If the title sounds familiar, that’s because it is. SCRAP began in 2018 as a short film written by Vivian Kerr and directed by Leena Pendharker. Vivian Kerr also starred in the short. Fast forward to 2022 and SCRAP is now a feature film with Kerr stepping into the director’s chair as well as being writer, while again playing the role of Beth opposite Anthony Rapp who returns from the short to play Beth’s brother Ben.
Sibling films always provide good fuel for fodder and in this case, serve SCRAP quite well in many respects because of the various shared experiences of youth, shared traits, not to mention age differences, and sibling pecking orders. Those childhood dynamics tend to shape us once we move into adulthood, be it for better or for worse.
Losing their musician parents at an early age, Ben more or less raised Beth. Ben is now a successful franchise book writer (move over Tolkien and Martin), happily married, and together with his attorney wife Stacy, desperate to have a child and currently undergoing IVF for the second time. They are also caring for Beth’s five-year old daughter Birdy.
Beth, on the other hand, is living out of her car, parking in some rather nice Los Angeles neighborhoods, changing into her silk pajamas as she snuggles under a blanket in the backseat of her SUV. Her glove box holds her toilet paper while the side-pockets on the backseat doors hold toiletries. She brushes her teeth in the car and then spits out on the street. She showers and changes into “work” clothes at the local gym when she gets a call for a job interview. Her cell phone is her communication with the world as she awaits word on that one job interview (she doesn’t strike one as being too industrious when it comes to job hunting though), but more often than not we get a glance at a caller ID of “Do Not Answer”. Bill collectors, maybe? Passersby and residents bang on her car window telling her to move her car. No one wants the homeless in their neighborhood.
One call that she inadvertently takes is from Ben, calling to find out when she’ll be home as he’s under the impression she’s out of town for work. Birdy misses her mom and she has an upcoming birthday and dance recital. As we quickly learn, Ben has no idea that Beth is living in her car. She lies to him handily. And while Stacy is more than happy to have Birdy in their home, she believes Beth to be on drugs as the reason she left Birdy with them, and isn’t happy that Ben is so gullible when it comes to Beth, accusing him of enabling her with whatever her problems are.
Thanks to a frightening incident on the street during the night, Beth shows up at Ben’s door “earlier than expected”, wanting to stay for a couple of weeks while waiting for her new apartment. Playing the role of the working girl doing well in the world, Beth greets each day with a shower, stylish work attire, and a smile and heads out, but things just don’t sit right with anyone, especially when Beth fails to pick up Birdy from school, and we start to see the veneer crack and ultimately crumble, affecting everyone around her.
Buoying the old adage of “you can’t judge a book by its cover”, we see Beth’s facade play out on both sides of the coin. Showered, dressed, and made up, one would never know she is homeless. On the flip side, seeing her sleeping in her car and looking disheveled, one would never know that she was recently an account executive. Kerr excels in bringing this to our attention.
Kerr also excels in not only showing us the sibling dynamic, but thanks to strong chemistry between herself and Rapp, let’s us feel it. We feel the love between them, the “go get ‘em” encouragement, the youthful banter and loving insults of siblings that carry into adulthood. We also feel the shame and questioning doubt; Beth’s shame at hiding her situation from her brother, Ben’s questioning and doubting of his sister. And we see helping hands come from the most unexpected places if one is just willing to swallow some pride, admit the truth, and take that hand.
Another strong theme we see play out the idea of self-delusion, something that plagues both Ben and Beth, and to a lesser degree Stacy. Beth doesn’t face reality or adulthood. Ben deludes himself into thinking he’s still “raising” Beth (something she plays on). While Stacy believes it’s up to her to keep all the balls in the air and the train on the track and on time. It’s interesting to watch this play out with these three characters.
But it’s drawing out the cracking veneer with one foible after another that gets tedious, giving the sense Kerr was struggling to reach a “feature-length” film. Unfortunately, not only did she reach “feature-length”, she went beyond with a film that could easily be trimmed by at least ten to fifteen minutes. And some revelations come too far into the film when tedium is hitting hard. A tighter cut would clarify and give sharper focus to the themes of the film.
Standout, however, is Markus Mentzer’s cinematography. He keeps the visual tonal bandwidth light and bright and upbeat. Beyond that, Mentzer does amazing work shooting inside vehicles, something that is prevalent throughout the film, be it Beth sleeping in her car, driving in her car, backseat and front seat passenger coverages, etc. And he leaves ECU’s for little touches to remind us of the comforts of life even when that life is in a car. A strong visual aspect is the use of reflection in windows as well as the use of mirrors that provide not only a visual duality, but a metaphoric one as well. Extremely purposeful and well done.
But at the end of the day, it’s the strength of the cast and their performances that carry the film, most notably Kerr and Rapp when sharing the screen, and Rapp and Lana Parrilla as Ben and Stacy. Rapp and Parrilla bring so much depth to Ben and Stacy and their own personal struggle. Beyond heartfelt. Parrilla also gives us pause for reflection as a strong woman who wants it all, but can she have it all, or should she. She truly shines in the SCRAP’s third act. Julianna Layne is adorable as Birdy, so much so that I wish we had seen more of her and less of Kerr in her solo scenes as Beth. Brad Schmidt also provides a nice turn as Joshua, lending to some wonderful reactive character reveals. And Khleo Thomas is a real breath of fresh air as roller rink manager Marcus. I’ve been watching Thomas’ career since “Holes” and he never disappoints, but in SCRAP he delivers ebullient energy.
Although with a few foibles of its own, SCRAP is a scrappy little film, purposeful in its messages, boasts beautiful cinematography, and strong performances, and is more than worth a look. Don’t scrap SCRAP!
Written and Directed by Vivian Kerr
Cast: Vivian Kerr, Anthony Rapp, Lana Parrilla, Julianna Layne, Khleo Thomas, Brad Schmidt
SCRAP makes its World Premiere at Deauville International Film Festival on September 5th.
by debbie elias, 09/03/2022
