I liked Small Pond for the lightness of its portrayals and the directness of its intentions, and I think it succeeds on its own terms as a character-driven comedy. But in its lightness and its directness it also scores some additional victories by distinguishing itself from some of the cliches of indie filmmaking, especially where inconspicuous people in fly-over states are concerned. I feel like a movie set in a small city and chronicling episodes in the lives of decent middle-class and lower middle-class people is a quiet revelation.
The opening sequence shows Kirsten’s (Hari Leigh) procession through the streets of Columbia, Missouri, and it will look more or less familiar to anyone who’s lived in a smallish city or relatively large town (of, say, approximately 100,000 people or fewer). Her leafy neighborhood appears to be adjacent to the downtown core and in any case is within a short walking distance of it, and the streets are sparsely populated by people she probably knows and at least one she definitely knows (Susan Burke). Her housemate Kate (Amy Seimetz) works in the same pizza joint, Shakespeare’s Pizza, and we sense that by the end of her shift she’s crossed paths with everyone who populates her daily routine and for all intents and purposes her whole life.
There are straws in the wind though and eventually Kirsten will be forced to decide if the pond is indeed too small. Some of the circumstances leading up to this denouement are entirely out of her hands, like the landlord’s decision to sell the house that she rents, and some are built up over time, like her frayed relationship with the increasingly put-upon Kate. The big variable and the event on which the third act turns is a result of sheer spur-of-the-moment stupidity. Every review I’ve read has rightly observed the actually shocking nature this ridiculous mishap, and although it is not a twist I do think signposting or describing it will do the filmmakers and viewers a disservice. I will say that it’s shocking because the scene otherwise plays out like an ordinary Friday night but it feels tonally consistent with the rest of the movie because as a terrible decision made in an instant — for someone like Kirsten, not a stranger to bad judgment — it rings true.
It is also the prelude to several moments of grimly amusing comedy. Kate knocks on her housemate’s bedroom door wanting to talk about whatever it was that happened: “Kirsten, open up… I can smell you. Okay, I’m kidding. Open up.” Although I feel like I would like Kate’s tasteless sense of humour, her timing here is itself comically bad. Kirsten’s return to Shakespeare’s Pizza has her cornered by onlookers, shocked at her baffling appearance, mouths gaping open, and although she feels defensive and persecuted, wanting only to escape, like a scene from Dawn of the Dead, these people are also her familiars and they insist they are genuinely concerned about her.
That sense of benevolence is what landed most strongly with me. Another critic made the point that this is no brooding indie film where unhappy people are locked in depressive lives, and it is true that Small Pond is refreshing in part because Kirsten and her peers are not haunted by soul-sickness, rage, or existential darkness. There are no creepers or sinister figures with dark secrets. Not even her landlord or her boss — ever the whipping posts for politicized filmmakers — are portrayed in a negative light. The one reminded Kirsten of her right of first refusal on the sale of the house and the other offered her a promotion that she turned down. Kirsten has a solidly middle-class aunt who seems willing to help within some decidedly reasonable limits.
Nor should we feel inclined to condescendingly view Kirsten and her circle as “loveable losers” because tens of millions of North Americans lead lives that resemble those of the ultimately decent characters depicted here. Some are happy with their lives, some less so, and Kirsten falls along the latter end of that spectrum. At the end we are given access to a dream in which Kirsten’s ambitions are realized and it is not meant to signal the dead-end horribleness of her life or the absurdity and impossibility of her modest hopes. Kirsten wakes up and smiles. This is a movie about unassuming moments of personal redemption and small slivers of optimism.
Tags: Amy Seimetz
root and anchor 