New York reporter Diana Sullivan travels with her drug-addicted teenage daughter Grace to the swamps of Louisiana to write a story about the descendants of Joe, the late brother of her grandfather. Diana is shocked when she meets Joe’s widow Ruth, who married him when she was 12, and lives in a desolate shack, ruling over her grown up kids with an iron fist: she locked up Tommy in a cage for misbehaving; Mark catches fish and lives with his pregnant wife Candy; Paul is mentally disabled, whereas Mike left the place and works in a striptease bar in the local town. When Mark is attacked at night in his boat, Diana and Ruth travel to the city to report the incident to the Sheriff. In their absence, a bored Grace gives cocaine to Mark, who attempts to rape her, so she flees on a boat. Diana finds her and they leave, Diana a little bit stricter; and Ruth a little bit softer, while Mike returns to her shack.
A rare Golan-Globus production outside the action genre, and one of the more misleading titles ever, swamp drama “Shy People” seems almost like a more grounded, dramatic version of Craven’s “The Hills Have Eyes”, exploring a yin and yang difference between two families, one civilized, the other backward and regressive. In this edition, the wealthy New Yorker Diana (Jill Clayburg) becomes a symbol for liberalism, and the Louisiana resident Ruth (excellence in acting by the brilliant Barbara Hershey) a symbol for autocracy, alas the stage is set for a culture clash between these two worldviews. These two women mirror themselves as some sort of antipodes (both lost their husbands; both have grown problem-kids), try to understand each other, and will eventually adopt certain traits from each other: the movie explores both positive and negative sides of their worldviews, since Ruth is too authoritative and allergic to any kind of change (she threatens the pregnant wife of Mark, Candy, that she is not allowed to leave the property; Tommy is even locked up in a cage for disobedience), but is strong (when a snake shows up under Diana’s legs during a boat ride, Ruth just takes it and throws it into the river), whereas Diana has class and an open mind, but is too lenient and permissive (her daughter Grace takes cocaine). “Shy People” is a peculiar and odd film, not that well written, but well made and acted. It may even have a political subtext, depicting Ruth’s swamp shack as a variation of a dictator isolating a derelict community from the rest of the world and proclaiming it as their “paradise”. However, the film relies too much on allegory and symbolism, instead of also developing an interesting story on its own right, or displaying a more versatile movie language. The characters of Mike and Paul are unnecessary. While flawed and meandering, this is a quality made drama that has a vision and a purpose behind its crazy decisions.
Grade:++
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