Summary
A queer coming-of-age tale that uses a love of cinema and a decent dose of irreverence to tell a deeply personal story.
Cast your mind back to a time when US and Russian tensions ran high, aggressively conservative economic policy ruled the day, and the Soviets were openly homophobic in their politics. Ok, there are some parallels between now and the 1980s, but it’s the lived experience of Wes Hurley — who recently produced the documentary Yes I Am narrated by Zachary Quinto — that informs this charming new release.
Using the heightened language of cinema and bright lights of theatre, Hurley reimagines his childhood in Vladivostok in 1985. Kids sit around in what looks like a demilitarised zone recapping the plot of Total Recall to each other, while the parents relay their pirated viewing of Pretty Woman. (“I wish I was a hooker in America” might be one of the more memorable lines from the sequence).
Relating to the world through cinema evokes shades of Cinema Paradiso, told by way of A Christmas Story‘s unreliable narrative memory. “Our lives are like Russian movies,” wannabe filmmaker Potato (newcomer Hersh Powers) laments. “Nothing ever happens.” Yet things do happen: Potato’s mother Lena (Sera Barbieri) works as a doctor in a prison, witnessing atrocities she must cover up under protest. A renegade third television station plays American movies, signalling a literal change in the air. Potato starts feeling sexually attracted to men, but is surrounded by classmates who are fiercely homophobic and anti-Semetic in line with state dictums.
Hope comes in the form a radical shift, both in location and storytelling. By way of a musical sequence that combines the Virgin Mary with Miss America, the suddenly heavily accented Lena (now played by Marya Sea Kaminski) marries American John (Dan Lauria) and moves to the US. The disconnect between the film’s two halves relays the culture shock of Potato (now played by the older Tyler Bocock) struggling with identity, not only as a closeted gay man but with the expectations of what a ‘Russian’ should be in an American classroom. Unsurprisingly, Potato finds solidarity in cinema — in this case, Greg Araki’s The Living End — while living under the constant threat of his conservative stepfather finding out.
Filled with comic misunderstanding and heartfelt series of internalised imagery, Hurley’s queer coming-of-age story doesn’t mind delving into the absurd and the sexy in equal measure. Jesus Christ is an easily bored housemate, for example, while the back half of the film shows Potato picking up numerous men after learning his accent is a drawcard.
If POTATO DREAMS stumbles, it’s during a third act reveal: it may hold true to Hurley’s own experiences, but it’s presented in a way that feels like a deus ex machina at best, and a throwaway transgender plot device at worse. It’s a minor quibble in a film that is not afraid to break the fourth wall, be deeply personal and celebrate diversity in all of its forms.
2021 | USA | DIRECTOR: Wes Hurley | WRITERS: Wes Hurley | CAST: Tyler Bocock, Marya Sea Kaminski, Dan Lauria, Hersh Powers, Sara Barbieri | DISTRIBUTOR: Creative Capital, Falco Ink, SXSW 2021 | RUNNING TIME: 95 minutes | RELEASE DATE: 16-20 March 2021 (USA)
