A Picture of You

An under-the-radar first feature with a great cast (incl. Teyonah Parris of "Chi- Raq," before she got famous for not getting an Oscar nom) and a pretty solid script. I felt like some of the indie atmospherics could have been cut to make room for a little backstory--maybe a line or two of not-too-obvious dialogue about what Kyle and Jen have been doing all their lives; do we ever find out what Professor Wu was a professor of, btw?

Still, I liked the way the relationship between the two squabbly sibs is fleshed out in all sorts of subtle ways--Jen makes an awkward joke about they're being "racially profiled" as the only two Asians in a rural diner; Kyle shows how much he admires his younger hipster sister by trying the same line on someone else, even after it bombs the first time... Other comedic touches are sparingly but skillfully applied. Big ups to Lucas Dixon, as Jen's doughy boyfriend, for one perfect line reading ("We should get pies that are really... good!"). Wait for it!

My one serious criticism--too bad that w/d J. P. Chan seems to have felt that the tension that sustains the wispy plot could only be resolved with a farcical "action" sequence that spoils the mood a bit (another reviewer mentioned "Scooby-Doo"; I was thinking "Goonies"). The rest of the film is charming and quite relatable. I was initially curious about "A Picture of You" because my bro and I went through a similar ordeal a couple of years ago, in a much less tidy house (didn't Prof. Wu even have an attic to fill up with useless crap?). Unlike a lot of crowd-funded indies that turn up on Netflix, this one has a real emotional core to it.