Indy Film Fest - Kendra and Beth
Mumblecore dramedy rife with empathy, pop culture references.
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“Kendra and Beth” is a small, quirky, incisive, slice of life mumblecore dramedy chockablock with pop culture references. From this description alone you likely already know if this will be your bag or not, but it generally worked like gangbusters for me.
Beth (indie staple Kate Lyn Sheil) is a woman in her early 30s who still lives at home with her widowed, sickly mother Ada (Catherine Curtin, currently of Netflix’s “Stranger Things”) and her artist older brother Robbie (Whitmer Thomas). Beth is the only woman working in a Minneapolis-based sausage company’s warehouse alongside Beck (Phil Matarese, creator of HBO’s animated series “Animals.”) and Joe (Matt Bailey) where they report to their boss Mr. Talcott (Jon Gabrus, one of my favorite podcasters as a result of The ActionBoyz).
Beth has few, if any, friends until by happenstance she meets Kendra (Eleanore Pienta, “7 Chinese Brothers”). Kendra works as a waitress at a nearby Thai restaurant and is a far freer spirit than Beth. Beth, against her better judgment, invites Kendra over to her house for a family dinner. Kendra soon thereafter cozies up to Joe, which threatens the women’s burgeoning friendship as well as Beth’s employment.
“Kendra and Beth” is written, edited, produced and directed by Dean Peterson (“What Children Do”). It’s a simple story told with great economy (it’s a mere 86 minutes) and even greater empathy. These characters are often strange (Beth’s dead Dad’s head is frozen like Ted Williams’, Ada plans on following suit and has money allocated for her children to do the same; Robbie built a LEGO version of his father that sits at the head of the dinner table), but they’re never less than sympathetic. This sympathy is earned through the sensitive performances of Sheil, Curtin, Thomas and Matarese. Pienta’s Kendra is alternatingly fascinating and frustrating, but she’s never less than watchable.
As a teen of the 1990s, I got a real kick out of the pop culture references dropped throughout “Kendra and Beth.” Ada has an extensive VHS collection consisting only of Julia Roberts movies. Robbie watches “America’s Funniest Home Videos” around the clock and rocks a “Crimson Tide” crew baseball cap. Kendra chastises Beth for owning a Third Eye Blind CD … she actually owns three of ‘em.
“Kendra and Beth” is the sort of movie film festivals are made for. I laughed. I cried. I suspect you’ll do the same.