Black Bear

An incit­ing inci­dent is the plot point in a nar­ra­tive that sig­nals the dis­rup­tion of the sta­tus quo and typ­i­cal­ly sends the pro­tag­o­nist hurtling into the main action of the story.

In Lawrence Michael Levine’s new film, Black Bear, the incit­ing inci­dent would seem to be the pro­tag­o­nist, and the pre-exist­ing sta­tus quo is tricky to pin down. Plus, which char­ac­ter is even sup­posed to be the pro­tag­o­nist? This dis­ori­en­ta­tion is high­ly apt for a film that trades in decon­struc­tion, toy­ing with the mechan­ics of film­mak­ing, and con­stant­ly rearranges the ground beneath your feet.

First impres­sions seem to fol­low Alli­son (Aubrey Plaza), an indie film­mak­er who arrives at a ram­bling lake­side house for a writ­ing retreat in order to con­jure up inspi­ra­tion for her next movie. The house belongs to Blair (Sarah Gadon) and Gabe (Christo­pher Abbott) who are con­sid­er­ing start­ing a B&B and for whom friend-of-a-friend Alli­son is their first guest. With Blair preg­nant with their first child, their rela­tion­ship is already strained before the spiky and seduc­tive Alli­son appears in their midst.

Plaza’s per­for­mance, which ini­tial­ly weaponis­es her awk­ward charis­ma before requir­ing her to ful­ly let loose, is alone worth the price of admis­sion, but Abbott and Gadon are equal­ly excel­lent as the frac­tur­ing cou­ple who use the foil of their guest to prod at one another’s open wounds with expert pre­ci­sion and to stom­ach-churn­ing effect.

Plaza’s third wheel proves to be any­thing but, becom­ing active­ly involved in their dynam­ic, ril­ing up both Gabe and Blair in their own spe­cif­ic ways. One extend­ed scene tak­ing in din­ner and sub­se­quent drinks con­stant­ly repo­si­tions the trio as they dis­cuss and debate cre­ative process­es, pro­gres­sive pol­i­tics, and gen­der roles – open­ing and clos­ing hos­til­i­ties on var­i­ous fronts and over var­i­ous glass­es of wine.

It is in these per­fect­ly observed moments of social enmi­ty and psy­cho­log­i­cal needling that Black Bear is at its most assured and impres­sive, but it is the ambi­tious about-face it pulls out of the hat at the mid-point that will define how audi­ences respond. Avoid­ing spoil­ers as far as pos­si­ble, the slow-burn nar­ra­tive unrav­el­ling in the first half is just reach­ing a fever­ish apex when a reset but­ton of sorts is pressed and the three same actors, inhab­it­ing the same house, are sud­den­ly rearranged into a dif­fer­ent but no less prick­ly and manip­u­la­tive scenario.

In both instances the pres­ence of anoth­er woman dis­rupts the har­mo­ny of the exist­ing rela­tion­ship and, in both instances, the pre-exist­ing har­mo­ny of that rela­tion­ship is revealed as more or less illu­so­ry. The sec­ond half leans even fur­ther into the film­mak­ing milieu – replete with var­i­ous wit­ty asides for insid­ers – and it cen­tralis­es and makes overt ques­tions of con­trol and per­for­mance that were seams run­ning through the dra­ma previously.

Exact­ly who is ​‘direct­ing’ pro­ceed­ings in both sce­nar­ios allows for a con­tin­ued mys­tique that lends itself to sev­er­al pos­si­ble read­ings of what pre­cise­ly it is we’re see­ing – and view­ers’ enjoy­ment will large­ly hinge on how much they rel­ish unpick­ing the rid­dle. Quite whether all of these ele­ments coa­lesce, and how far the sec­ond half enhances the first, are sep­a­rate ques­tions entirely.

Black Bear is released dig­i­tal­ly on 23 April via Ver­ti­go Releas­ing.