A Slipping-Down Life

A hopeless loner in a bunny suit and the Jim Morrison of a middle-of-nowhere town become emotionally dependent on one another with the twisted help of self-mutilation in this surprisingly uplifting film by writer/director Toni Kalem. Based on an Anne Tyler novel, Lili Taylor co-stars as a helpless, miserable young woman with a dead-end amusement- park job who lives with her reclusive, widowed father. However, once she hears the screwball philosophies of a sultry-voiced third-rate rock star (Guy Pearce) on the radio, her low-grade life changes forever. The obsessed would-be groupie shifts her borderline psychosis into high gear by carving the singer’s name into her forehead with glass. While the down-on-his-luck musician uses this deranged stunt as a marketing strategy to promote his suffering image, Taylor’s character gains empowerment from being needed by her hero. Although the storyline is often far-fetched, the talented cast keeps this odd drama from slipping down into oblivion.