Heather Graham and Jeremy Sisto star in this ambitious and surprising film. Broken resembles a medieval morality play brought forward to the 21st century, and tells the story of choices that can break a person on the life path, in this case becoming a singer/songwriter in Los Angeles.
Broken is told in an episodic manner, without a fixed timeline, and with a flexible reality. All the viewer knows for certain is that Hope (Heather Graham) has left her Ohio home to seek a career in the big time of Los Angeles, and has been thrown off track. We see her seduced (in a dreamlike beach setting) into attaching herself to Will (Jeremy Sisto) who makes her life a meaningless existence of drug abuse.
Is Will a real person, or is he Hope’s own Will that she listens to, follows, and then discovers has led her the wrong way? Her strong will might have served her in attaining her goal of musicianship, but she allowed him/it to lead her into drugs and freeze her movement forward.
Hope is seen working in the present as a waitress in an end of the road diner The Blue Star, and with each encounter of a customer she has a flash-back or a revelation about an element in her journey. Like the medieval morality plays, Hope represents an “everyman” and each of the characters that demand her “service” is an embodiment of of the seven deadly sins, greed, lust, sloth, gluttony, envy, pride and wrath.
In the flashbacks and dream/surreal scenes the audience is witness to how Hope has dealt with these sins in her own life. Other figures in the diner can be correlated to reason, and wisdom, and give Hope strength at odd moments. The movie suffers from a lack of explanation…it would not have to be a long process, but just a bit more set up to let the audience know that the drama may only be in Hope’s mind as she deals with addiction, denying or removing the temptations that beset her life.
This movie is rated R, and is presented in widescreen format with English closed captions and Spanish subtitles. The running time is approximately 97 minutes. Heather Graham does an excellent job of portraying the hopeful innocent starting out, the lethargic druggie loser, and the world-weary but determined waitress.
Bits of philosophy crop up in the dialog at surprising moments, and without thought, can seem trite or just silly. A little tweaking of the script to clue in the audience would have made a world of difference.
Broken is now available at Amazon . As of yet, there is not a release date for the UK. Visit the DVD database for more information.
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