City, Friends & Sex

Splendor is a much different film than you'd expect from writer/director Greg Arakki's previous work. It stays away from the stylistic and linguistic tendencies that plagued both "The Doom Generation" and "Nowhere". Visually, the film is also much more conventional, adding to a slightly strange, but by no means bizarre plot line. It's the story of Veronica, featuring a fine performance by Kathleen Robertson, who has fallen in love with two different men. She somehow manages to keep them apart, and then eventually, to get them to like each other. Together they form a triple, as opposed to a couple. It seems a bit of a stretch to assume that this complex relationship would work, that the two would be willing to share her as a girlfriend, and that they would all be able to live together in seeming harmony. The problem, is that the two different men soon become crude characterizations, rather than flesh and blood people that we could care about. They seem rather pathetic at times, and things get complicated when yet another man enters Veronica's life, offering stability and desiring a relationship with her. Despite the obvious nods to Three's Company, and the sometimes funny scenes that Arakki conjures up, the film is simply not exciting enough to hold our interest in these characters, the writing is not bold enough to grab out attention, and the film isn't nearly as erotic as its set up would suggest. All in all, it's an okay film from a director I usually don't like all that much, but it's definitely not what you're expecting from an Arakki film (which doesn't necessarily mean that it's any better for its difference)