These
kids are probably perfect for each other. He’s an ex-con with anger management
issues. She’s on the run from gangster who thinks she owes him money. What
could go wrong, except everything in Gary Michael Schultz’s Vincent N Roxxy (trailer here), which opens this
Friday in select cities.
Vincent
(is anyone grown-up enough to have a surname in the movies anymore?) was
driving by when he saw Roxxy being attacked by a thug working for “Suga,” the
local loan-sharking drug dealer. Actually, he didn’t just happen to be in the neighborhood,
but that’s a detail to worry about later. Long story short, he hits the dude
with his car and she hits him with a brick. While making their getaway, the
recently released Vincent invites Roxxy to come crash at his family farm.
Initially, she passes, but a few weeks later, she shows up looking to lay low.
Naturally,
Roxxy immediately accepts a job working with Kate, the trampy girlfriend of
Vincent’s brother JC at a rough & tumble roadhouse. It’s the perfect place
to be, if you’re looking for trouble. Kate’s knuckle-dragging ex has plenty of
trouble to offer the Brothers X. Presumably, those other bad guys are also
still out there looking for them too.
There
is really no compelling reason for this film’s existence, but at least Schultz
earns credit for an ending that somewhat upends expectations, while delivering
some grindhouse style payback. If only there were more of that grunginess
earlier in the film. Nevertheless, it should be stipulated Emile Hirsch and Zoë
Kravitz have a surprisingly pleasant rapport as the country mouse-city mouse
lovers. It is also somewhat refreshing to see their courtship last well past
the first act before they inevitably go all in. Plus, Emory Cohen has volatile
Ben Foster kind of thing going on as JC that works rather well for the film.
Unfortunately, the villains are just your basic redneck creeps and street gang
sociopaths.
