to conduct a Q&A after the screening. So, whether you liked Stinking Heaven and want more, or if you are in search of the burgeoning best in American indie cinema, Micro-Wave Cinema is the place to be, folks.