Black Bear is one of those movies, even considering its flaws and convolutions, that I can't help but admire for its ambition to play with story structure and screenwriting. It's an impressively topsy-turvy bit of metacinema that will keep you intrigued by strong performances and odd editing, even if you still aren't quite sure what happened when the credits roll. It's no Charlie Kaufman (nor is it really going for that level of eye-squinting headiness), but it's doing a lot with little material.
Written and directed by Lawrence Michael Levine, Black Bear tells the story of a film director, Allison (played by a characteristically dry and nonchalant Aubrey Plaza), who has hunkered down at a bed and breakfast—a remote cabin in the woods, home to pregnant couple Blair and Gabe (Sarah Gadon and Christopher Abbott, respectively)—to find "inspiration" for her next film.
Allison is much like Plaza's other characters: kind enough in passing (due more to indifference than anything else), and easy to talk to, but completely unconcerned with ruffling someone's feathers with her opinions if asked. Blair and Gabe are both immediately drawn to these qualities, yet are clearly not equipped to handle them once conversations get uncomfortable. As the three sit around the dinner table, it becomes apparent that Blair and Gabe have a lot of unresolved differences of opinion on important topics—how to raise kids, gender roles in the home, and the legitimacy of Gabe's professional music career. Tensions begin to rise between the couple, and as Allison gets dragged into their drama, the whole situation deteriorates from there. Jealousy, previously unspoken qualms, accusations of infidelity—is Allison trying to tempt Gabe away from Blair? Hard to say.
Shit hits the fan and trust is thrown out the window as the conversation explodes, and Levine takes us on a wild ride of paranoia and temptation before sticking a corkscrew into the whole thing and popping it open... and that's, like, the first third of the movie.
What ensues is a confusing redux of the previous scenario, only this time, it's hard to tell what is a diegetic piece of the original narrative, and what is merely one of Allison's films in the process of creation. Characters' roles are swapped, as is an actor, and suddenly it's hard to tell what is real or staged, current or past. I'd love to get more specific, but I think that would take some of the power out of Levine's creation—and I think that's worth preserving. Even the trailers don't really touch on this element of the film... and it's most of the film.
Tensions remain high between Allison, Blair, and Gabe (rather, the characters that were formerly Allison, Blair, and Gabe), but for ever-changing reasons. Turns out Allison is a lot to work with, but she isn't entirely without her reasons for being difficult. Emotional manipulation and deceit abound, but is it in the name of malice, or art? By the end of the emotionally exhausting but impressively performed climax, you may have more questions than answers, and the final shot doesn't show much interest in alleviating your confusion. But it's a worthwhile ride nonetheless, and feels somehow cathartic and repulsive at the same time in how it poses questions about inspiration and storytelling. I wouldn't call it incisive, but it is provocative in (mostly) the best way.
If you don't mind a head-scratcher, and would like to see Plaza knock this twist-on-typecasting out of the park, there's plenty to appreciate here. Levine is showing a strong grasp on inventive storytelling, and I'm eager to see him deal with something perhaps a little more concrete or fully formed. Black Bear is a ride all its own, but I have to imagine its building to something even greater, creatively.