USA,
1990, 90 min
Shown in 1991
CREDITS
- dir
-
Hal Hartley
- prod
-
Jerome Brownstein
- scr
-
Hal Hartley
- cam
-
Mike Spiller
- editor
-
Nick Gomez
- cast
-
Adrienne Shelly, Martin Donovan, Merritt Nelson, Edie Falco, John MacKay
- source
-
Fine Line Features
-
COMMENTS
Martin Donovan in person.
OTHER
Maria is an ordinary self-centered teenage brat, pregnant by her unloving quarterback boyfriend. On hearing of her pregnancy, her father drops dead. Disowned by her devastated mother, dumped by her lover and shunned by her friends, Maria wanders the streets and bumps into Matthew. A brooding appliance repairman with a hatred for television sets, Matthew has just lost his job and been driven from home by his abusive father, the meanest man in town. The two exiles fall in together and, after a shaky and untrusting start, set out on the adventure of becoming a normal, domestic, suburban couple. After The Unbelievable Truth became a sleeper hit last year, director Hal Hartley is back with another biting, provocative comedy of suburban middle America. As in the first film, this is an America riddled with violent, miraculous, hilarious and occasionally lifesaving accidents. Unlike the optimism of the pretty, wide compositions of The Unbelievable Truth, Trust is a much darker film, almost claustrophobically dominated by tight shots. Set in a landscape where philosophical bourbon-swilling nurses share the streets with confused grenade-wielding terrorists and lonely women plotting baby thefts from busy bus stops, and where parents torture and plot against their own children, Trust depicts a world in which the happy ending is a deception and a snare, where comedy cuts to the quick.
—Kay Armatage, Festival of Festivals
FACTOID #1
The Festival has screened many debuts, both short- and feature-length, by some of cinema’s most influential artists including Juan Antonio Bardem, Jane Campion, Roman Polanski, Melvin Van Peebles and Lina Wertmüller.
