Palo Alto Weekly
Fledgling screenwriter/directors often dream up intriguing concepts that more often than not lose something in the translation. When concept and story cleanly unite, the results are immensely satisfying. Such is the case with High Art, a seductive tale of the struggle for love and the pain of rehabilitation.
Syd (Radha Mitchell) is an assistant editor at the hip photo magazine Frame. Despite the long hours and ambitious notions, she's still on the fringe. A leaky apartment ceiling leads to a chance encounter with a reclusive neighbor, Lucy Berliner (Ally Sheedy). Seems Berliner was a celebrated photographer who abruptly dropped out of the art scene 10 years earlier. Syd is enchanted by Lucy's work, and curiously attracted to Lucy's lesbianism and co-dependent relationship with a heroin-addicted German actress. Syd convinces Lucy to jump-start her career again, but passion and professionalism clash in a series of dramatic circumstances.
This is a surprisingly accomplished project for young writer/director Lisa Cholodenko. The story is chock full of small subtleties that loom large; the rekindling of Lucy's long dormant ambition, Syd's urgency to succeed, a yearning and complex romance, and the wasted energies of heroin addiction. Sheedy is remarkably unlike the actress of her Brat-Pack days; she performs with a forceful desperation that is mesmerizing. Mitchell is a divine combination of sexuality and innocence, and her spiritual awakening is intensely erotic. Just when the story risks being bogged down by scenes of strung out addicts doing their thing (as did Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas), it redeems itself by cutting a new dramatic corner. Photography is stark, and the bold colors are reminiscent of early Pedro Almodovar work. Tragedy, comedy, love and sex. You can't ask for more than that.
