Director Gabrielle Muller’s Midwest-set drama “Crossroads of America” centers on a fragmented family in the aftermath of trauma. It’s a realistic, gritty depiction of marginalized lives and it features compelling performances from Kaye Tuckerman as Glenda, the mother who escapes into her persona as a psychic but still tries to hold it together; Natalia Ortonowska as Ellie, her eldest, who fights physical challenges; and Laura Sampson Hemingway, who wrote the screenplay, as troubled Sandy. The three headstrong women are offset by the endearing young son/brother Carlos (Mitchell Wray) who’s alternately coddled and neglected.
The movie opens with a wallop: Sandy comes home wasted followed by the police who arrest her for a drunk driving accident that, we later learn, has left Ellie paralyzed. Fast forward about a year and Sandy is floundering, trying to get through nursing school while making camcorder porn videos in the cramped bedroom she shares with Carlos. Angry and guilt ridden about her role in the accident and with stoic, wheelchair bound Ellie who now sleeps in the living room as a constant reminder of the pain she’s wrought, Sandy goes on drinking binges and takes brief refugee in the now empty house she used to live in with her late grandfather, Glenda’s father. This seems to be the root source of her trauma as Sandy suffers nightmares and flashbacks that opaquely hint at sexual abuse. These scenes are staged fantastically, in arty motifs which are in contrast to the raw, chaotic life in the ramshackle house. The shift in tone didn’t entirely work for me but it’s an impressively daring creative choice by Muller, working with cinematographer Alice Millar.
“Crossroads of America” is a showcase for notable young talent in front of and behind the camera. The film’s realistic and searing portrayal of physical, psychological and emotional struggle deserves an audience.