One of the first feature films we (both Ethan and I) saw at Sundance 2011 was an "apocalyptic love story" titled Bellflower, named after the street it mostly takes place on in LA. It's written, directed by, and stars, Evan Glodell, who was also responsible for building props and vehicles in the film, including a Mad Max inspired flame-spitting car and homemade flamethrower. It's a story about a guy who meets a girl and their subsequent break-up but told through an apocalyptic and visually-stylistic lens, literally meaning they used homemade cameras and old lenses. Watch a video review that Peter from /Film, Ethan & I recorded below.

Here's a better description from the Sundance 2011 guide: Bellflower follows two friends who spend their time building flamethrowers and other weapons in the hope that a global apocalypse will occur and clear the runway for their imaginary gang, Mother Medusa, to reign supreme. While waiting for the destruction to commence, one of them meets a charismatic young woman and falls in love—hard. Quickly integrating into a new group of friends, they set off on a journey of betrayal, love, hate, and extreme violence more devastating than any of their apocalyptic fantasies. We'll be sure to let you know if it gets picked up for US distribution.

Bellflower is the movie equivalent of those GOP lawmakers who rail against homosexuality and keep rentboys on the side. It wants to be a movie about growing up and leaving behind childish concepts of masculinity, but it also wants to wallow in those childish concepts and have a fucking kick-ass car and an amazing flamethrower, and it wants to mostly sell those elements to you.

And therein lies the disconnect that kept me from really liking Bellflower. As a narrative it’s deeply flawed, which I could get over, but the thematic dissonance was impossible to get past for me. It’s a movie that pretends to be about one thing but is really about something completely different, and as a result its final conclusion feels fake and half-hearted and most of all like a cop out.

The film is about two friends who, without visible means of support, spend their days drinking and fantasizing about living in a post-apocalyptic world. Very specifically the post-apocalypse of The Road Warrior, where they hope to be as badass as Lord Humongous. They spend their time modding cars and building flamethrowers (again, despite having no visible means of support). One friend is unbelievably irritating and wimpy while the other is an annoying, destructive asshole, but at least he’s a lot of fun.

Things begin to change when the irritating friend, whose voice keeps cracking like Bobby Brady, meets a crazy girl at the local bar. She’s a bad wild girl, and together they do bad wild things, like drive from California to Texas just to eat at the most disgusting and filthy restaurant ever. It feels like this is probably supposed to be a destructive relationship, but since the guy has a car with a built in whiskey dispenser, destructive is probably a relative term. Watch Bellflower Movie Online

And then the movie kind of floats along there. Bellflower is certainly in no hurry to get anyplace, but when it gets to something dramatic – which I won’t reveal, but which culminates in a nasty motorcycle accident – the film suddenly and completely falls apart. Again, it’s hard to critique this part of the movie in a review since it’s the third act and is completely in spoiler territory, but I can say this: the film throws aside all character and sense in a way that’s stupid but also kind of brave… and then it steps away from the edge of the abyss and says ‘OK, maybe not,’ and thinks it’s clever.

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