I wish I could say nice things about this film, as it was made in home state. But, in all honestly, I can't. From the filmed-through-the-bottom-of-a-beer-bottle cinematography (I guess that's supposed to be the haze of nostalgia, but it just makes everything blurry and orange-ish); the cheezy, tinny piano noodlings that barely pass for a score (like something out of a bad silent film); the painfully awkward, overly earnest, just plain bad writing (WAY too many backstory speeches of the "It's too bad he's that way because of this terrible thing that happened in his past, blah, blah, blah"-variety); a genuinely obnoxious performance by lead Chris Rydell (it's really difficult to identify with a protagonist who spends the entire film sulking and acting like a complete a**hole), though he seems tolerable compared to Karen Black's astoundingly shrill, utterly unbelievable portrayal of Aunt Zelma (Selma?); all the totally non-period hairstyles (especially sad in light of the fact that there was obviously some effort put into making the rest of the production design authentic) - alright, I'll put a cork in it. Suffice to say that this is a deservedly obscure, poorly made film that you should NOT seek out at your local video emporium.
Review of Dixie Lanes
