Review: Dinner in America
Blu-ray: Dinner in America (2020)
Written and directed by Adam Rehmeier and starring Kyle Gallner as Simon and Emily Skeggs as Patty, this seems to be tagged with the unfortunate ‘coming of age’ tag.
Nope. Couldn’t be further from John Hughes or any ‘angst tweenies find love’ film you’ve seen.
No, this is far better.
We first see Simon (angry, attractive, punk, angry, very attractive) going to some girl’s house for an excruciatingly painful dinner with her ‘typically American’ family. After getting abuse off all of them, and nearly getting caught shagging the mother, he sets fire to the house and runs away. Pretty punk huh?
One of Simon’s songs is called Dinner in America, and we see three sad and desperately uncomfortable middle class family dinners with three different families, Simon (always angry) being the focus at each one.
You see Simon is also John Q Public, the singer in a hot Punk band Psy Ops, he sells pills to make money to record and he won’t play with more popular bands to gain exposure. He IS punk. Little does Patty, the girl he just bumped into know, that this cross, strange young man she’s taken home, is her obsession. She’s been leaping about to his music and wanking to it for… well… ages. She takes a polaroid of every orgasm and along with her sticky pants, posts them to this unknown man…he wears a mask onstage.
It’s not just the boy meets girl thing that makes this such a great film, all the actors do a sterling job but the chemistry between Gallner and Skeggs is palpable.
Playing a young woman who perhaps has ADHD (but who is somewhere on the special needs spectram) Skeggs is instantly annoying, bouncy and daft, not understanding the most simple things and obviously the most innocent and naïve girl in town, Simon could crush her, use her, and spit her out. But what does he do? He falls for her, and she for him.
SPECIAL EDITION CONTENTS
- High Definition (1080p) Blu-ray presentation
- Original 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio
- Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
- Brand new audio commentary with director Adam Rehmeier, producers David Hunter and Ross Putnam and lead actors Kyle Gallner and Emily Skeggs
- Fantasia International Film Festival 2020 live-streamed Q&A with Adam Rehmeier, Emily Skeggs, Kyle Gallner, Ross Putman, and cinematographer Jean-Philippe Bernier hosted by Mitch Davis
- Pendance Film Festival 2021 live-streamed Q&A with Adam Rehmeier, Kyle Gallner and Emily Skeggs hosted by Robert Misovic
- Trailer
- Image gallery
- Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by John Pearson
FIRST PRESSING ONLY: Booklet featuring new writing by Michelle Swopes.
Review by Tina from a disc kindly supplied by Arrow Films via Fetch Publicity.