Blake Robbins
“THE SUBLIME AND BEAUTIFUL” My rating: B (Opening Oct. 24 at the Screenland Crown Center)
91 minutes | No MPAA rating
The Lawrence-lensed “The Sublime and Beautiful” is a home-grown art film, funded through Kickstarter and exuding the sort of downbeat but classy aura that wows ‘em on the festival circuit (where the film has picked up several awards) if not at the multiplex.
This first writing/directing effort from veteran actor Blake Robbins (TV’s “The Office”), who also stars, is what you might call a transcendent tragedy.
The film’s first 20 minutes depict an average day in the lives of Dave (Robbins) and Kelly (Laura Kirk) and their three kids, who range in age from toddler to tweener.
In a scene of lively chaos the kids are bundled off to school. There’s talk of Christmas wish lists.
At the university where he teaches, Dave — burly, balding, bearded — grades semester finals and gently rejects the offer of a pretty student willing to trade sex for a passing grade.
It’s pretty much a study in normalcy with Dave as our smart, likable, decent protagonist.
Laura Kirk
But that night, while his family is at a Christmas party, Dave meets his graduate assistant (Nastasia Barnova) in a local bar. It becomes all too clear that the family man has been cheating.
“The Sublime and Beautiful” turns incredibly dark when Kelly and the kids are involved in a collision with a drunk driver. Kelly is injured, the children killed.
Many a filmmaker would use such a setup as a springboard for histrionics, big acting, or perhaps even revenge drama. Robbins goes the other direction, quietly depicting internalized grief.
“Sublime…” is a model of dramatic efficiency. Robbins tells his story more through observation than through dialogue.
This low-keyed approach has big payoffs when the film does kick into high dramatic gear, as when Kelly, pushed to the edge by the sympathetic looks and comforting hugs she receives at a faculty holiday gathering, loudly announces: “Woman with dead kids walking out this f**king door!”
While it toys with melodrama — Dave considers suicide and begins staking out the home of the drunk driver (Armin Shimmerman, the alien trader Quark in the “Star Trek”
franchise) — Robbins wisely holds his cards tight to his chest.
The result is a film that gets under your skin.
|Robert W. Butler
Butler's Cinema Scene 
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