Rating: NN
Suspicious River has been sitting on the shelf for a year and half, and after seeing it you’ll understand why. It’s not a poorly made film, just relentlessly depressing and ultimately distressing. Molly Parker stars as the unhappily married Leila, who works at a motel where she supplements her income by having sex with the male customers. The macho Gary (Callum Keith Rennie) shows up, and even though the sex gets a little rough, she sees him as her saviour. Leila’s life gets very ugly when he turns out to be a devil. Parker gives a gutsy performance and Stopkewich pushes her to the limit, asking her to portray a woman who’s used, abused and on a certain level needs to be degraded to feel alive. Parker’s hollow stare haunts us, but what does it all mean? Stopkewich avoids giving us even a partial explanation for Leila’s self-destructiveness, and that makes Suspicious River hard to stomach. 92 minutes.