A unique, almost unclassifiable mixture of ghost story and poetic mood piece, writer/director Steven Peros's FOOTPRINTS opens on a dazed young woman (Sybil Temtchine) who comes to her senses in the forecourt of the Chinese Theater, then follows her as she wanders up and down the boulevard trying to piece together who she is, how she got there and what her future might be. Besides the Chinese, the film touches on many familiar landmarks (to Angelenos, at least) of the real, geographical Hollywood: the Egyptian Theatre, Hollywood Book & Poster Company, the Scientology Center, tour guides and street performers. In that sense FOOTPRINTS is very much a movie about the actual Hollywood, a gaudy and more than slightly seedy neighborhood where people live and work. Peros shows a real knowledge and affection for the neighborhood: you can almost smell the exhaust coming off the boulevard and hear the sounds of people jostling and hawking up and down the street.
On a deeper level, though, FOOTPRINTS is about the Myth of Hollywood, the dreams and delusions that young hopefuls bring there. Dreams that sustain them through years of rejection and disappointment, and dreams that in the end can break them. In an extremely savvy bit of casting, Peros draws on two Hollywood survivors -- actor H.M. Wynant (a familiar face to fans of classic 1950's and 1960's TV from appearances in "The Wild Wild West," "Playhouse 90," "Perry Mason" and many others) and actress Pippa Scott (THE SEARCHERS, AUNTIE MAME, "The Virginian") -- to play key roles in the story. Wynant and Scott both lend a quiet grace and rueful charm to their parts, and when they talk about Hollywood you get the sense it comes from a lifetime of hard experience.
It's not too much of a stretch to compare the film to THE WIZARD OF OZ, with Temtchine's lost, amnesiac lead character standing in for Dorothy as she wakes up in a strange wonderland filled with sometimes helpful, sometimes sinister characters, and trying desperately to find her way "home," wherever that may be. FOOTPRINTS is also a ghost story of sorts (although definitely not a horror film) -- and especially in an indie film world too often filled with overly literal, kitchen-sink dramas, it's really refreshing to see an independent film that's as poetic and haunting as this one is.
