Delayed Reaction: Sword of Trust

Premise: Four people get caught up in a plan to sell a sword to a collector that supposedly proves that the South won the war.

 

This movie is a nice slice of humanity, prone to meandering, and amounting to little, in a satisfying way. The four main characters are pretty hapless and none of them buy into the supposed stakes of the movie. That probably sounds harsher than I mean it to be. I don't think Lynn Shelton, cowriting and directing what turned out to be her final film, wanted this movie to amount to much. The point of the movie seems to be that life is full of setbacks, but that's OK. Marc Maron plays a pawn shop owner who, believe it or not, is pretty annoyed most of the time. Jon Bass works for him at the shop, although "work" is a generous description. He spends most of the day watching YouTube conspiracy videos and the rest of the time just generally annoying Maron. Jillian Bell thinks she's going to inherit her grandfather's house, but when she and her wife (Michaela Watkins) go to collect, it turns out, all that's been left to them is a sword from the Civil War along with some ramblings about how it was given when General Sherman surrendered to the South. Bell and Watkins try to sell Maron on that story. None of them believe it's real, but they hatch a scheme to sell it to a buyer online who pays big money for "evidence" that the South really won the war.

 

They all end up way over their heads when the collector and his associates take this way more seriously than they do. The four leads essentially laugh their way through until shit hits the fan when it's too late for them to back away. And it all still ultimately ends up being meaningless.

 

I kept looking for something a little more resonant in the movie. Instead, it played a lot more like an IFC series than a movie. Like some cross between Maron and Lodge 49. I wanted to hang out in this movie rather than invest in the plot. That's a strength and a weakness of it.

 

If nothing else, it's a nice showcase for all the actors. They all play in their comfort zones really well. Maron in particular always ends up being a better actor in things than I expect. It helps that he doesn't exactly have to disappear into this role. Watkins I really liked too, playing something similar to her Casual character.

 

In the scheme of things, I'd rather watch a lightly humorous hang out movie like this than a lot of other indie movies that make abrupt dramatic turns because they think they have to. Sometimes it's nice to watch a movie that's about nothing.

 

Verdict: Weakly Don't Recommend